A Century of Subways: Celebrating 100 Years of New York's Underground Railways

by Brian J. Cudahy

Brian Cudahy offers a fascinating tribute to the world the subway created. Taking a fresh look at one of the marvels of the 20th century, Cudahy creates a vivid sense of this extraordinary achievement―how the city was transformed once New Yorkers started riding in a hole in the ground.

Genres: New York, Nonfiction

388 pages, Paperback

First published October 29, 2003

Reviews

[Reed · Rating 3 out of 5]

Painfully dry. Imagine reading a book full of Wikipedia entries about trains. Does it have a few interesting parts - sure - but it’s for the true train geek who wants to know every stat and detail.

[Charlene McGrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting

This was a pretty comprehensive book on subway transit everywhere. Very interesting to read. If you are interested in subway transit, this is the book for you.

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been interested in reading a book about the New York City Subway System for a while now, and I received this book as a gift, which was perfect. Let me start by saying that this book is about the histories and origins of subway systems around the world, not just New York, which adds a good air of perspective to the whole of the text. Much of the history is really kind of fascinating. It's interesting to read about how much of this technology was new, and much of it was an uncertain process born out of business instinct rather than a city mandate to expand the rapid transit system. Of course, all of that evolved to what these subways are today, but it's still an incredible process all the same. And reading about the sheer amount of work that crews were able to finish in such a short amount of time is really something remarkable. It makes you wonder why things take so long these days....

The two things I would say against this book are that 1) it tends to read a bit on the dry side and 2) it reads on the dry side because of the extreme level of detail given in the chapters. To be honest, I have no need to know that this first train model is RT-6000 and that he second model is the GE 492X (I'm totally making these numbers up, by the way.).

All in all, you could do worse if you were interested in reading about this subject.

[DW Rowlands · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title was a bit misleading---much of the book is a history of rapid transit in Boston and other American and European cities---but the part that covered New York (largely the IRT and the electrified regional rail) was very good, and the parts covering other cities were honestly even more valuable, given that much less tends to be written about trains in cities that aren't New York.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Title is deceptive, only one chapter really wholly focuses on the IRT and the NYC subway - other chapters discuss the rapid transit systems in Boston, London, Paris, ect and electrified commuter rail service in the New York area. Still a very good book and a must read for transit buffs.

[Jack Laschenski · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating story of late 19th and early 20th century subway building all over the world.

And the story of electric motors.

And of finance - all of them went bankrupt!!!