USA > New York > A short history of New York State > Part 59
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One of the first steps in the interest of better roads was taken by the League of American Wheelmen, a group of bicyclists. Organized in 1880, it carried on an incessant campaign for improved roads through its maga- zine, Good Roads, which had a wide circulation. In 1887 the legisla- ture enacted the "Liberty Bill" granting Wheelmen the right to use the highways. Bicycle paths were also authorized by local units of govern- ment.
During the 1890's the demand for better roads increased in volume and enlisted the support of many political spokesmen. The state government, however, took no important action prior to 1900. Only the counties ad- jacent to the larger cities, notably in the New York metropolitan area, actually constructed some hard-surfaced roads before the beginning of the twentieth century. Water-bound macadam and gravel were first used but soon gave way to bituminous macadam. Little or no effort was made in these early days to eliminate curves, to widen the roadways, or to cut down hills and knolls. The "improved roads" in the state in 1890 were merely the traditional roads with a hard surface.
But the increasing use of the motor vehicle made better roads im- perative. The table below, giving the number of motor registrations be- tween 1915 and 1955, indicates the phenomenal rise in the use of automo- biles.
553
FROM TOWPATH TO AIRWAY
Table 17. Motor vehicle registrations, 1915-1955, for passenger cars, buses, trucks .*
Year
New York
United States
1915
255,000
2,491,000
1920
676,000
9,239,000
1925
1,626,000
19,491,000
1930
2,308,000
26,532,000
1935
2,331,000
26,230,000
1940
2,743,000
32,025,000
1945
2,330,000
30,638,000
1950
3,693,000
48,557,000
1955
4,787,087
61,334,000
* These registrations include all types of motor vehicles other than motorcycles. Source: Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1951; State of New York, Depart- ment of Taxation and Finance, Bureau of Motor Vehicles. Motor Vehicle and Motor- cycle Registrations . . . for the Year 1955; Britannica Book of the Year, 1956.
In 1956 approximately 5,000,000 licenses were issued by the state. To accommodate this huge number of vehicles, the state has a complex road system of 103,000 miles ranging in quality from the Thruway, the landscaped parkways, and modern urban arterial routes to the dirt roads still untouched, at this writing, by the state's town-road improvement program, launched in 1950. When broken down into categories the state's highway mileage in the mid-1950's is roughly as follows:
Miles
State hard surfaced highways
14,000
Urban arterial roads
601
County roads
18,000
Town roads
54,000
Parkways
279
City streets
11,300
Village streets
3,800
Because of the scarcity of funds during the Depression of the 1930's, the scarcity of materials and manpower during World War II, and the phenomenal increase in automobile ownership since the war, many of the highways of the state are unequal to the present demands of traffic, which is now growing at the rate of 11 per cent annually. Moreover, many of the older state highways are in bad repair and must be rebuilt. In 1954 the State Temporary Commission on Highway Finance Planning proposed the expenditure of $2,886,200,000 for the next ten years. The greater part of this sum will be used for the improvement of 5,600 miles of state highways, 7,500 miles of county roads, 14,000 miles of town roads, 192 miles of parkways, and the elimination of 56 grade crossings. New
554
A SHORT HISTORY OF NEW YORK STATE
York's share of the $33,480,000,000 appropriated by Congress in the mid- 1950's for highway building totals $451,300,000.
To ease the situation, after several false starts a 427-mile toll pike known as the Thruway, between New York City and Buffalo, was built by the Thruway Authority. Most of the route was open to motorists by 1955. Spurs projected to New England and Massachusetts turnpikes, to Niagara Falls and the Pennsylvania state line from Buffalo, and to New Jersey's Turnpike and Garden State Parkway, will bring the total length of the Thruway to 564 miles. Paralleling the Hudson River to Albany and the route of the Erie Canal across the state, the Thruway and its connections,
0
25
50
75
100
MILES
Massena
Malone
Plattsburg
CANADA
& Potsdam
Ogdensburg
Saranac Lake
(37)
Wateriown
VT
LAKE
ONTARIO
N. Y. STATE THRUWAY
Oswega
Lake/ George
104
Rome
Saratoga Springs
Rochester
Schenectady
20
Auburn
(12)
20
RIE
16
14
Norwich I
E
(13
20
Watkins
11
Oneonta
N. Y. STATE THRUWAY
MASS
17
Olean
Carning
Binghamton,
(28)
Jamestown
Elmira
Kingston
PENNSYLVAN
A
1209
TACONIC PARKWAY
Port
Jervis
MAIN HIGHWAYS TODAY
Middletown
17
State parkways
State highways
NEW
JERSEY
LONG
U. S. highways
New York City
104
Niagara Falls
Batavia
Avon
Syracuse
Utica
Buffalo
Troy
19
15
Albony
Cortland
Ithaca
Glen
Westfield
Wellsville
9
Geneva
Cooperstown
Rouses Point!
Map 15. Main highways of New York State today. (By Harold K. Faye from Exploring New York by Wainger, Furman and Oagley, @ 1956 by Har- court, Brace and Company, Inc.)
555
FROM TOWPATH TO AIRWAY
when completed, will serve the most densely populated and the richest agricultural and industrial area of the state. Its long-range effects for business, industry, agriculture, and recreation may be even more revolu- tionary than were those of the canal and the railroad which preceded it.
Wholly apart from its social and economic aspects the Thruway rep- resents one of the most gigantic engineering feats in the history of the state. The Tappan Zee bridge across the Hudson between Tarrytown and South Nyack is a great engineering undertaking in itself. Four other major bridges and hundreds of small spans had to be built. Across Onondaga Lake Outlet, northwest of Syracuse, a three-span girder bridge of 450 feet was constructed; southwest of Rochester a 304-foot cantilever bridge spans the historic Genesee River. In the Herkimer area of the Mohawk Valley there are two more big bridges-one spans the New York Central Railroad tracks and U.S. Highway 5, and the second is over the Barge Canal and the Mohawk River. These bridges are, from the point of view of engineering, companion pieces to the beautiful George Washington Bridge, the vehicular tubes under the Hudson connecting New York and New Jersey, and the Triborough Bridge and the other remarkable en- gineering accomplishments which have done so much to transform the New York City metropolitan area.
In addition to the Thruway, Governors Lehman and Dewey proposed the construction of four superhighways to be integrated with the Thru- way and built to Thruway standards. These expressways, if built, will parallel existing routes for a distance of approximately eight hundred miles. Two of these will follow north-south routes. One will extend from the Thruway at Albany to the Canadian border at Rouses Point, parallel- ing Route 9 and serving Saratoga Springs, Glens Falls, Plattsburgh, and the Adirondack region. A second would extend from Binghamton and El- mira on the south to Syracuse. A third expressway would replace or parallel Route 17 between Harriman and Binghamton and thence westward to Dunkirk. The fourth would extend R. L from the New York City line sixty miles eastward to Riverhead, Long Island.
CONN
SLANDS
ATLANTIC
Access to Greater New York was made easier after World War I by a series of outstanding engineering feats. These included the stately George Washington Bridge over the Hudson from 180th Street to New Jersey. Designed by the architect Cass Gilbert and OCEAN completed in 1931, it is one of the longest suspension bridges in the world. The Triborough Bridge Author- ity, established as an independent self-supporting corporation in 1933, completed the four-span Triborough Bridge connecting the Bronx, Man- hattan, and Queens in 1937 and the beautiful Bronx Whitestone Bridge
556
A SHORT HISTORY OF NEW YORK STATE
farther up Long Island Sound in 1939. At the mid-twentieth century plans were under way to bridge the Narrows, thus connecting Brooklyn with Staten Island.
Robert Moses, one of the state's most distinguished public servants, as head of the Hendrick Hudson Parkway Authority completed the Henry Hudson Bridge at the northern tip of Manhattan in the 1930's. Also, under his direction, four-lane superhighways were built along the east and west sides of Manhattan and through the other boroughs to connect with parkways of Long Island and those extending northward and eastward through Westchester. The entrance of the Thruway into New York City also opened up a new and much-needed artery with the rest of the state.
To further increase the city's accessibility, three great vehicular tun- nels were built. The Holland Tunnel, commenced by the states of New York and New Jersey at the end of World War I and completed in 1927, connects lower Manhattan with Jersey City. The first of the three tubes of Lincoln Tunnel from New Jersey to midtown Manhattan was opened in 1937, the Queens-Midtown Tunnel to Long Island City in 1940, and the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel in 1949. Most of these tunnels and bridges are financed by tolls.
Flanked to the west and north by two of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River, bisected by the Barge Canal and the Hudson River, and terminating in the south with America's greatest harbor, New York State has an abundance of waterways which are among its richest commercial assets.
Between 1865 and 1914 the American merchant marine flourished on the Great Lakes and in the protected coasting trade but slumped badly on the high seas, where by 1914, the percentage of imports and exports carried under the American flag, on the basis of value of the world's cargo, had fallen to only 9.7. The reasons for this remarkable drop from approximately 75 per cent in the 1850's are to be attributed in part to a lag in American technological progress in shipbuilding and partly to the higher cost of building and operating ships under the American flag.
The coastal and intercoastal shipping of New York City grew tre- mendously during the last half of the nineteenth century.1 From Maine came spruce for piling, lime for industry, brownstone for new residences, granite for government buildings, ice for slaughterhouses. From the south- ern ports came shiploads of cotton, which New York City merchants dis- tributed in every direction. Anthracite coal came overland to the Jersey shore by rail, but most bituminous coal came by barge or collier from the
1 Coastal trade includes traffic movement between the state's ports (primarily the port of New York ) and other Atlantic ports. Intercoastal shipments cover trade with Gulf and Pacific ports and with territories and possessions of the United States.
557
FROM TOWPATH TO AIRWAY
coal ports of Virginia. Coastwise schooners and steamboats carried from the piers of Manhattan a wide assortment of merchandise to other coastal points along the Atlantic and the Gulf. The development of north-south rail lines attracted passengers and high-priced goods, but prior to 1900 the bulky products were mainly waterborne.
Steamships on Long Island Sound remained formidable competitors of the railroads throughout the nineteenth century. Businessmen going be- tween New York and Boston preferred to patronize the overnight steam- ships since they could spend a full day in either city and reach their destination the next morning without experiencing the discomforts of poorly ventilated sleeping cars. Competition between the various lines kept rates low for both freight and passengers. In 1881 the major con- testants came to an agreement and fixed rates. Furthermore, the New York, New Haven, and Hartford system in the 1890's absorbed many of the railroads leading to the sound and set the rate policies for their steam- ship affiliates.
During the first half of the twentieth century coastal and intercoastal trade through New York State ports fluctuated greatly. In 1948 it reached an all-time high of 60,000,000 tons, but it fell off the following year to 56,095,000 tons. The major items of coastal and intercoastal trade are bulk commodities, such as petroleum and petroleum products, coal, phosphates, sulphur, sand, and gravel. These materials account in recent years for 70 to 80 per cent of all coastal and intercoastal traffic. The balance is general cargo and includes such commodities as lumber, raw and refined sugar, iron and steel and their products, canned foods, citrus fruits, and paper products. General cargo makes up a larger proportion of intercoastal than of coastal trade.
Ordinarily inbound movements far exceed outbound cargoes in the state's coastwise shipping. Since the state serves a large industrial and consumer market, inbound cargoes consist of heavy bulk commodities for manufacturing processes and foodstuffs for consumption. Outbound freight is less bulky, consisting primarily of manufactured goods.
Although business among coastwise carriers is markedly influenced by the general swing of the business cycle, particularly for goods in the gen- eral cargo category, the Depression years had less effect upon the volume of waterborne trade than on freight carried by the railroads. Thus, average tonnage carried by the nation's Class I railroads declined by 29 per cent during the Depression period as compared with a 6 per cent drop in waterborne commerce. During this period of shrinking profit margins, the marine carriers, with comparatively lower rates, were able to retain a larger share of their tonnage. In some instances they attracted a por- tion of the freight normally carried by the railroads.
Prior to World War II the coastal and intercoastal business of the
558
A SHORT HISTORY OF NEW YORK STATE
state, particularly of the port of New York, was sporadic. In 1927 it reached a pre-Depression high of 46,025,000 tons. During the decade of the 1930's it fell to an annual average of 36,171,000 tons, but improvement was evident from 1932 on. In 1941 no less than 70 per cent of the United States merchant marine was operating in coastal services. General cargo carriers at the port of New York maintained an average of 188 monthly sailings, with 239 registered vessels. Sixty ports were served by eleven coastal and nine intercoastal shipping companies.
Despite substantial recovery from the low tonnages handled during the early stages of the Depression, the earnings trend continued to be unfavorable. During the 1930's the steamship companies were caught between the intense rivalry of the railroads and steadily rising terminal costs. According to a survey made by the Port of New York Authority, an administrative control agency, nine steamship lines engaged in general cargo service between the port of New York and other Atlantic and Gulf ports lost over $4,000,000 during the period 1931-1940. When World War II broke out, a large part of the coastal and intercoastal fleet was approaching obsolescence and most shipping companies were in a doubtful financial condition.
During the war, coastal and intercoastal trade was sharply curtailed. Enemy submarine action claimed many ships, and an additional large number was requisitioned by the War Shipping Administration for mili- tary use. By 1944 coastal commerce of the port of New York had declined to less than two-fifths of the 1939-1941 average of 42,415,000 tons. Most of the traffic during the war consisted of inbound bulk commodities. Gen- eral cargo trade on intercoastal lanes was all but suspended. With the cessation of hostilities, two years of transition and adjustment were re- quired for the coastwise shipping companies to regain their prewar level of business, despite continued high production and trade. During and immediately after the war, wages and other voyage expenses, terminal charges, and fuel prices all advanced rapidly. In addition, the railroads were in many instances able to hold on to business acquired during the war by successfully competing on routes paralleling those of water car- riers.
Coastwise traffic in 1947 exceeded the prewar tonnage. General cargo vessels in use were larger and faster than prewar models but fewer in number. The decline in the port of New York's coastwise tonnage in 1949 was occasioned by a trade recession and proved to be only temporary. By the close of the year 1950 the tonnage trend was again upward.
In the course of the last one hundred years important changes have taken place in the Lake marine of the state. Many of these occurred dur- ing the last half of the nineteenth century. Among these were the shift from sail to steam, the trend from wooden to steel ships, the growth of
559
FROM TOWPATH TO AIRWAY
the "long trade" from Lake Superior to Lake Erie ports, and the relative decline in short coastal trips.
During the 1850's steam-propelled vessels drove most of the sailing vessels out of the passenger and high-class freight business. After 1860 operators swung over to the propeller-driven ships, which were more eco- nomical than the sidewheelers. During the 1870's the railroads slashed rates so drastically that most of the passenger traffic and a good share of the grain freight deserted the Lake vessels. The shipping interests fought back by building larger steam barges, capable of carrying one thousand tons and towing a sailing vessel as well. By 1890 the shipyards were be- ginning to shift from wood to steel. Gradually steel ships and barges became predominant.
Several factors were responsible for the growth of the Lake traffic. These include the rapid expansion of the winter wheat belt, the con- struction and enlargement of the Sault Ste. Marie Canal, and the rise of the iron-ore traffic from the Mesabi range in Minnesota. New York State enjoys only a portion of the Great Lakes trade, but as early as 1907 Buf- falo was first among all the Lake ports in actual tonnage received. The seaborne traffic of Buffalo and other state ports located on Lakes Erie and Ontario will, in all probability, be greatly increased by the St. Law- rence Seaway project.
During the last half century the volume of the Lake traffic, both for- eign and domestic, has depended in large measure on the volume of steel production and the size of the grain harvest. In 1932, for example, when the nation's steel production was only at 20 per cent of capacity, domestic lakewise traffic at the port of Buffalo dwindled to 5,957,000 tons. With a 70-per-cent increase in steel production the following year, the port's Lake traffic increased by 55 per cent. Shippers operating out of the major Lake ports in New York State in 1949 carried approximately 12 per cent of all the waterborne trade in the state. Buffalo, one of the five largest lake ports in the United States, handled 78 per cent of the state's Lake tonnage. Buffalo's favorable location at the eastern extremity of Lake Erie and the western terminus of the New York State Barge Canal makes it an important point of transshipment. Other New York State ports handling a significant volume of lakewise commerce include Oswego, Rochester, and Great Sodus Bay-all on Lake Ontario.
At mid-century Lake trade with Canada amounted to approximately 14 per cent of total Lake traffic. This water trade, however, constitutes only a small proportion of the total trade between New York State and Can- ada. In terms of value, about 97 per cent of the foreign trade passing through the Buffalo customs district in 1948 was transported by rail and by means other than water. Canadian Lake traffic consists largely of in- coming grains, iron ore, and stone products and outgoing bituminous coal
560
A SHORT HISTORY OF NEW YORK STATE
and coke. Foreign commerce on the Lakes in 1949 was below prewar levels, due in part to changes in the destination of grain consignments. In recent years Canadian lower Lake ports have been receiving more Do- minion grain than ports on the American side. Consequently, Buffalo, which for three-quarters of a century was prominent as the gateway through which Canadian grains flowed to the seaboard, has been receiving less than its former share.
About four-fifths of the Lake commerce consists of cargo shipments between United States Lake ports; in 1949 this domestic freight totaled 19,590,000 tons. Buffalo handled 88 per cent of this tonnage. Almost 40 per cent of the port of Buffalo's freight receipts in 1948 consisted of iron ore and 17 per cent of bituminous coal. Grains, largely wheat and some corn, oats, barley, and rye, represented 16 per cent of incoming cargoes and limestone 13 per cent. Lakewise shipments from Buffalo to other United States ports are also concentrated among a handful of bulk items -iron and coal represented 45 per cent of outgoing cargoes, anthracite coal 35 per cent, and petroleum and its products 10 per cent. Buffalo, how- ever, is primarily a receiving port, its receipts being ten times as large as its shipments in 1948.
Exclusive of the Great Lakes traffic the state has considerable internal and local traffic on its major rivers and canals. During 1949 eight of the larger ports of the state handled a million tons of local traffic.
The length of New York's entire canal system including canalized lakes and rivers exceeds eight hundred miles. In addition to Lake Cham- plain and the Hudson River, the system consists of four principal divisions: (1) the Champlain Canal from Troy on the Hudson River to Whitehall on Lake Champlain; (2) the Erie Canal from Waterford on the Hudson to Buffalo on Lake Erie; (3) the Oswego Canal, from the Erie Canal at Three Rivers, northwest of Syracuse, to Oswego on Lake Ontario; (4) the Cayuga and Seneca Canal from the Erie Canal at Montezuma to Ithaca on Cayuga Lake and to Montour Falls and Watkins Glen on Seneca Lake.
Transportation on the canals of the state has had its ups and downs. Prior to the coming of the railroad the importance of the canals to the growth of the state is difficult to exaggerate. The Erie Canal in particular became the leading route over which much of the nation's inland com- merce was transported. It was the canal, too, that gave great impetus to the growth of Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Utica.
By the close of the Civil War, however, canals were in growing dis- favor. The Panic of 1873 not only reduced the normal amount of traffic, but it also forced the overextended and financially harassed railroads to compete savagely with the canals as well as with each other. The Erie Canal, hampered by mismanagement, technological obsolescence, the
FROM TOWPATH TO AIRWAY
561
SOREL
MONTREAL
Richelieu River Canal
St. Lawrence River
Lake Champlain
Lake Ontario
Oneida
WHITEHALL
Oswego Canal KOSWEGO Lake
Erie
FULTON/
ROME
ROCHESTER
THREE RIVERS
UTICA
SYRACUSE
LITTLE FALLS
Erie Canal BUFFALO
SENECAFALLS GENEVA ..
MONTEZUMA CAYUGA
SCHENECTADY
WATERFORD "TROY
Lake Erie
Cayuga Lake
Cayuga & Seneca Canal
Seneca Lake
ITHACA
MONTOUR FALLS
Hudson River
NEW YORK CITY
Map 16. The New York State Barge Canal system. (Adapted from New York State Commerce Review, February 1953.)
high costs of transshipment at Buffalo, and the inability of the canal men to match the financial resources of the railroad princes, fell on evil days.
A constitutional committee in 1872 proposed that the clause in the Con- stitution of 1846 prohibiting the sale of the canals should be amended to include only the Erie and Black River, Oswego, Cayuga and Seneca, and Champlain canals. In 1874 the proposed amendment was approved by an overwhelming majority of the voters. As a result state operation of the Chenango and Genesee Valley canals ceased.
Criticism of canal administration mounted during the 1870's. Gov- ernor Samuel J. Tilden brought to light flagrant frauds in contracts for canal repairs. The boodlers in the Canal Ring had performed their re- pair work so carelessly that breaks in the walls and accumulation of un-
Canal
Champlain ¡Canal
ALBANY
562
A SHORT HISTORY OF NEW YORK STATE
removed silt in the channel caused serious delays in navigation. Keepers of the locks and boat inspectors required "beering up" before they would allow boats to pass. Constitutional amendments were enacted forbidding extra compensation for contractors and providing for the appointment by the governor of a superintendent of public works with more powers than the former canal commissioners had been permitted to exercise.
Despite its short-comings, the canal system still had many champions, the most notable being former Governor Horatio Seymour. Boat operators and the commercial interests of Buffalo, who gained more from water traffic breaking cargoes in their city than from unbroken passage rail freight, also rallied to the defense of the canals. But the most influential supporters of all were the New York City merchants and their powerful organizations-the New York Chamber of Commerce and the New York Produce Exchange who profited from the cheap cost of transportation afforded by the canals and their influence on railroad rates. These or- ganizations dispatched delegations to canal conferences and were repre- sented at legislative hearings. The activities of these groups combined with the antirailroad sentiment of the time persuaded the voters of the state in 1882 to eliminate canal tolls and persuaded the legislature to set up a railroad commission to study railroad transportation charges.
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