Why so little freight hauling in and around NYC?

Out of curiosity, why is there so little freight railroading in and around New York City (compared to its population size)? I see a Norfolk Southern or CSX train here and there in northern New Jersey and along the Hudson, and I know that there are a few small freight lines in Staten Island and Long Island, but freight railroading in and around NYC has a much lower market share than elsewhere in the US.

Did NYC at one time have more extensive freight lines? If so, are there specific reasons why they failed? If not, why didn't Class Is back in the day focus on building a NYC presence? Do the MTA, Amtrak and NJ Transit have any interest in allowing more freight trains on their lines?

Given the area's huge population, terrible traffic jams and large industries (in certain areas), there must be potential for freight, although I'd assume that the costs of entry into the market would be very high.

Thanks.

High cost of land as you get close to New York City has pushed the rail customers further away, in addition most of the old manufacturing done in New York proper is gone. It just isn't efficient to do most manufacturing over many floors of a multistory building with transportation relatively cheap. New York City is almost exclusively a consumer products consumption area. What little manufacturing that remains (refineries and some chemical plants) are on the New Jersey side and along the lower bay where the dock areas have deeper water for larger ships.

This Wikipedia article gives a good look at freight railroading in New York City was like in the past, by the early 1960's things were shrinking fast.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_freig ... ong_Island

It's not just New York, it's New England too. One of the NYNH&H's major western gateways was an extensive car floating operation from three different NYC terminals across to several railroads on the New Jersey side of the harbor. New England industry started drying up in the 1960s and 70s and the remaining traffic was largely rerouted through Selkirk.

And yet another factor would be the development of "breakbulk" warehouses and distribution centers in smaller, less expensive and often less crime- and racketeering-prone cities such as Albany, Allentown, Reading, Harrisburg and Richmond. These locations can serve most of the East Coast Megalopolis within the 11-hour truch haul currently allowed under hours-of-service regulations.

Thanks- all very helpful!

SouthernRailway wrote:Out of curiosity, why is there so little freight railroading in and around New York City (compared to its population size)? I see a Norfolk Southern or CSX train here and there in northern New Jersey and along the Hudson, and I know that there are a few small freight lines in Staten Island and Long Island, but freight railroading in and around NYC has a much lower market share than elsewhere in the US.

Did NYC at one time have more extensive freight lines? If so, are there specific reasons why they failed? If not, why didn't Class Is back in the day focus on building a NYC presence? Do the MTA, Amtrak and NJ Transit have any interest in allowing more freight trains on their lines?

Given the area's huge population, terrible traffic jams and large industries (in certain areas), there must be potential for freight, although I'd assume that the costs of entry into the market would be very high.

Thanks.

"Around NYC" would certainly have to encompass the Newark, NJ area and that includes several major rail terminals with an enormous amount of traffic. I've been making regular business trips down to NJ from where I live in Southeastern New England and find the rail activity in Newark very impressive.
So there is plenty of rail freight coming into the New York Metropolitan area, it just "lands" on the other side of the Hudson..
If you visited San Francisco you might ask the same question about freight trains, but cross the Bay to Oakland and your question would be answered....

v8interceptor wrote: "Around NYC" would certainly have to encompass the Newark, NJ area and that includes several major rail terminals with an enormous amount of traffic. I've been making regular business trips down to NJ from where I live in Southeastern New England and find the rail activity in Newark very impressive.
So there is plenty of rail freight coming into the New York Metropolitan area, it just "lands" on the other side of the Hudson..
If you visited San Francisco you might ask the same question about freight trains, but cross the Bay to Oakland and your question would be answered....

I think a lot of people forget that the City of New York is in a way more like Amsterdam or Venice than it is like Chicago or Boston. Even though there aren't canal boats sailing down 5th Ave., the fact is that The Bronx is the only one of the five boroughs on the North American mainland. Everything else is sprawled across three major and dozens of minor islands. Back in the day, much of the rail activity in New York City was really maritime-- the New Haven, Pennsylvania, New York Central, etc. had fleets of tugs, carfloats, and passenger ferries all over the harbor, and freight terminals might well be piersheds on the East or Hudson rivers. Today, it's just more efficient to terminate the freight trains on the Jersey side-- where most the heavy industry is, too-- and dray into Manhattan, Brooklyn, etc.

Now if the Port Authority ever got its act together and built the cross-harbor freight tunnel they planned back in the mid-1920's, that might change...

At one time the tracks into NYC were owned by common carriers, New York Central, New Haven, and Pennsylvania. Now the transit agencies hold the cards. They are very restrictive to freight trains running on their lines. This compounds the other expensive costs of doing business in New York, which the other posters clearly explained.