Railroad Forums 

Discussion of the past and present operations of the Long Island Rail Road.

Moderator: Liquidcamphor

 #1505811  by DogBert
 
After the route was severed in the middle, the end that connected to the bushwick branch was LIRR owned (many of the lots still are MTA owned). On the fremont end, Conrail/CSX owned the tracks/property (and I assume ran the trains). When the LIRR/MTA bought the bay ridge route, they did not buy that stub of the evergreen. There were no known customers left by that time.

If I recall right CSX sold the last bit of old evergreen property they owned in the early 00's. They should have held out longer, as values around there have probably doubled or tripled since then.

There's a slew of detail on this here, along with photos from 2017 of every crossing.
http://ltvsquad.com/2017/09/06/brooklyn ... ad-part-2/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Lesser known is the 'Glendale and East River RR' which the Evergreen was originally part of. There's still a tiny few traces of the route to Greenpoint if you look extremely closely. http://ltvsquad.com/2017/09/06/brooklyn ... ad-part-1/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 #1505848  by nyandw
 
Dogbert: Really fine links, thank you.

As you indicated: "...fter the route was severed in the middle, the end that connected to the bushwick branch was LIRR owned (many of the lots still are MTA owned). On the fremont end, Conrail/CSX owned the tracks/property (and I assume ran the trains). When the LIRR/MTA bought the bay ridge route, they did not buy that stub of the evergreen...."

The map below shows the northern portion from Varick Ave Yard to Flushing Ave still served by the LIRR as you indicated.
 #1505871  by Publius Plunkett
 
Hi Dogbert. Great post by the way. To clarify what you wrote, when the line was severed, one end that was connected to the Bushwick Branch was the "LI end" and still an ROW? And the other that connected to the Bay Ridge Branch was Conrail (and its predecessors) and has been sold off? If that is correct, I wonder why CSX would bother selling it. I don't think they pay property taxes on their land in NY. At least that is what I heard when the LIRR was trying to build up its Freight Dept. prior to NYAR. The "talk" in the Freight Dept. was that, the State threatened to pull Conrail's property tax exemption to coerce better cooperation from them with the LIRR. Allegedly, Conrail went to court to nullify this threat because it exemptions were legislated and couldn't simply be changed. This could all be nonsense, but this is what we were told at the time. Obviously, it is all different now.
 #1506021  by DogBert
 
I'm really not sure why CR & CSX sold off the property lots on the 'fremont' end. Perhaps there's some historic record buried deep in the corporate archives that can outline the decision making here, but so far as I know that information, should it still exist, isn't available anywhere online.

Short term profit was the likely motive, since most of the Conrail owned lots were sold during their lean years in the late 70s and early 80s. They sold off part of Oak Point probably around the same time, which was an error CSX is rumored to have tried to fix offering to buy it back. Needless to say that didn't happen, and now that big Jetro store sits on former yard property.

The MTA's real estate department is slow moving and strange - I'm not sure why they haven't sold off some of the ROW tracts near the bushwick end yet, as that neighborhood has become a bit trendy and beyond attractive to real estate developers. Last I checked, there's a former ROW in LIC's former degnon terminal area that is now a street, though it's still listed on tax records as belonging to the MTA.
 #1506030  by nyandw
 
DogBert wrote:I'm really not sure why CR & CSX sold off the property lots on the 'fremont' end.Short term profit was the likely motive, since most of the Conrail owned lots were sold during their lean years in the late 70s and early 80s. They sold off part of Oak Point probably around the same time, which was an error CSX is rumored to have tried to fix offering to buy it back. Needless to say that didn't happen, and now that big Jetro store sits on former yard property...
Side bar: July 2001 Summer Bus Tour Trip NYCRR Oak Point Yard was a stop that day. Big blue and CSX in attendance. Where they leasing it back at the time, perhaps?
 #1506078  by Publius Plunkett
 
The MTA's real estate department is slow moving and strange - I'm not sure why they haven't sold off some of the ROW tracts near the bushwick end yet, as that neighborhood has become a bit trendy and beyond attractive to real estate developers. Last I checked, there's a former ROW in LIC's former degnon terminal area that is now a street, though it's still listed on tax records as belonging to the MTA.
The MTA doesn't pay any taxes on their property, so there really isn't any costs associated with unused land. The complaints about dumping and overgrown vegetation are usually ignored, so why bother? Usually, when an offer is made on an MTA property, MTA Real Estate will or at least is supposed to defer to the agency and department(s) in the agency, that use the property. If anyone of those department(s) object to the sale, generally the MTA will decline the offer to purchase. One would look at an empty lot and wonder what use is this to any department in their respective agency? But someone may have a thought that down the road, it can be used for something and object to the sale.

The street you mentioned on MTA land in Degnon, may be a deal between the City and the MTA...with the MTA retaining rights to retake the land in the future. This is not really unusual. A good portion of the Atlantic Branch west of Jamaica is owned by the City under lease to the MTA. They resigned another 99yr lease around the late 90's. I don't know if they pay rent, and if so, how much. Regardless, its an example of NYC/MTA cooperation for each other's needs.