author
Interborough Rapid Transit Company
A pioneering transit company, not a person, it helped shape modern New York by operating the city’s first subway line and expanding rapid transit across Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens. Its story is closely tied to the birth of the New York City Subway as millions of riders came to rely on it.
1 Audiobook
The New York Subway, Its Construction and Equipment
by Interborough Rapid Transit Company
About the author
Founded on May 6, 1902, the Interborough Rapid Transit Company, usually called the IRT, was created to operate New York City’s first underground rapid transit line. Backed by financier August Belmont Jr., it took on the task of running the subway after the initial construction contract had been awarded, and it also leased the Manhattan Railway Company in 1903, bringing major elevated lines under its control.
The IRT opened New York’s first subway on October 27, 1904, with service running from City Hall to 145th Street. In the years that followed, it expanded through the city, especially after the 1913 Dual Contracts, which greatly enlarged the system and fixed the famous five-cent fare for decades.
In 1940, the company was purchased by New York City as part of the unification of the subway system. Its former routes now make up what is known as the A Division of today’s New York City Subway, so even though the company itself is long gone, its lines remain central to daily life in the city.