Page 2 - Toll Issues: Private Individual and Early City of New York

City of New York - Department of Bridges

As I am sure a lot of the casual readers may not be aware (especially those not from the New York City area); that the East River Bridges collected tolls as well, when they were first opened.

These crossings include the:

Brooklyn Bridge - 1883
Manhattan Bridge - 1909
Williamsburg Bridge - 1903
and the:
Queensboro Bridge - 1909
(formerly named Blackwell's Island Bridge)

These bridges have become to be known by the New York City driver as "free" bridges in the present day conversation, when held in discussion with the tolled crossings of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

But in fact, tolls were collected on these East River spans when they first opened individually (1883 through 1909 respectively) and these tolls were collected until 1911, when it was realized the City of New York was not legally empowered to collect tolls, and thereby the tolls were abolished.

This is just another little tidbit of history that has been lost to time. That is, until now.

Brooklyn Bridge

As I research deeper into the existence of toll collection on the City of New York bridges; I encounter thousands of images but so few of the toll booths. So far, I have only been able to locate two photos; both of which attributed to George Hall. Both taken at almost the same location (the curve on the Brooklyn side) however they clearly have been taken on two different dates as the elevated trains and trolley wire support structure is different.

Moving onto the known ticket issues marked for the Brooklyn Bridge, we know of three distinct design types.

The Promenade ticket is prolific, but often listed as a subway or train ticket on eBay. As a result of this erroneous belief of being a railroad or subway issue, it is one of the most misunderstood and misattributed ticket issues circulating in the category of historical ephemera for New York City, and I sincerely hope this website can correct this.

First and foremost, when comparing New York & Brooklyn Bridge Railroad tickets to the other issues, the others are very conspicuously marked "Promenade" or "One Horse Vehicle" and these issues clearly lack the word "railroad":


New York & Brooklyn Bridge "Promenade" Toll: Foot traffic / Pedestrian Ticket - used February 1, 1885 through 1900 C. C. Martin; Chief Engineer & Superintendent (NOT railroad) American Bank Note Company 2 1/8" x 1" collection of Philip M. Goldstein			New York & Brooklyn Bridge (Carriageway) Toll: One Horse Vehicle (5 cents)- SPECIMEN used 1883 through 1911 C. C. Martin; Chief Engineer & Superintendent (NOT railroad) American Bank Note Company 2 ½" x 1 ½" collection of George S. Cuhaj at least two known		New York & Brooklyn Bridge Railroad Cable Car Fare Ticket: 1883: 5 cents, 1885: reduced to 3 cents or 10 for 25 cents C. C. Martin; Chief Engineer & Superintendent (NOT a toll ticket - (shown for comparison) (NY&BB RR absorbed into Brooklyn Kings County Elevated June 30, 1898) Hamilton Bank Note Engraving & Printing Co. 2" x 1"

In further discussion of the blue One Horse Vehicle Specimen Tickets; it is the estimation of George Cuhaj that several specimen sheets were sold when the archives and records of the American Bank Note Company were liquidated and auctioned off during sales were which were both held privately and in public auction sales held by Christie's NY during the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Many of the groups of items sold in large lots, and have yet to fully come onto the market. Presumably, one or several of the sheets were subsequently cut up, so individual tickets could be sold. This is further evidenced by the registration mark on the left edge margin of the ticket that sold on eBay, as the uncut sheet shown has an identical registration mark on the left margin as center.

Some interesting differences are seen between the cut tickets above center and below left and the uncut sheet seen below right. The first is the uncut sheet has punch cancellation holes through each ticket. The second difference observed, is the uncut sheet of tickets seen below right, has the overprinted word "SPECIMEN" in a sans-serif font, while the individual tickets above center and below left have the word "SPECIMEN" in a serif font and at different angle to the uncut sheet. Interesting to say the least.

At the very least, the stamp date of June 1901 on the uncut sheet helps date the issue. George has also noted; that to date, no examples of this ticket have ever been seen in circulated condition and / or lacking the specimen overprint.

The only questions that remain now, are: a) were the tickets produced and issued; and b) were there any other denominations, i.e.: two horse vehicle or other denominations for the toll?


sold on eBay; February 14, 2024 - realized $305	image: collection of George S. Cuhaj

If you were to perform a Google search of "Brooklyn Bridge Promenade" as I did; you will either see reference to and images of the wooden center walkway (over the railway tracks) on the Brooklyn Bridge, dating back to its opening in 1883; or you find reference to the Brooklyn Heights Promenade over the Brooklyn Queens Expressway.

(As the later Brooklyn Heights Promenade was not opened until 1950 / 1951 and does cross the Brooklyn Bridge, we shall not concern ourselves with it nor infer any relation of it to the ticket issue.)

Furthermore, C. C. Martin is listed as chief engineer and superintendent on all three issues: the Promenade, the One Horse Vehicle as well as the New York & Brooklyn Bridge Railroad issue. Research reveals that Charles Cyril "C. C." Martin was assistant engineer to Washington Roebling, which we all know continued building the Brooklyn Bridge after taking over upon his father's death, John August Roebling.

Prior to this, C. C. Martin was the designing engineer of Prospect Park in Brooklyn. So with this information coming to light, we know see that C. C. Martin was not a "railroad" man, but a "city" man; with the New York & Brooklyn Bridge under his authority.

Additionally during my research, I encountered several issues of "The City Record" which was the official journal of the City of New York throughout the 1880's. In those pages, they clearly define income from three separate sources of receipts on the New York & Brooklyn Bridge:

From the promenade
From the carriageways
From the railroad

Another excerpt I will include here to further bolster my conclusions, is from the America Railway Journal, annual issue from April 1885 through March 1886. In it, it clearly defines the suggestion of eliminating the toll for foot passenger: "... Five promenade tickets for one cent..."

So if you need further proof that the Promenade Tickets were toll related and NOT railroad related, I cannot help you any further at this point.

In conjunction with the Manhattan Bridge issue in the next chapter, I felt it was now necessary to include the commonly seen Brooklyn Bridge Promenade ticket issue on this website. While it is often listed as a railroad or subway ticket, IT IS NOT, and I presented the proof to reinforce this conclusion.

Also located is this article published by the New York Times on December 28, 1895; which covered the railway and carriageway issues of the Brooklyn Bridge tickets:

According to the DEPARTMENT OF BRIDGES of the CITY OF NEW YORK -
A STATEMENT OF FACTS as PUBLISHED BY THE CITY CLUB OF NEW YORK, OCTOBER 1903; "The city's revenue from the Brooklyn Bridge is derived from four general sources:

(1) Payments by railroad companies for the right to operate cars over the
bridge, and rental for tracks, stations, etc;

(2) tolls charged for vehicles;

(3) payments from railroad, telephone, telegraph, pneumatic tube and cable
companies for the right to lay and operate cables and wires on the
structure;

(4) rentals from lessees of the vaults, warehouses and other spaces under the
approaches.

The city's revenue from the Brooklyn Bridge is not as much as formerly. One cause was the abolition of the 1-cent toll for passengers using the promenades.

Another cause was the installation of the elevated railway and trolley lines on the bridge and the discontinuance of the bridge cars by the city."

By referencing the following 1905 Brooklyn Daily Eagle Almanac, page 455 (seen at right); it lists the following tolls. It appears pedestrians / foot passengers were no longer required to pay a toll for crossing the Brooklyn Bridge.

I have since found an earlier reference in the Report of the Industrial Commission on Transportation, May 1901; that being of testimony taken since May 1, 1900 (seen below) to the New York and Brooklyn pedestrian fare being free in 1900.

So this would date the use of the Promenade tickets from 1885 to 1900.

Upon finding a copy of the "Minutes of the Board of Estimate and Appointment of the City of New York" it is then learned that all the tolls were abolished on all other East River Bridges by August 31, 1911.

So, what are the ticket worth? Other than essays, proofs, specimens & samples, the issued New York & Brooklyn Bridge Promenade and the New York and Brooklyn Bridge Railroad tickets are common; with no less than half a dozen listed for sale on eBay in Buy It Now or auction formats, in various conditions; at any given time. Furthermore, if you are patient, you will even see them listed in strips of four, five or more tickets still attached.

Are they worth $45 each? Not on your life. If you think they are, then I've got both a bridge in Brooklyn and swampland in Florida to sell you. And maybe I'll just list it on eBay as "RARE! Waterfront Property."

In short, the Brooklyn Bridge Promenade Tickets were not railroad. Not cable car, not trolley car, not elevated railway, not subway or anything else associated with any railroad. They are pure and simply: pedestrian toll tickets. Are they a unique piece of history? Absolutely. Do they carry an aura of nostalgic times of yesteryear? Yes. Are they rare? No.

Strictly as a convenience to the reader, I include information from the Wikipedia page on the Brooklyn Bridge about the New York and Brooklyn Bridge Railroad for those collecting those ticket issues:

Cable Cars & Elevateds

The New York and Brooklyn Bridge Railroad, a cable car service, began operating on September 25, 1883; it ran on the inner lanes of the bridge, between terminals at the Manhattan and Brooklyn ends.

Since Washington Roebling believed that steam trains would bear excessive loads upon the structure of the Brooklyn Bridge, the cable car line was designed as a steam / cable-hauled hybrid. They were powered from a generating station under the Brooklyn approach. The cable cars could not only regulate their speed on the 3 3⁄4% upward and downward approaches, but also maintain a constant interval between each other. There were 24 cable cars in total.

Initially, the service ran with single-car trains, but patronage soon grew so much that by October 1883, two-car trains were in use. The line carried three million people in the first six months, nine million in 1884, and nearly 20 million in 1885 following the opening of the Brooklyn Union Elevated Railroad. Accordingly, the track layout was rearranged and more trains were ordered. At the same time, there were highly controversial plans to extend the elevated railroads onto the Brooklyn Bridge, under the pretext of extending the bridge itself. After disputes, ultimately the trustees agreed to build two elevated routes to the bridge on the Brooklyn side.

Patronage continued to increase, and in 1888, the tracks were lengthened and even more cars were constructed to allow for four-car trains of cable cars. Electric wires for the trolleys were added by 1895, potentially allowing for the future decommissioning of the steam / cable system. The terminals were rebuilt once more in July 1895, and following the implementation of new electric cars in late 1896, the steam engines were dismantled and sold.

Following unification of the cities of New York and Brooklyn in 1898, the New York and Brooklyn Bridge Railroad ceased to be a separate entity that June, and the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company (BRT) assumed control of the line. The BRT started running through-services of elevated trains, which ran from Park Row Terminal in Manhattan to points in Brooklyn via the Sands Street station on the Brooklyn side. Before reaching Sands Street (at Tillary Street for Fulton Street Line trains, and at Bridge Street for Fifth Avenue Line and Myrtle Avenue Line trains), elevated trains bound for Manhattan swapped their steam locomotives for the cable cars, which would pull the passenger carriages across the bridge.

Through services were discontinued from 1899 to 1901, and due to increased patronage following the opening of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT)'s first subway line, the Park Row station was rebuilt in 1906. At one point, there were also plans for Brooklyn Bridge trains to run underground to the BRT's proposed Chambers Street station in Manhattan, though work on the connection was never completed. The overpass across William Street was closed in 1913 to make way for the proposed connection, but reopened in 1929 after it became clear that the connection would not be built.

After the IRT's Joralemon Street Tunnel and the Williamsburg Bridge tracks opened in 1908, the Brooklyn Bridge no longer held a monopoly on rail service between Manhattan and Brooklyn, and cable service ceased. New subway lines from the IRT and from the BRT's successor Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit Corporation (BMT), built in the 1910s and 1920s, posed significant competition to the Brooklyn Bridge rail services. With the opening of the Independent Subway System in 1932, and the subsequent unification of all three companies into a single entity in 1940, the elevated services started to decline, and the Park Row and Sands Street stations were greatly reduced in size. The Fifth Avenue and Fulton Street services across the Brooklyn Bridge were discontinued in 1940 and 1941 respectively, and the elevated tracks were abandoned permanently with the withdrawal of Myrtle Avenue services in 1944.

Trolleys

A plan for trolley service across the Brooklyn Bridge was presented in 1895, and the Brooklyn Bridge trustees agreed two years later to a plan where trolleys could run across the bridge under ten-year contracts. Trolley service, which began in 1898, ran on what are now the two middle lanes of each roadway (shared with other traffic). When cable service was withdrawn in 1908, the trolley tracks on the Brooklyn side were rebuilt to alleviate congestion. Trolley service on the middle lanes continued until the elevated lines stopped using the bridge in 1944, when they moved to the protected center tracks on the left sides of the roadways. On March 5, 1950, the streetcars also stopped running, and the bridge was redesigned for automobile traffic exclusively.

Please refer to the Wikipedia page for the Brooklyn Bridge - Rail Traffic for citations.

Manhattan Bridge

Literally within minutes of going public with this page, George S. Cuhaj, (an established token collector and author) sends me the following image, asking if I would be willing to include the East River Bridge issues on the page? Sure, why not! After all, they are bridge tickets from New York City, right?

The following is a fare ticket for a led horse on the carriageway of the Manhattan Bridge. I believe the cost was 3 cents, and it is facsimile signed by J. W. Stevenson, Commissioner of Bridges for the City of New York. The Manhattan Bridge opened on December 31, 1909.

This piece is interesting to say the least, and according to the Proceedings of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Volume 45, 1919; horse-drawn traffic on the Manhattan Bridge was prohibited during certain times of the day:

"The Manhattan Bridge roadway is 35 feet wide, sufficient to pass two lanes of traffic in each direction. In order to care for the morning and evening rush-hour traffic on this bridge, horse-drawn vehicles are prohibited from crossing from Brooklyn in the evening period and from Manhattan in the morning period. During both these periods this traffic is diverted to the Brooklyn Bridge, making it possible to accommodate three lines on the Manhattan Bridge from Brooklyn in the morning rush and to Brooklyn in the evening rush."

Further research has uncovered that the four East River Crossings (from south to north): Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, Williamsburg Bridge and the Queensboro Bridges collected tolls for use of the roadway. To be absolutely clear, these were NOT a collection of fares for the streetcars or trolley lines crossing those bridges; this was for automobiles, horses & horse & wagons utilizing the roadway. It is further understood the toll was 3 cents for horses, 5 cents for horse and wagons and 10 cents for automobiles.

Take note of the artwork at the top of the Brooklyn Bridge Promenade ticket above; and compare to the artwork of this Manhattan Bridge ticket. it is the same silhouette of the tower with Gothic arches with cables! In reality, the Manhattan Bridge has a single Roman arch. Apparently, the same artwork was used, or at least copied; from the Brooklyn Bridge issue.


Department of Bridges - City of New York Manhattan Bridge Form E - December 31st, 1909 3 cent toll ticket for led horse on carriageway. J. W. Stevenson, Commissioner collection of George S. Cuhaj

Williamsburg Bridge

Further research on the subject has revealed that the Williamsburg Bridge also collected tolls for automobile and horse drawn traffic crossing the span. Again, this was not a fare collected for streetcar or trolley car lines crossing the bridge.

It is understood the toll was the same as the Manhattan Bridge and fixed at 3 cents for horses, 5 cents for horse and wagons, and 10 cents for automobiles.

At this time, tickets or scrip have not been seen. But I have encountered at least two images that shows the toll booths. One is dated April 1906; three years after the bridge opened. The other is undated. What is interesting is it appears there were two different styles of toll booths. And ornate style on the Manhattan side, and a simpler structure on the Brooklyn side. This may have been a policeman's shanty, but I am uncertain.

Considering the tolls were abolished from the City owned bridges in 1911; there is only a small window of time in which the toll booths may be seen in photographs.

courtesy of the New York Public Library Digital Archives
added 13 February 2021

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I cannot remember the provenance of this image. If you know, please feel free to contact me.
added 13 February 2021

Blackwells Island / 59th Street / Queensboro Bridge

From the same documents that revealed the collection of tolls for the Williamsburg Bridge, it was also learned the Blackwell's Island Bridge collected a toll as well. This bridge is better known today as the Queensboro - 59th Street Bridge.

And once again, to be absolutely clear, this was a toll for automobiles and horse drawn vehicles. Toll rates were 3 cents for horse, 5 cents for horse and wagon, 10 cents for automobiles.

The following image is in the archives of the Greater Astoria Historical Society, and is simply dated 1909. It is unclear at this time if the image was taken for the grand opening of the Queensboro Bridge, which took place on March 30, 1909; or was taken on the occasion of a Motor Parade and Auto Celebration during the week of June 12th through the 17th of that year, and on which date the toll was waived for all "machines" that compete in Long Island. Judging from the heavy coats being worn by the men in the image - I believe this to be on the the date of grand opening.

Queensboro Bridge Toll Booth - 1909 (Believed to be Grand Opening of Bridge)
Lead automobile is the Commissioner of the City of New York Department of Bridges. Notice automobile has right hand drive.
courtesy of the Greater Astoria Historical Society
added 13 February 2021

Abolition of Tolls on East River Bridges

We also now know, by way of the following New York Times article dated July 7, 1911; why toll collection on the East River Bridges ceased.