Greater New Yorker: George McAneny, the Dual System and the Making of Greater New York

By Lucie Levine

On March 19, 1913, at the offices of the New York State Public Service Commission, in the New York Tribune Building at Nassau Street and Park Row, a group of city administrators and transit tycoons signed the “Dual Contracts,” a landmark deal between the City of New York, and the IRT and BRT subway companies, to vastly expand the city’s subway network. The Dual System was the largest single public works initiative in American history up to that time. It doubled the size of the subway network and tripled its capacity, made possible the development of the outer boroughs, and allowed for the unprecedented growth of an unparalleled city.[1]

The BRT became the BMT in 1923. This 1924 Map shows the extent of that system's extension under the dual contracts.

Manhattan Borough President George McAneny (1869-1953), who had negotiated the contracts, was seated at the center of the signing table. Though McAneny called the Dual Contracts “the best investment the city ever made,” he saw the extraordinary deal not as an end in itself, but as the true beginning of a greater whole: the plan and the future of “Greater New York.”[2] The rails that ran beneath the streets, knitting together the far-flung metropolis, would be the bedrock of a new city plan that treated the consolidated city as its own discrete region.

McAneny, who held a remarkable number of civic posts including (but not limited to) Borough President, President of the Board of Alderman, Chairman of the New York State Transit Commission, President of the Regional Plan Association, Chairman of the World’s Fair Corporation, and President of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society,[3] understood urban planning not “in its narrower sense of the mere laying out of parks and streets and boulevards, but in its larger significance as the science of directing the actual building and growth of a city along proper and rational lines.”[4] McAneny referred to city planning as his “hobby,”[5] but it was the wellspring of his vision, and the catalyst of his career. With the proper and rational lines of the Dual System forming the functional basis of the ideal metropolis, McAneny turned to science, fact finding, and analysis to make possible a livable city, planned according to human scale and healthy density, which prized light, air and accessibility over profit. More than any other New Yorker of his generation, McAneny shaped the face and the future of Greater New York.

Greater New York refers to the five borough metropolis we live in today. It was born at the moment of Consolidation, the stroke of midnight, January 1, 1898, when Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island and most of the Bronx were fused administratively to “The City of New York,” (which had previously included only Manhattan and the West Bronx.)  What had been a city of roughly 1.5 million people, became, literally overnight, a city of more than 3.4 million people, scattered across five boroughs. In 1898, Greater New York was not only the largest city in the United States but also the “Second City of the World,”[6] trailing only London in population and international import. The question that lay before the new city as it stepped into the new century was, how could it properly be governed, planned and connected so that it could function and thrive?

George McAneny began to answer that question as early as 1892, when, as a 22-year-old ex-journalist, he joined the city’s progressive “Good Government” elite, as the Assistant Secretary of the National Civil Service Reform League. In the 1890s, New York’s Progressive reformers were focused on civil service reform as a way to curb the city’s bloated patronage system, curtail its profligate spending,[7] and put a stop to what Tammany operatives liked to call “honest graft.” 

Civil service reform also gained traction around this time, because it mandated a modern, rational, bureaucratic efficiency born of a new discipline: Political Science.  The field of Political Science sought to apply the principles of the Industrial Revolution to the problems of city life and urban government. It promised dispassionate, rational scientific answers to public and political concerns,[8] and was therefore championed as a way for a professional class of administrators and bureaucrats to shape the city’s institutions and its physical landscape.[9]

McAneny himself revolutionized the role of the civil service in both New York City and New York State, drafting the civil service sections of the revised New York City Charter,[10] and co-authoring the revised New York State Civil Service code, which went into effect in New York City on July 11th 1899.[11] Civil Service, coupled with rational, scientific planning that was worthy of New York “as one of the first capitals of the world,”[12] and that formed “the firm basis for a healthy and happy community,”[13] would inform McAneny’s work and vision for the rest of his life.

The intersection of rational planning, capital improvements and healthy, happy communities drew McAneny to transit early in his career. After as stint as lobbyist for Pennsylvania Railroad, McAneny was elected President of the City Club in 1906. The City Club, long a backbone of the progressive Good Government movement in New York, turned its attention to transit during McAneny’s tenure, because the need for that infrastructure had become tied to a public health crisis: population congestion.[14]

In the first decades of the twentieth century, New York’s population was growing by more than 100,000 people per year;[15] the Lower East Side was the most densely populated place in the world, and Manhattan was home to the highest concentration of manufacturing in the United States.[16] In its potential to redistribute a densely-concentrated population, the subway stood out as the steel-clad answer to any number of real and perceived social ills that plagued the city’s densest districts, from death and disease to prostitution, gambling and vice.

By dispersing residents to the wide-open space of the then-undeveloped outer boroughs, a vast network of rapid transit could genuinely change how the other half lived. New Yorkers stuck in firetraps and plagued by tuberculosis, could, The City Club hoped, jump on newly constructed subways, and hightail it to the Bronx or Brooklyn, where fresh air and larger homes awaited them; then, they could take the same trains back into Manhattan during a quick commute to work. Not only would “vast new districts” be opened for development, McAneny pointed out, but also New York would see “the creation of new real estate values, the increase of city revenue from taxation, [and] the ushering in of a new era in the city’s life.”[17] The rationally developed, low density “subway suburbs” would be planned along these new transit lines, and with them, the connected five borough city would rise.

The issue of population growth and congestion had moved New Yorkers to make serious efforts in rapid transit since 1860, and the first elevated line, along 9th Avenue, opened in 1869.[18] In 1904, the first subway opened, carrying passengers in a zig-zag across Manhattan from City Hall to 42nd Street, across 42nd Street to Times Square, then up Broadway to 145th Street.[19] During its first year in service, that line carried 73,000,000 passengers.[20] By 1912, it carried 303,000,000.[21] In 1908, when the extension was completed in Brooklyn, combined passengers on the city’s surface, elevated and subway lines totaled 1,365,000,000.[22] By 1912, that number had grown to 1,622,979,709.[23] 

Usage was overwhelming; the growth in ridership far outpaced the growth in the system itself. Chairman Willcox of the city’s Public Service Commission saw the problem as two-fold: “How to bring about the expansion of the various lines so as to relieve existing congestion” and “how to build an entirely new system which will provide for the new traffic of future years.”[24] McAneny summed up the situation, remarking, “the chief trouble has been that the new subways invariably have been started at about the time when they ought to have been completed and ready for use.”[25] He wasn’t the only one who felt this way. City administrators had tried to plan ahead. For example, by 1905, New York’s Rapid Transit Board had laid out 19 new subway routes. But, by 1909 construction had begun on just two of them.[26]

Here was the holdup: For a comprehensive subway system to be useful — making Manhattan’s business districts easily and quickly accessible to all New Yorkers, linking the boroughs and opening up new land for development so that the city could grow and thrive — it was necessary for all these new subway lines to be built at the same time. If just one was built, it could not connect the city as a whole, and the same pattern of congestion would repeat itself along the new line, because no single line could adequately open up enough land to alleviate density. But, the city itself didn’t have the money to build a full system in one fell swoop, and New York’s transit barons had no interest in expanding the lines already in place.[27]

The original subway was built with public funds from the city’s coffers. It was owned by the city, but leased to the private Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT), which equipped and operated the system.[28] Until 1913, the IRT was the sole subway operator in New York City[29] (The Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company controlled the elevated lines in Brooklyn).[30] Because the IRT had not put up private capital to build the original system, it had virtually no interest in doing so to expand it. Additionally, overcrowding on the IRT was good for business. Because the company’s lease mandated a fixed five-cent fare for 49 years, the IRT was looking to collect the most nickels, covering the shortest distance, to maximize profit. If the IRT had to pay to expand the system, then pay to operate cars over longer distances, and also extend lines into sparsely populated areas where fewer passengers were around to pay the fare they would be losing money.[31] It was a clash between public service and private gain that seemed intractable.

By 1909, the expansion of rapid transit had so vexed city administrators, and was so essential for its citizens, that it became the focus of the 1909 municipal election.[32] McAneny, who was running for Manhattan Borough President, was so committed to solving the transit crisis, and making his progressive vision for Greater New York a reality, he helped found the Fusion Party, a new political party that put transit at the center of the municipal stage.

On May 11, 1909, the “Committee of 100,” met at Cooper Union to found the Fusion Party.[33] McAneny chaired the meeting. The Fusion Platform ran in part, “immediate steps should be taken to give the whole city proper transit facilities. Not only must the present disgraceful condition of transportation be relieved, but a comprehensive and adequate system of transit…must be adopted without further delay.”[34] Fusionists also came out as the party of political science and rational urban planning. They vowed to use material collected by the Bureau of Municipal Research (a Good Government organization of which McAneny was a trustee), to show voters the extent of Tammany’s wasteful leadership.[35] A Fusion victory would not only mean a victory for the subway, it would mean a victory for George McAneny’s vision of Greater New York.

George McAneny became president of the Board of Alderman in 1914. His success with the Dual Contracts helped him win the office. Courtesy of the George McAneny Papers, New York Historical Society.

Ultimately, Fusionists carried every office except the Mayoralty and the Borough Presidency of Queens. The New York Times called Fusion’s victory “complete,” because the party won control of the Board of Estimate, “and with it city control,” given that the Board of Estimate was in charge of the city’s purse strings.[36]

McAneny called his role as Chairman of Board of Estimate’s Committee of Transit Proposals “the most important of my Board of Estimate assignments,” because it was as Chairman of the Transit Committee that he negotiated the Dual Contracts.[37] In 1911, the BRT proposed that it build subways in Brooklyn, and bring them into Manhattan, by running a lucrative line up Broadway. The proposal brought the IRT to the table, and in true Fusionist from, McAneny was able to fuse the seemingly opposed camps of public function and private enterprise that had stymied rapid transit expansion for decades. He brokered a deal between the city, the IRT and the BRT that required capital from all three parties, and shared profits amongst them.[38]

The final contracts stipulated that the city would put up about $200 million, while the IRT and BRT contributed $77 million and $61 million, respectively. The new lines would be owned by the city, and operated by the companies on a 49-year lease. The companies would earn their current profits from existing lines and an additional six percent on their investment. That money would be taken out of operating revenues. The additional profit would be shared between the city and the companies. [39] McAneny kept the companies in line with the stipulation that if either company balked or rejected the deal, its lines would be granted to its competitor.[40]

George McAneny at left, celebrating Ground Breaking for subway construction at 67th Street and Lexington Avenue, July 31, 1911. Library of Congress.

Mayor Gaynor called the Dual Contracts “the greatest accomplishment of our day,”[41] and the Municipal Engineers of the City of New York enthused, “never before have all the outlying boroughs been made so equally accessible.”[42] Before the Dual Contracts were signed, there were four subway stations in Brooklyn. The contracts provided 189 more. Queens, which had no stations, gained 41. In total, the whole system gained 332 more stations,[43] and 323 new miles of track.[44] The new “subway suburbs” that sprawled out from the new nexus covered twice as much land as the city’s existing built up districts. In 1912, the BRT and IRT together carried 475 million passengers. By 1930, that number was more than  2 billion.[45] Here was New York transformed. Here was Greater New York.

After brokering the Dual Contracts, McAneny continued to serve the city, and further develop Greater New York according his dream that the well planned metropolis would serve “every utilitarian purpose,” while also providing necessary “air and sunlight” and “monuments of beauty that will appeal to the imagination and the emotions of the people.”[46] To that end, while President of the Board of Alderman, he was responsible for the 1916 Zoning Ordinance, the first such law in the United States, which regulated height and land use, saved light and air for New Yorkers and led, wonderfully, to the city’s grand Art Deco signature. In the early 1920s, he took his transit expertise state-wide, chairing the New York State Transit Commission. In 1930, he took his most comprehensive city planning post, as President Regional Plan Association. In his later years, McAneny championed the preservation movement, saving sites like Federal Hall and Castle Clinton from the machinations of another planner, Robert Moses. In fact, at Federal Hall, there is a plaque that calls McAneny a “friend beyond compare,”[47] to the city of New York, for it was he who helped make Greater New York a reality.

Lucie Levine is a historian and tour guide. She founded Archive on Parade, and is a proud member of Friends of George McAneny. She is also the Public Programs Consultant at FRIENDS of the Upper East Side Historic Districts, and a contributing writer at 6sqft.

[1] Peter Derrick, Tunneling to the Future: The Story of the Great Subway Expansion that Saved New York, (New York: NYU Press, 2001), 1.

[2] “Transit Inquiry Ends as M’Aneny Accuses Hylan of Distortion,” The New York Times, January 9, 1925.

[3] A comprehensive overview of McAneny’s life and work can be found in Charles Starks, New York’s Pioneer of Planning and Preservation: How George McAneny Reshaped Manhattan and Inspired a Movement (New York: The New York Preservation Archive Project, 2016).

[4] George McAneny, “What I Am Trying to Do,” The World’s Work vol. 26 (May-October 1913): 177.

[5] Ibid., 177.

[6] Mike Wallace, Greater Gotham: A History of New York City from 1898 to 1919 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 5

[7] Starks, 5-7.

[8] Wallace, 131-32.

[9] Starks, 7.

[10] Purposes and Methods of the Bureau of Municipal Research (New York: Bureau of Municipal Research, 1907): 5.

[11] George McAneny, “Mr. George McAneny for the New York Association,” Proceedings of the National Civil Service Reform League (New York: National Civil Service Reform League): 18.

[12] McAneny, “What I Am Trying to Do,” 180-81.

[13] McAneny quoted in: Nelson P. Lewis, The Planning of the Modern City: A Review of the Principles Governing City Planning (New York, John Wiley and Sons, 1916): 50.

[14] Starks, 15.

[15] Derrick, 46.

[16] Ibid., 90.

[17] “Subway in 19 Years gains 875 Percent,” New York Times, October 28, 1924, 1.

[18] Ibid., 9

[19] Id., 50.

[20] “Subway in 19 Years Gains 875 Per Cent,” 1.

[21] Derrick, 233.

[22] William R. Willcox, “The Transportation Problem in New York City,” Harpers Weekly, 54 (March 5, 1910): 13.

[23] McAneny, “What I am Trying to Do,” 174.

[24] William R. Willcox, “Dual System of Rapid Transit for New York City” (New York: New York State Public Service Commission for the 1st District, 1912): 5

[25] “Subway in 19 Years Gains 875 Per Cent,” 1.

[26] Derrick, 47.

[27] Ibid., 2-5.

[28] Id., 187.

[29] George McAneny, “New Subways: Proposed Addition to Rapid Transit System to Cost $218,000,000 (New York: New York State Transit Commission, 1922): 2

[30] Willcox, “Dual System,”11.

[31] Derrick, 187.

[32] Ibid, 86.

[33] “New Political Clan to Strike Tammany,” New York Times, May 10, 1909.

[34] Derrick, 86.

[35] “New Political Clan,” New York Times.

[36] “Gaynor Wins; Tammany Loses All The Rest,” New York Times, November 3, 1909.

[37] McAneny, What I Am Trying to Do,” 178.

[38] Wallace, 238.

[39] Ibid.

[40] Derrick, 181.

[41] Ibid, 230.

[42] Le Roy T. Harkness, “The Dual Subway System in Its Relation to the Rapid Transit History of New York,” in The Municipal Engineers of the City of New York Proceedings 1913 (New York: Municipal Engineers of the City of New York, 1914): 268.

[43] Ibid.

[44] Wallace, 238.

[45] Derrick, 231-33.

[46] “Sees Planning Vital to City Beautiful,” The New York Times, January 19, 1930, 151.

[47] Starks, 1.