New York and Putnam Railroad
Encyclopedia
The New York and Putnam Railroad (nicknamed Old Put) was the final name for a railroad line heading north from New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, between the Hudson River Railroad and the New York and Harlem Railroad
New York and Harlem Railroad
The New York and Harlem Railroad was one of the first railroads in the United States, and possibly also the world's first street railway. Designed by John Stephenson, it was opened in stages between 1832 and 1852 between Lower Manhattan to and beyond Harlem...
. It became part of the New York Central
New York Central Railroad
The New York Central Railroad , known simply as the New York Central in its publicity, was a railroad operating in the Northeastern United States...
system in 1894, was abandoned beginning in 1958, and has since been converted into a series of rail trails.
Early history: a route to Montreal
Harlem River
The Harlem River is a navigable tidal strait in New York City, USA that flows 8 miles between the Hudson River and the East River, separating the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx...
in New York north and northeast to Brewster. At Brewster connections were to be provided to the New York and Harlem Railroad
New York and Harlem Railroad
The New York and Harlem Railroad was one of the first railroads in the United States, and possibly also the world's first street railway. Designed by John Stephenson, it was opened in stages between 1832 and 1852 between Lower Manhattan to and beyond Harlem...
for travel north to Albany, and to the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad (completed 1881) east and northeast to Boston.
The New York, Boston and Northern Railway was formed on November 18, 1872 as a consolidation of the New York and Boston with two companies to the north — the Putnam and Dutchess Railroad and Dutchess and Columbia Railroad. The former was a plan for a line to split from the New York and Boston at Carmel and run north to a point about midway along the latter. The latter had opened in 1871, running from the Hudson River
Hudson River
The Hudson is a river that flows from north to south through eastern New York. The highest official source is at Lake Tear of the Clouds, on the slopes of Mount Marcy in the Adirondack Mountains. The river itself officially begins in Henderson Lake in Newcomb, New York...
northeast, north and east to the Connecticut
Connecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
state line. The Clove Branch Railroad, chartered 1868 and opened 1869, was to serve as a short connection between the two parts of the planned line.
The New York, Boston and Montreal Railway was organized January 21, 1873 as a renaming of the New York, Boston and Northern. It was to continue north to Chatham and then use the Harlem Extension Railroad into Vermont
Vermont
Vermont is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state ranks 43rd in land area, , and 45th in total area. Its population according to the 2010 census, 630,337, is the second smallest in the country, larger only than Wyoming. It is the only New England...
. However, the Panic of 1873
Panic of 1873
The Panic of 1873 triggered a severe international economic depression in both Europe and the United States that lasted until 1879, and even longer in some countries. The depression was known as the Great Depression until the 1930s, but is now known as the Long Depression...
hit and the leases and mergers were cancelled on December 1, 1873. Construction on the Putnam and Dutchess stopped, and the finished grading was never used; the Dutchess and Columbia Railroad later became part of the Central New England Railway
Central New England Railway
The Central New England Railway was a railroad from Hartford, Connecticut and Springfield, Massachusetts west across northern Connecticut and across the Hudson River on the Poughkeepsie Bridge to Maybrook, New York...
, the Harlem Extension Railroad became a part of the Rutland Railroad
Rutland Railroad
The Rutland Railway was a small railroad in the northeastern United States, primarily in the state of Vermont but extending into the state of New York. The earliest ancestor of the Rutland, the Rutland & Burlington Railroad, was chartered in 1843 by the state of Vermont to build between Rutland...
, and the Clove Branch Railroad was abandoned in 1898.
Reorganization and completion
The New York, Westchester and Putnam Railway was formed on July 3, 1877 as a reorganization, and was leased to the New York City and Northern Railroad, formed February 18, 1878, on March 1, 1878. The line finally opened under the original plan, ending at Brewster, in April 1881. That same year, the New York and New England RailroadNew York and New England Railroad
The New York and New England Railroad was a major railroad connecting southern New York state with Hartford, Connecticut, Providence, Rhode Island and Boston, Massachusetts. It operated from 1873 to 1893. Prior to 1873 it was known as the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad, which had been formed by...
opened to the north, using some of the grade originally built for the Putnam and Dutchess Railroad.
The West Side and Yonkers Railway was chartered July 21, 1879 and leased to the NYC&N on May 1, 1880, extending the line south across the Harlem River
Harlem River
The Harlem River is a navigable tidal strait in New York City, USA that flows 8 miles between the Hudson River and the East River, separating the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx...
to the northern terminal of the Ninth Avenue Elevated at 155th Street
155th Street (IRT Ninth Avenue Line)
155th Street was an elevated railway station in New York City which was in use from 1870 until 1958, serving as the north terminal of the Ninth Avenue Line from its opening until 1918 and then as a southern terminal of a surviving stub portion from 1940 until its closure.- History :The Ninth Avenue...
. It was merged into the NYC&N on July 16, 1887. Later, in the 1910s, the Interborough Rapid Transit Company
Interborough Rapid Transit Company
The Interborough Rapid Transit Company was the private operator of the original underground New York City Subway line that opened in 1904, as well as earlier elevated railways and additional rapid transit lines in New York City. The IRT was purchased by the City in June 1940...
would buy that section to extend the Elevated north into the Bronx
The Bronx
The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...
, cutting the Putnam back to Sedgwick Avenue.
The Yonkers Rapid Transit Railway was organized in 1879 and opened in 1888 as a branch from the Putnam at Van Cortlandt northwest to Yonkers. It was merged into the main company on November 11, 1887.
In 1881 the trestle
Trestle
A trestle is a rigid frame used as a support, especially referring to a bridge composed of a number of short spans supported by such frames. In the context of trestle bridges, each supporting frame is generally referred to as a bent...
at East View was bypassed by a longer loop without the weight restrictions of the trestle, which was removed in May 1883.
The Mahopac Falls Railroad was chartered and opened in 1884, a short branch of the Putnam from Baldwin Place to Mahopac Mines. The line north of Mahopac Falls was abandoned in 1902. The MFRR was merged into the main company on March 7, 1913.
The company was foreclosed on July 22, 1887 and sold on August 17, being reorganized on October 11 as the New York and Northern Railway.
New York Central control
The New York & Northern also failed, and on January 12, 1894 the New York and Putnam Railroad was organized by J. P. MorganJ. P. Morgan
John Pierpont Morgan was an American financier, banker and art collector who dominated corporate finance and industrial consolidation during his time. In 1892 Morgan arranged the merger of Edison General Electric and Thomson-Houston Electric Company to form General Electric...
to buy the line. The purchase was made on January 15, and the NY&P was leased to the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad on February 1. On March 7, 1913 the NY&P was merged into the NY&HR, becoming its Putnam Division. Passengers could transfer at High Bridge
Highbridge (Metro-North station)
The Highbridge Facility is a maintenance facility of the Metro-North Railroad in Bronx, New York City, United States. It is the third stop along the Hudson Line, and is for Metro-North employees only...
to the Hudson Division (the Spuyten Duyvil and Port Morris Railroad) to reach Grand Central Terminal
Grand Central Terminal
Grand Central Terminal —often incorrectly called Grand Central Station, or shortened to simply Grand Central—is a terminal station at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States...
or continue to the 155th Street terminal.
The southern part of the line, from Sedgwick Avenue (the terminal since the sale of the West Side & Yonkers trackage) to Van Cortlandt and the Yonkers Branch from Van Cortlandt to Getty Square, was electrified in 1926. This part of the line was sometimes treated as part of the NYC Electric Division.
The Mohansic Branch that came off at Yorktown Heights was abandoned before 1918. It was to serve a mental institution that was cancelled by Albany.
The first diesel locomotive
Diesel locomotive
A diesel locomotive is a type of railroad locomotive in which the prime mover is a diesel engine, a reciprocating engine operating on the Diesel cycle as invented by Dr. Rudolf Diesel...
passenger train in the U.S. ran on the Putnam on March 18, 1929.
In 1929, John D. Rockefeller, Jr.
John D. Rockefeller, Jr.
John Davison Rockefeller, Jr. was a major philanthropist and a pivotal member of the prominent Rockefeller family. He was the sole son among the five children of businessman and Standard Oil industrialist John D. Rockefeller and the father of the five famous Rockefeller brothers...
paid to have the railroad relocated out of his Pocantico Hills
Pocantico Hills, New York
Pocantico Hills is a hamlet in the town of Mount Pleasant, New York, northeast of the village of Sleepy Hollow and southwest of the village of Pleasantville. The area was originally settled by native Americans of the Wecquaesgeek tribes; "Pocantico" means "running between two hills," and the name...
property, eliminating four stations and creating one. The nearby village of East View was obliterated in order to build the new right-of-way. The railroad ran through Pocantico Hills until March 15, 1931, when the new route was opened.
Besides the regular Sedgwick Avenue–Brewster service, service also operated from Golden's Bridge
Golden's Bridge (Metro-North station)
The Golden's Bridge Metro-North Railroad station serves the residents of Goldens Bridge, New York via the Harlem Line. It is from Grand Central Terminal and the average travel time to Grand Central is one hour, nine minutes...
on the Harlem Division via a connecting branch to Lake Mahopac, and then over the Putnam Division to Brewster, where it returned to the Harlem Division. Trains taking this route were said to go "around the horn".
The stub of the Mahopac Mines branch was abandoned in 1931.
Declining ridership resulted in the abandonment of the Getty Square branch on June 30, 1943. Despite a fierce legal battle by Yonkers residents which reached the United States Supreme Court to save it, the line was scrapped in December 1944.
Lack of commuter parking along the main Putnam Division, and the necessity of transferring to reach Grand Central Terminal, doomed passenger service on the line. The last passenger train ran on the division on May 29, 1958. Service "around the horn" via the Harlem Division's Lake Mahopac Branch continued until April 2, 1959. Until 1962, when the old West Shore Railroad
West Shore Railroad
The West Shore Railroad was the final name of a railroad from Weehawken, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City, north along the west shore of the river to Albany, New York and then west to Buffalo...
was upgraded, the Putnam served oversize freight trains, due to the lack of tunnels on its line. Tracks between East View and Lake Mahopac were removed in 1962.
Penn Central, then Conrail
The NYC and the PRR merged to form Penn Central in 1968. The last freight movement over the northern part of the Putnam Division occurred in 1970. The southern end of the line remained strong until the closing of the A&PThe Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company
The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company, better known as A&P, is a supermarket and liquor store chain in the United States. Its supermarkets, which are under six different banners, are found in Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. A&P's liquor stores, known as...
warehouse in Elmsford in 1975. The decrease in traffic from Stauffer Chemical cut back the line to Chauncey by 1977. Conrail took over Penn Central operations in 1976, but had no plans for increasing business on what it called the "Putnam Industrial Track." Aside from occasional movements to Chauncey, the only revenue movements were to Stella D'Oro
Stella D'Oro
Stella D'oro is a brand of cookies and breadsticks owned by Lance Inc.. Stella D'oro means "star of gold" in Italian, and the cookies are inspired by Italian baking. Its products include breadsticks, Swiss Fudge and other cookies, biscotti, and their S-shaped breakfast treats.The Stella D'oro...
Bakery in the Bronx through the 1980s.
Metro-North uses the remaining stub at Marble Hill
Marble Hill (Metro-North station)
The Marble Hill Metro-North Railroad station serves the residents of the Marble Hill neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City via the Hudson Line and is one of four express stations on that line south of Croton–Harmon seeing most trains minus peak hour trains to/from Poughkeepsie...
("BN") for storage of maintenance of way and contractor's trains.
Since then, much of the right of way has been converted into the South County Trailway
South County Trailway
The South County Trailway is a long trail stretching from Van Cortlandt Park in The Bronx to Elmsford, New York. Construction started in the 1990s and was completed in 2011.- Bronx and Yonkers :...
, North County Trailway
North County Trailway
The North County Trailway is a paved bicycle and pedestrian path located primarily on right-of-way lands of the former Putnam Division of the New York Central Railroad. The Trailway runs , from the Putnam County border down to the Eastview section of southern Greenburgh, where it nears the South...
, and Putnam County Trailway
Putnam County Trailway
The Putnam County Trailway is a paved bicycle and pedestrian trail in Putnam County, New York. With few exceptions, it follows the former right-of-way of the New York and Putnam Railroad from the northern end of the North County Trailway at the Putnam County line in Somers north to Carmel, with a...
bike paths, respectively.
About ½ mile of the section abandoned in the 1931 Rockefeller rerouting is accessible from a trailhead alongside the Tarrytown Reservoir
Tarrytown Reservoir
The Tarrytown Reservoir is a storage reservoir in Tarrytown, New York. It was completed in 1897 by the City of Tarrytown as the city's main storage reservoir. The reservoir was formed by the Tarrytown Waterworks Dam which impounded a tributary of the Saw Mill River...
. It is trackless, unimproved grade; it can be traversed on foot to an empty stone trestle abutment
Abutment
An abutment is, generally, the point where two structures or objects meet. This word comes from the verb abut, which means adjoin or having common boundary. An abutment is an engineering term that describes a structure located at the ends of a bridge, where the bridge slab adjoins the approaching...
.
, a replica of the former Bryn Mawr Park station at the former Palmer Road grade crossing is in use as a grocery.
The abandoned station in Millwood
Millwood
-Places:Australia*Millwood, New South WalesCanada* Millwood High School, Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia* Millwood Junior School, Etobicoke, OntarioUnited Kingdom* Millwood, County Fermanagh, a townland in County Fermanagh, Northern IrelandUnited States...
is still standing although in June 2011, the Millwood Task Force formally requested that the New Castle town building inspector look at the station house at Station Place in Millwood to determine whether that structure is in violation of town law and should be demolished. The property’s owner, Leo Rota, in an interview said "if the town wants me to tear it down, I’ll tear it down. I’m not going to fight with them. I get a lot of requests about the station building. People seem to like it, but if people want me to tear it down, I don’t have any problem with that.”
The station in Briarcliff Manor was purchased by the village and converted into a public library
Public library
A public library is a library that is accessible by the public and is generally funded from public sources and operated by civil servants. There are five fundamental characteristics shared by public libraries...
. The station in Elmsford was converted
Adaptive reuse
Adaptive reuse refers to the process of reusing an old site or building for a purpose other than which it was built or designed for. Along with brownfield reclamation, adaptive reuse is seen by many as a key factor in land conservation and the reduction of urban sprawl...
into a restaurant. The Yorktown Heights station
Yorktown Heights Railroad Station
Yorktown Heights Railroad Station is a former railroad station on the Putnam Line in Yorktown Heights, New York, United States. It is a wooden building located on Commerce Street at the intersection of Underhill Avenue in Railroad Park....
had its exterior restored and is the centerpiece of the town park. The freight house in Baldwin Place and the station in Tilly Foster are on private property.
Station Listing
Main Line
- Sedgwick Avenue
- HighbridgeHighbridge (Metro-North station)The Highbridge Facility is a maintenance facility of the Metro-North Railroad in Bronx, New York City, United States. It is the third stop along the Hudson Line, and is for Metro-North employees only...
(shared with Hudson Division) - University HeightsUniversity Heights (Metro-North station)The University Heights Metro-North Railroad station serves residents of the University Heights neighborhood of the Bronx, New York City, via the Hudson Line. Trains leave for Manhattan every 25 to 35 minutes on weekdays...
(shared with Hudson Division) - Morris HeightsMorris Heights (Metro-North station)The Morris Heights Metro-North station serves the residents of the Morris Heights neighborhood of the Bronx, New York via the Hudson Line. Trains leave for New York City every 25 to 35 minutes during peak hours, and every hour at other times and on weekends...
(shared with Hudson Division) - Kings Bridge
- Van Cortlandt - 4.82 (junction with electrified Getty Square Branch)
- Lincoln - 6.52
- Dunwoodie - 8.09
- Bryn Mawr Park - 9.44
- Nepperhan - 10.50
- Gray Oaks - 11.92
- Nepera Park - 12.01
- Mount Hope - 13.02
- Chauncey - 13.86
- Ardsley - 14.72
- Woodlands
- Worthington - 16.60
- Elmsford - 18.14
- Beaver Hill
- Eastview - 20.41
- Graham - 23.92 (created by 1931 relocation)
- Briarcliff Manor - 27.04
- MillwoodMillwood (NYPRR Station)The Millwood Station, in New Castle, New York, was a station stop on the New York and Putnam Railroad which ended service in the 1960s. It is now bypassed by the North County Trailway, a rail trail. The station building still stands on the site, although in quite dilapidated condition, scheduled to...
- 30.44 - Kitchawan - 32.52
- Croton Lake - 33.57
- Croton Heights - 35.04
- Yorktown HeightsYorktown Heights Railroad StationYorktown Heights Railroad Station is a former railroad station on the Putnam Line in Yorktown Heights, New York, United States. It is a wooden building located on Commerce Street at the intersection of Underhill Avenue in Railroad Park....
- 36.76 (coach yard and engine service, connection to Mohansic Branch) - Amawalk - 37.94
- Granite Springs - 39.96
- Baldwin Place - 42.25 (connection to Mahopac Mines branch)
- Lake Mahopac - 44.38
- Mahopac - 45.13
- Crafts - 47.20
- Carmel - 49.58
- Tilly Foster - 51.84
- Putnam Junction - 53.82 (no station, connection with Harlem Division and yard)
- BrewsterBrewster (Metro-North station)The Brewster Metro-North Railroad station serves the residents of Brewster, New York via the Harlem Line. It is the southernmost station in Putnam County. Trains leave for New York City every hour, and about every 25 minutes during rush hour...
(connection to Harlem Division trains)
Getty Square Branch
abandoned 1943- Mosholu (abandoned 1926)
- Caryl
- Lowerre
- Park Hill
- Getty SquareGetty SquareGetty Square is a square in the downtown area of Yonkers, New York, United States of America. It is near the historic Philipse Manor, Saint John's Episcopal Church, the Yonkers rail station, and many shops and landmarks...
Former stations
closed 1929 as part of realignment- Tarrytown Heights
- Tower Hill
- Pocantico Hills
- Whiteons