The Montauk Cutoff is an abandoned railroad
right-of-way
Right of way is the legal right, established by grant from a landowner or long usage (i.e. by prescription), to pass along a specific route through property belonging to another.
A similar ''right of access'' also exists on land held by a gov ...
in
Long Island City
Long Island City (LIC) is a residential and commercial neighborhood on the extreme western tip of Queens, a borough in New York City. It is bordered by Astoria to the north; the East River to the west; New Calvary Cemetery in Sunnyside to the ...
,
Queens
Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
,
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
, that connected the
Long Island Rail Road
The Long Island Rail Road , often abbreviated as the LIRR, is a commuter rail system in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, stretching from Manhattan to the eastern tip of Suffolk County, New York, Suffolk Co ...
's
Main Line
Mainline, ''Main line'', or ''Main Line'' may refer to:
Transportation
Railway
* Main line (railway), the principal artery of a railway system
* Main line railway preservation, the practice of operating preserved trains on an operational railw ...
and
Lower Montauk Branch
The Montauk Branch is a rail line owned and operated by the Long Island Rail Road in the U.S. state of New York. The branch runs the length of Long Island, 115 miles (185 km) from Long Island City on the west to Montauk on the east. Ho ...
.
Route
The Montauk Cutoff is a
cutoff approximately one-third of a mile in length
and was double-tracked for its entire length.
It begins just west of
Sunnyside and
Arch Street Yards (), after which it runs west parallel to Skillman Avenue and passes over the tracks leading to the
East River Tunnel
The East River Tunnels are four single-track railroad passenger service tunnels that extend from the eastern end of Pennsylvania Station under 32nd and 33rd Streets in Manhattan and cross the East River to Long Island City in Queens. The tracks ...
s and
Hunterspoint Avenue.
It then runs elevated across several blocks in an industrial section of Long Island City,
before crossing the Cabin M Bridge ()
—a
swing bridge
A swing bridge (or swing span bridge) is a movable bridge that has as its primary structural support a vertical locating pin and support ring, usually at or near to its center of gravity, about which the swing span (turning span) can then pi ...
over
Dutch Kills—and meeting the
Montauk Branch
The Montauk Branch is a rail line owned and operated by the Long Island Rail Road in the U.S. state of New York. The branch runs the length of Long Island, 115 miles (185 km) from Long Island City on the west to Montauk on the east. How ...
immediately to the east of Dutch Kills Bridge at Blissville Yard ().
History of operation
The Montauk Cutoff received a charter for construction in 1907
and was likely completed in 1908.
It was originally constructed to allow trains from the Montauk Branch to directly access Sunnyside Yard,[ which was opened by the ]Pennsylvania Railroad
The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...
in 1910. Following its opening, the Montauk Cutoff was primarily used by freight train
Rail freight transport is the use of railroads and trains to transport cargo as opposed to human passengers.
A freight train, cargo train, or goods train is a group of freight cars (US) or goods wagons (International Union of Railways) haul ...
s; it was constructed contemporaneously with other freight connections in Queens, including the Hell Gate Line
The Hell Gate Line is the portion of Amtrak's high-speed Northeast Corridor between Harold Interlocking in Sunnyside, Queens and Shell Interlocking in New Rochelle, New York.
The first portion of the line was built by the Harlem River and ...
(which now also sees Amtrak
The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...
passenger service). On weekdays, the Montauk Cutoff was also used in lieu of a turntable
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
(in essence, as a wye track) to turn diesel locomotive
A diesel locomotive is a type of railway locomotive in which the prime mover is a diesel engine. Several types of diesel locomotives have been developed, differing mainly in the means by which mechanical power is conveyed to the driving whee ...
s in Long Island City – then the main terminus for non-electric trains, which are not allowed to enter the East River Tunnels and Penn Station Pennsylvania Station is a name applied by the Pennsylvania Railroad to several of its grand passenger terminals.
Pennsylvania Station or Penn Station may also refer to
Current train stations
* Baltimore Penn Station
* Pennsylvania Station (Cinc ...
. As there was no turntable at Long Island City, west-facing locomotives from westbound trains would run around the cutoff after the trains discharged their passengers; the turned locomotives could then pull eastbound trains later in the day.[
In the late 1990s, this practice was discontinued, as the LIRR's new diesel equipment (]EMD DE30AC and DM30AC
The EMD DE30AC and DM30AC are a class of 46 locomotives built between 1997–1999 by Electro-Motive Division in the Super Steel Plant in Schenectady, New York, for the Long Island Rail Road of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) in ...
locomotives and C3 coaches) included cab cars, which enable remote control of the locomotive from the opposite end of the train and eliminate the need to turn locomotives in daily operations.[ Between the 1970s and 1990s, freight traffic into Long Island City also decreased,][ and in the 1990s, the MTA ceased freight operations with the sale of the LIRR's freight division to the ]New York and Atlantic Railway
The New York and Atlantic Railway (NY&A) is a short line railroad formed in 1997 to provide freight service over the tracks of the Long Island Rail Road, a public commuter rail agency which had decided to privatize its freight operations. An af ...
. As a result, the Montauk Cutoff saw less use and began to fall into disrepair.[
]
Abandonment and possible reuse
The MTA has not used the Montauk Cutoff since its freight operations ended and the replacement of its diesel fleet—between 1989 and the late 1990s.[ Since then, the right-of-way has been overgrown and has seen ]graffiti
Graffiti (plural; singular ''graffiti'' or ''graffito'', the latter rarely used except in archeology) is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from s ...
, trespassers, homeless camps, and guerrilla gardening
Guerrilla gardening is the act of gardening – raising food, plants, or flowers – on land that the gardeners do not have the legal rights to cultivate, such as abandoned sites, areas that are not being cared for, or private property. It enco ...
.[ In 2013, some local residents obtained a lease from the MTA to use a part of the abandoned right-of-way as a ]community garden
A community garden is a piece of land gardened or cultivated by a group of people individually or collectively. Normally in community gardens, the land is divided into individual plots. Each individual gardener is responsible for their own plo ...
;[ it was first conceived in 2011 as a guerrilla garden and is still operative .]
In 2015, the MTA announced that it was decommissioning the Montauk Cutoff.[ It also announced that it was seeking concepts for reuse of the right-of-way.][ Some potential uses include an expanded garden, ]urban farm
Urban agriculture, urban farming, or urban gardening is the practice of cultivating, processing, and distributing food in or around urban areas. It encompasses a complex and diverse mix of food production activities, including fisheries and fo ...
, or a park resembling the High Line
The High Line is a elevated park, elevated linear park, greenway (landscape), greenway and rail trail created on a former New York Central Railroad spur on the West Side (Manhattan), west side of Manhattan in New York City. The High Line's ...
in Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
, though the MTA announced that it does not want to sell the structure, as it wants to keep open the possibility of reuse as transportation infrastructure.[ A part of the Montauk Cutoff was later demolished to expand yard space for the ]East Side Access
East Side Access (ESA) is a public works project in New York City that extended the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) from its Main Line in Queens into a new station under Grand Central Terminal on Manhattan's East Side. A project of the Metropol ...
project.
See also
* Rockaway Beach Branch
The Rockaway Beach Branch was a rail line owned and operated by the Long Island Rail Road in Queens, New York City, United States. The line left the Main Line at Whitepot Junction in Rego Park heading south via Ozone Park and across Jamaica ...
* Bay Ridge Branch
The Bay Ridge Branch is a rail line owned by the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) and operated by the New York and Atlantic Railway in New York City. It is the longest freight-only line of the LIRR, connecting the Montauk Branch and CSX Transporta ...
References
{{Long Island Rail Road
Closed railway lines in the United States
Long Island City
Long Island Rail Road
Rail freight transportation in New York City
Railroad cutoffs
Railroads on Long Island
Transportation in Queens, New York