Fulton St EL I Oct 2008

At the time of my previous posting on Broadway Junction, I had tried to make sense of the incredible jumble of steel that is found at Broadway junction. There seemed to be far more structural work than could be justified by a mere two elevated lines converging (along with a covered passageway from the A train subway. I decided to explore the area on foot from the ground to make some sense of all this. I was aided by an old subway map from 1939 that I printed out.

The then newly constructed A train shadowed the path of the Fulton St EL. When construction was completed up to the Broadway Junction/Atlantic Ave stations, the Fulton St EL was torn down up to that point (1940). Prior to this, a shunt existed to allow some trains from the Broadway EL (now the J line), joined by the Lexington Ave EL (long since demolished), to take passengers from Manhattan over the Williamsburg bridge to Canarsie on the Canarsie line, rather than on to Jamaica. These passengers could change over to the Fulton EL or to the Canarsie line at the Atlantic Ave station.

Unlike the A train, which ties into Broadway Junction, the Fulton St EL Shared station facilities with the Canarsie Line at the very close Atlantic Ave station. There are six train tracks or former tracks at Atlantic Ave. This would be considered overkill in this day and age when there is only the two track Canarsie line at this location. But two of those tracks were from the Fulton St EL and two more tracks with their own platform (now unused) belonged to the shunt from the Broadway EL.

The Fulton St EL has not disappeared entirely. The A train emerges from underground at the point where it turns off to the Rockaways. However, a branch continues straight on, ending at Lefferts Boulevard. This branch, consisting of six subway stations, runs on the tracks of the Fulton St EL.

Fulton St El I Oct 2008