Page:Vincent F. Seyfried - The Long Island Rail Road A Comprehensive History - Vol. 1 (1961).pdf/18

The South Side Reaches the East River 8. Metropolitan Avenue varied widely in grade; a steep rise from the ferry to Bedford Avenue, a deep dip near Union Avenue, etc. The grade varied eight feet over all and because nineteen streets intersected it, cutting it down to a level for steam engines would be unthinkable.

Proponents of the South Side Rail Road urged these points in answer:

As the argument raged in the hearings and in the press, the local newspaper came out strongly in favor of the South Side road. The Brooklyn Times and the Brooklyn Union championed the railroad, and the Eagle favored the idea. There were not wanting voices of compromise. Some suggested running the road to the Wallabout Basin (now the Navy Yard) along the lowlands marking the division between old Brooklyn and Williamsburgh, approximately along the line of Flushing Avenue, then sparsely settled. Another school of thinking viewed favorably a private right-of-way running midway between Maspeth and Metropolitan Avenues as far as Bushwick Avenue. Still others liked the idea of a line along Newtown Creek down to the East River by-passing Williamsburgh altogether.

In the first week of July 1867 the hot dispute came to a vote