Seventh Ave Looking North From 23rd Street

This photograph was taken by the City of New York to document construction along Seventh Avenue. The date is Tuesday, August 29 ,1916. The high temperature for the day was a comfortable 71 degrees.

The extension of the subway from Times Square south of Seventh Avenue to the Battery would necessitate ripping up the street along the route. The “cut and cover” method was the primary construction method in use. This involves digging a trench to construct the subway and temporarily covering it, until a permanent street surface would be laid.

Under New York – Electrical Age Oct 1 1916

While this was going on commerce would continue. Timbering covers much of the street. Trolley tracks are visible and in use and shops along the route open.

Also public utility, telephone, telegraph, gas, steam and electrical lines, pneumatic mail tubes, water and sewer pipes would need to exposed, protected, sometimes moved and kept intact.

When the street was opened it could look like this.

This work was all done without environmental impact review. The objective – get the job done quickly and at the lowest possible cost.

So people go about their business, crossing the street as horse drawn delivery wagons make their way to their destinations.

Safety was the responsibility of the pedestrian, not the construction crew.  If you got hurt tripping over an obstacle, it was not the city’s fault, it was yours.

Pay attention to all the debris strewn about the streets and sidewalks.

A man in a straw hat decides it is safe to cross Seventh Avenue. The workers gathering around some wood beams figure out their next move. Another man with a suitcase makes his way up Seventh Avenue, as a woman on the sidewalk waits for the lone automobile to pass heading west along 23rd Street.