Yisroel R.

Did you know that more than 100 years ago, New York City began constructing an underwater railway tunnel connecting Brooklyn and Staten Island, near where the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge stands today, only to abandon the project before it was ever completed?

The little-known project, known as the Staten Island Tunnel, was intended to create a direct railway connection between the two boroughs, allowing trains to travel beneath the Narrows and providing Staten Island with a rail link to Brooklyn and the rest of the city’s transit network.

Construction officially began in 1923 under Mayor John Hylan, with work taking place near Owl’s Head Park in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The ambitious project was expected to transform transportation between the boroughs at a time when Staten Island remained largely disconnected from the city’s expanding subway system.

However, just two years later, in 1925, construction came to a halt. Funding difficulties, political disputes, and disagreements over the tunnel’s intended use contributed to the project’s abandonment, leaving a section excavated right beneath our feet.

The unfinished excavation remained beneath Bay Ridge, while the Staten Island construction shaft was eventually filled in. Over the following decades, various proposals were introduced to try to revive the idea of the railway project, but none of those attempts moved forward to completion.

Today, more than a century after construction began, Staten Island remains the only New York City borough without a direct subway connection to the others. The unfinished tunnel serves as a reminder of an ambitious transportation project that began beneath the Narrows but never reached the other side.