car float

{{More citations needed section|date=February 2021}}

{{split|Car float operations in New York Harbor|date=March 2024}}

During the Civil War, Union general Herman Haupt, a civil engineer, used huge barges fitted with tracks to enable military trains to cross the Rappahannock River in support of the Army of the Potomac.{{cite book|last1=Wolmar|first1=Christian|title=Engines of War|date=2012|publisher=Atlantic Books|location=London|isbn=9781848871731|page=49}}

Beginning in the 1830s, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) operated a car float across the Potomac River, just south of Washington, D.C., between Shepherds Landing on the east shore, and Alexandria, Virginia on the west. The ferry operation ended in 1906.{{cite book |title= Impossible Challenge: The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in Maryland | last=Harwood | first=Herbert H. Jr. |year=1979 |publisher= Barnard, Roberts |location= Baltimore, MD |isbn=0-934118-17-5 }}

The B&O operated a car float across the Baltimore Inner Harbor until the mid-1890s. It connected trains from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C., and points to the west. The operation ended after the opening of the Baltimore Belt Line in 1895.

The Port of New York and New Jersey had many car float operations, which lost ground to the post-World War II expansion of trucking, but held out until the rise of containerization in the 1970s.{{cite book |title= Box Boats: How Container Ships Changed the World |last= Cudahy |first= Brian J. |year= 2006 |publisher= Fordham University Press |location= New York, NY |isbn= 0-8232-2568-2 |pages= [https://archive.org/details/boxboats00bria/page/45 45–47] |url-access= registration |url= https://archive.org/details/boxboats00bria/page/45 }}

These car floats operated between the Class 1 railroads terminals on the west bank of Hudson River in Hudson County, New Jersey and the numerous online and offline terminals located in Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, the Bronx, and Manhattan.{{cite book |title= New York Harbor Railroads in Color, Volume 1 |last= Flagg |first= Thomas R. |year=2000 |publisher= Morning Sun Books |location= Scotch Plains, NJ |isbn=1-58248-082-6 }}{{cite book |title=New York Harbor Railroads in Color, Volume 2 |last= Flagg |first= Thomas R. |year=2002 |publisher= Morning Sun Books |location= Scotch Plains, NJ |isbn=1-58248-048-6 }} Class 1 railroads in the New York Harbor area providing car float services were:

• Baltimore and Ohio RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 16–23.Flagg, 2002, pp. 26–29.
• Central Railroad of New JerseyFlagg, 2000, pp. 24–33.Flagg, 2002, pp. 38–39.
• Delaware, Lackawanna and Western RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 34–45.Flagg, 2002, pp. 40–51.
• Erie Railroad and Erie Lackawanna RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 46–55.Flagg, 2002, pp. 52–57.
• Lehigh Valley RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 56–61.Flagg, 2002, pp. 58–63.
• Long Island Rail RoadFlagg, 2000, pp. 62–65.Flagg, 2002, pp. 64–67.
• New York Central RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 66–83.Flagg, 2002, pp. 68–93.
• New York, New Haven and Hartford RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 84–91.Flagg, 2002, pp. 94–97.
• Pennsylvania RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 92–101.Flagg, 2002, pp. 98–109.

As well as the offline terminal railroads:

• Brooklyn Eastern District TerminalFlagg, 2002, pp. 110–116.
• Bush Terminal/Industry CityFlagg, 2000, pp. 118–125.Flagg, 2002, pp. 120–127.
• Brooklyn Army Terminal
• Hoboken Manufacturers RailroadFlagg, 2000, pp. 126–127.
• Jay Street Connecting RailroadFlagg, 2002, p. 118.
• New York Dock RailwayFlagg, 2000, pp. 110–117.Flagg, 2002, p. 119.
• Pouch TerminalFlagg, 2002, p. 117.
• East Jersey Railroad and Terminal Co.

Car float service was also provided to many pier stations and waterfront warehouse facilities (that did not engage in car floating service directly) by the above-mentioned railroads.

At their peak, the railroads had 3,400 employees operating small fleets totalling 323 car floats, plus 1,094 other barges, towed by 150 tugboats between New Jersey and New York City.

Abandoned float bridges are preserved as part of this history at:

• Gantry Plaza State Park in Long Island City, Queens; (former Long Island Railroad),
• West 26th Street float bridge (former Baltimore & Ohio) and the only surviving wood Howe truss float bridge in New York Harbor
• North River Pier 66a, and 69th Street Transfer Bridge (former New York Central)

Several other abandoned but unrestored float bridges exist in other locations around New York Harbor. A complete list is available at

[http://www.trainweb.org/bedt/IndustrialLocos.html#Surviving Surviving Float Bridges of New York Harbor]

The Bay Coast Railroad formerly operated a 2-barge car float connecting Virginia's Eastern Shore with the city of Norfolk, Virginia across the Chesapeake Bay.

File:Tug and Barge at Erie Street.png

Between 1912 and 1936, the Erie Railroad operated a car float service on the Chicago River in Chicago, Illinois.{{cite journal | title=Erie Railroad's Chicago River Service | author=Sennstrom, Bernard H. | journal=The Diamond | year=1992 | volume=7 | issue=1 | pages=4–10}}

• Santa Fe Railroad: San Francisco
• Southern Pacific Railroad: (?)
• Union Pacific Railroad: (?)
• Western Pacific Railroad: San Francisco
• Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad: Seattle; Tacoma, Washington; Bellingham, Washington; Port Townsend, Washington
• Seattle and North Coast Railroad: Seattle; Port Townsend, Washington

File:Woodf3a.jpg]]

File:Rail Barge in Howe Sound.jpg

• Prince Rupert, British Columbia – Whittier, Alaska (Aquatrain, Service ended in April 2021.{{cite web | url=https://www.alaskarails.org/industries/aquatrain/last/index.html | title=The Last AquaTrain | date=2021}})
• Various inland lakes of British Columbia (Okanagan{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}, Arrow{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}, Kootenay){{citation needed|date=July 2022}} (Canadian National Railway and CPR)
• Port Maitland, Ontario – Erie, Pennsylvania (TH&B Navigation Company)
• Port Burwell, Ontario – Ashtabula, Ohio (CN)
• Cobourg, Ontario – Rochester, New York (Ontario Car Ferry Company)
• Sarnia, Ontario – Port Huron, Michigan – rail-barge – (CN, until the opening of the Paul Tellier Tunnel). The rail ferries Pere Marquette 12 and Pere Marquette 10 were converted to barges (PM 10 in 1974, PM 12 in the 1980s) and used until 1995 to carry dangerous cargoes and oversize cars.[http://www.pmhistsoc.org/ferries.shtml#lakemich The Pere Marquette Marine Fleet], Pere Marquette Historical Society, 10-MAY-2011, accessed July 16, 2012
• Windsor, Ontario – Detroit, Michigan (Grand Trunk, CN, CPR, Michigan Central, Wabash, until the 1980s){{citation needed|date=July 2012}}
• BC Rail. until 1955 railcars were barged from North Vancouver to Squamish.
• A large number of isolated BC pulp mills had chemicals and freight moved by car floats.
• In the Victoria Harbour to Ogden Point{{Cite web |url=https://www.jamesbaybeacon.com/home/2020/10/18/then-and-now-the-ogden-point-grain-elevator |title=car float |access-date=2021-04-26 |archive-date=2021-04-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210426170337/https://www.jamesbaybeacon.com/home/2020/10/18/then-and-now-the-ogden-point-grain-elevator |url-status=usurped }}[https://www.flickr.com/photos/37908073@N04/3661243327 Greg George]

The Alaska Railroad provides the Alaska Rail Marine rail barge service from downtown Seattle to Whittier on the central Alaskan mainland.[http://www.alaskarailroad.com/corporate/Corporate/FreightServices/AlaskaRailMarine/tabid/394/Default.aspx Alaska Rail Marine] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131221081655/http://www.alaskarailroad.com/corporate/Corporate/FreightServices/AlaskaRailMarine/tabid/394/Default.aspx |date=December 21, 2013 }}', CN Rail provided the Aquatrain rail barge service from Prince Rupert, British Columbia to Whittier.{{Cite web |url=http://www.cn.ca/en/shipping-north-america-alaska-aquatrain-cnworldwide.htm |title=Aqua train |access-date=2011-03-05 |archive-date=2018-09-30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180930192839/https://www.cn.ca/en/shipping-north-america-alaska-aquatrain-cnworldwide.htm |url-status=dead }} Service ended in April 2021.

Image:Bay Ridge Float Dock jeh.JPG, Brooklyn, New York.]]

The only remaining car float service in operation in the Port of New York and New Jersey is operated by New York New Jersey Rail. This company, operated by the bi-state government agency Port Authority of New York & New Jersey is the successor to the New York Cross Harbor Railroad. Car float service operates between 65th Street / Bay Ridge Yard in Brooklyn and Greenville Yard in Jersey City, New Jersey.{{cite web|url=http://nynjr.com/route-map/|title=Route Map|website=New York New Jersey Rail, LLC|access-date=2017-06-03}} The service exists because freight cars do not run in the East River Tunnels nor the North River Tunnels (under the Hudson River), in part due to inadequate tunnel clearances of the New York Tunnel Extension.

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• Bay Ridge Branch
• Cross-Harbor Rail Tunnel (proposed)
• Ferry slip (includes examples of rail ferry and barge slips)
• Linkspan
• New York tugboats
• Santa Fe Dock and Channel Company

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{{reflist|30em}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20061001020615/http://www.geh.org/fm/feininger/htmlsrc/m197806060008_ful.html Railroad ferry, Hudson River, New York], Andreas Feininger, 1940. Still Photograph Archive, George Eastman House, Rochester, NY.
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070930095203/http://www.nynjr.com/index.php NYNJ Rail] – official site
• [http://www.freightrrofnyc.info Industrial & Offline Terminal Railroads of Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, Bronx & Manhattan]

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Category:Ship types

Category:Train ferries