Did the Canarsie Line (L) ever extend past Rockaway Parkway?

[n2cbo]

Did the Canarsie Line (L) ever extend past Rockaway Parkway? Looking at Google Earth, it looks like the ROW extended around a curve and continued out to E 95th between Aves J & K. Or am I just seeing things in my "old age"?

[pennsy]

Hi,

You really are going into ancient history at this point and we will have to go strictly by memory. I seem to remember the old three unit articulated MU units taking me down to a dead end which connected to a bus line that would get you to the Canarsie Pier, and some good fishing and some nice fishing boats. Does that sound familiar ?

The Canarsie line was one of my favorites since there were grade crossings whereby the third rail ended, the cars behind the lead car pushed the lead car across the intersection and it then picked up the third rail once again, now pulling the sections in the intersection, without a third rail, to cross the intersection. And so the train was able to get across the intersection, without power there, to continue on. The Physics teachers had a ball explaining how that worked.

[Trainmaster5]

The Canarsie Line did indeed go all the way to the waterfront at one time. The Google map shows the old surface route which used trolley wire from today's terminal via a surface route through private ROW. See nycsubway.org for more info and maps.

[RussNelson]

Yes, it went all the way down to the south/eastern end of Canarsie Rd. See here:
http://rutlandtrail.org/mapview.cgi?lat ... e=Historic
or here:
http://rutlandtrail.org/gmap.cgi?NYnC-brooklyn.ny.track
I see several other interesting things comparing the modern and historical maps:
That there was a trolley paralleling the Rockaway Branch, on Rockaway Pkwy, heading up Rockaway Avenue to Linden Blvd.
That the route of the Belt Parkway in this area is entirely on filled land.
That the bent section of Avenue D (nearly north/south) is a fossil road which used to go up to Linden Blvd.
That there used to be farms between Flatbush and Canarsie just 100 years ago.
That St. Jude Place is also the remains of a north/south road.

Alas, nysubway.org has been taken over by a domain name spammer.

[n2cbo]

Thanks, Also where was the old grade crossing?

[CHANGEATJAMAICA]

Though the memory is faint, I can recall as a youngster in the early '50's taking the Canarsie train to Rockaway Parkway and then transferring to a trolley that took me down circle down by the beach.
Best regards,
Rodger

[Allan]

.........

Alas, nysubway.org has been taken over by a domain name spammer.

You have the URL wrong - it is nycsubway.org. I just checked and it is working fine.

[RussNelson]

DOH! http://nycsubway.org/ Yep, it works. My bad. Sorry. Mea culpa.

[alchemist]

Farms in Canarsie? Yes, indeed! My great-great-grandfather, Ike Morris, was a dairy farmer out there. That's really ancient history!

[SwingMan]

How long ago was that? Thats a piece of history right there . Can someone post the areal view? Thanks! lirr415-Peter

[alchemist]

That would have been around the time of the Civil War. Sheesh, it was a while ago!

[MR. NIGHT TRAIN SHOW]

I have a friend whose father was a motorman on the Canarsie Line way back when. He showed me a newspaper article that his father became the one and only motorman to run a cow over that was crossing the tracks back in the farm days out there. I'm hoping to get a copy of that article and find a date for this.

[pennsy]

Hi All,

Not so unusual. Seems that horses as well got free and tangled with the Canarsie Line. I remember a horse getting electrocuted by contact with the third rail when it ran to avoid capture and a train. The Daily News ate the story up. The punch line; what was cooking ? And then came the name of the horse that got fried. It was a good looking horse too.

[BMTLines]

Yes - it originally ran all the way to Canarsie Pier - the three stations that no longer exist were at Flatlands Ave, Avenue L, and Canarsie

See Map

[Crabman1130]

Why on earth would they ever let that go?