Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1880-06-08
BORING UNDER BROADWAY.
a Project for SUbterraneah RGiIIuay
in NeIU York.
MAN VnrLr Gun /

New York Sun.
On Thursday, in the registers Office, was
filed map of the proposed Broadway I'm
derground railroad, with certificate of q
majority of the directors of the company in
corporated ON that day. Robert Sewell ap-
pears as president of the company, Mr.
James L. Ruggles as secretary, and the fol-
LOWING gentlemen are named as a majority
of the directors: Mess,s. Douglas Campbell,
Dewitt G. Brown, Henry Sheldon, james F.
Pierce, O. Vandenburgh, and Walter j.
Morris.
COL Origen Vandenburg CLAIMS to have
originated the idea OF an underground rail-
way between the upper and lower parts OF the
city some fifteen years ago, and the present
company holds the franchise of the company
then organized. The requirement of the
French capitalists, whom Col. Vandenburgh
has interested in the project, having been
complied with by the procurement OF an
authoritative legislative affirmation of the IN
impaired rights of the company transferred
by purchase 10 Col. Vandenburgh, he says
they will take all the bonds of the new COM
panv about to be formed which may be as
signed them to the full extent of $1O,OOO,-
600, if desired, upon terms which are deem
ed advantageous to the company. The main
subterranean line, which that company pur-
poses to commence the construction of i'm
mediatelv upon organization, is to run:
Commencing at the south ferry, extending
through the battery and battery place to
Broadway; thence up Broadway to the City
Hall park, on the easterly line of Broadway;
thence easterly, passing in front and in rear
of the old city hall to Centre street; under
and across Centre street to City Hall place;
through City Hall placs to Pearl street;
across Pearl street, northeasterly, in curved
line to or near Mulberry street, at point
between Bayard and Park streets; thence
northerly, under Mulberry street to Blocker
street, and continuing northerly to and under
Lafayette place to Aston place; northerly and
easterly under Astor place, Eighth street, and
across the southeast corner of the block be-
tween Eighth and Ninth streets, and easterly
of st. AIMS church to and under
Fourth avenue; northerly under Fourth
avenue and Fourteenth street and Fourth
avenue to and under Union square; northerly
under Union square to Seventeenth street
and Broadway, and under the latter to and
near and northerly of Ninetnenth street;
thence northerly, bearing easterly, IN
straight line to and under and across Twenty
third street, to and through Madison square,
and continuing northerly under, on, over and
upon Madison avenue, to and along the Har-
lem river. BY that latter divergence IN spe-
cification, "over and upon Madison avenue,
etc." it will be understood that 1t ID con-
templated that above Ninety ninth street the
road shall no longer be suOterranean, but an
elevated line, and in this latter way will be
continued along the Harlem river.
In connection with this main line are to
be two branches. One of tLese, commencing
under Broadway at the northerly line of
Eighteenth street, and continuing nOrtherly
under Broadway to Twentythitd street and
Fifth avenue, will extend thence under
Broad Way to the grand circle at the south
westerly corner of the Central park, and
thence by no1therly and westerly inclining
liue to point at about One Hundred and
Thirtie!h street on the North river. The
other branch line will run from the main
line at the City Hall park directly up Broad
way to Union square, where it will again
join the main line.
Walter J. Morris, q civil enginstr, who is at
the head of the mechanical part of the work,
said, yesterday: "All our plans are made; We
are ready to commence work at once, and
expect to do so in few days, just as soon as
the governor has signed the bill which has
been passed to satisfy foreign capitalists as
TO the legal right We have. We will break
ground at the City Hall park and work both
ways, for the main line will be prosecuted at
the same time as the branch, which is the
object of this first formed company. Our
estimate of the cost fixes it about $4,000, 900
per mile. In some places it will be less, but in
others, where we have to purchase private
property or overcome serious natural obsta-
nles, it may be more, so we name that as the
average. | do not think we will have any
very great engineering difficulties to contend
with. Below Fourteenth street We will have
no rock excavations, SO that there can be no
ground for tho pretended fears of inimical
property owners that weiwill shake their foun-
dations by blasting. Even if there were
rock the blasting can be done in q perfectly
safe way, as it was in the excavation recently
done for the Madison Square theatre, of
which people in the neighborhood were hard
ly aware while it was going on. The canal
or slough at Canal street will be crossed by
q water-tight tunnel covered with
asphalt, lined with a hydraulic &C.
ment, and supported on piling. We will
have two tunnels, side by side, each fifteen
by eighteen feet in their greatest diameters.
In some instances they will come within
three feet of the surface of the
street, but much more of the way they will
be sunk from six to eight feet below. Our
stations will be nearer together than those of
the elevated railway. Each will present
space twelve or fourteen feet wide and five
hundred feet long, besides the track, lighted
by electricity and made much more beauti-
full than any of the elevated stations are:
At Forty-seventh street we will probably
make connection with the Vanderbilt roads.
1t Is at present contemplated to make our
uniform rate five cents. People have pre-
indeed and mistaken ideas about
tunnels which We intend to reform entirely.
We will show them a tunnel as clean as
any room, in which the atmosphere will al
ways be pure where-owing to the uni
formity of temperature-the rails are laid
closely, so as to give an absolutely continu-
Gus and consequently noiseless track. Our
trains will move much more rapidly than do
those of the elevated roads, yet always with
perfect safety, and by simple device each
train will change the air of the tunnel, keep.
ing it always sweet and pure. There will be
no dirt, no smoke, no noise, no violet
changes of temperature, no possibility of &C
cident, and every car will be brilliantly
lighted. We expect to be in operation from
the South ferry to Forty seventh street with
in eighteen months. or at the most two
years.
The company is required to obtain the
consent of the Majority of the property
owners on its line to the construction of its
tunnel, or failing in this, the consent of the
eunreme court of the iudicial district