[Additional photos and comments on the fleet are in  Picture Gallery 3 Equipment]

The original cars for the Tubes were supplied in the period 1908 through the late 1920s (mostly by American Car and Foundry Co.) and were colloquially known as the "black cars". Then, as now, they were electrically powered with 650V DC obtained from a third rail.

These original cars were all steel, one of the first fleets of this type, running under the MU system propulsion. Contemporary reports made much of the cars being free of all wood and of being fireproof, down to the cushions and the cement floors [which were impregnated with carborundum for better wear and tear resistance as well as to prevent slipping. With the trains running in narrow tunnels under both land and water, again a relative first, the public had to be assured that it was especially safe from fire. The cars were to seat 50 passengers [in reality the number of seated passengers turned out to be slightly less, usually 44]. These cars were 51'-0" long,  8'-10.5" wide and 11'-8.5" high, weighing in at 79,200 lbs. 

Also unusual or a first in these cars were the doors: not only were there doors at each end of the cars as the public had been used to on the elevateds, but there also were center doors on the sides of the cars operated with compressed air by the motorman. Here too contemporary publicity tried to assure the public that there would be no danger from these side doors because the passengers could slow down the rate of the closing doors by pressing with the hand against the door.

Original plans called for 250 of these cars running in the rush hours as eight car trains on a maximum 90 second headway. The running time between Hudson Terminal and Exchange Place was set at 3 minutes; Hudson Terminal Erie at 6 minutes; and Hudson Terminal Hoboken at 10 minutes.

Original estimates said the cars could carry 600,000 passengers per day, or 219 million per year. [In fact, the high point of the system so far has been 113 million passengers in 1927.]

With the opening of the Manhattan Transfer - Newark extension in 1911 a slightly different car series was added, the MD-38 "red cars". Some of these  were owned by the H&M, some by the PRR and the cars were used for the joint service west of Journal Square.

The declining financial fortunes of the H&M prevented any major replacement or modernization of the rolling stock. There had been talk of replacement stock, either new or more likely re-built, in the early 1950s - in fact the Tubes displayed a full size mock up of a proposed modernized car design on Jan. 24, 1950.  But nothing came of these plans.

Some of the  cars which entered service on the Tubes' opening day were still in service in the early 1960s, a half century later. It was only with the introduction of the K-Series in 1958 that these cars could start to  be withdrawn from passenger service. [Click images for full view of this "black car".]

The Tubes' continuing financial problems also meant that almost a quarter of a century after their introduction and after the change from private to public ownership (1987), the K-Series cars were still in daily service. 

The K-cars were part of the last ditch efforts to keep the Tubes running under private ownership. Under Trustee Herman Stichman steps were undertaken to improve the railroad's services and to regain its public. On August 31, 1955 the H&M began testing an experimental air conditioned car [which the New York Subway had declared to be impractical] and on July 19, 1956 the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Hudson Tubes  announced a contract for 50 air-conditioned MU cars for the joint Hudson Terminal-Newark service with the Pennsylvania Railroad. A little over a year later on August 22, 1956 the H&M conducted  the first test of a  prototype of a Pullman-Standard air-conditioned car for 60 guests between Hudson Terminal and Hoboken. 

The K-cars had been delivered in 1958 by the St. Louis Car Co. and began going into service on July 9, 1958 when the first 5 [of 50 new PRR/H&M cars] began carrying passengers. Thirty of the order were designated by the PRR as "Class MP52", while twenty were known by the H&M as "Class K" . They were the first fully air conditioned subway car series in the world. The 47 K-cars measured 51' long, 9' high and 12' long, weighed 69,300 lbs and seated 44. The K Car's passenger carrying capacity was unusually high and efficient.

Cars number 1200-1229 belonged to the H&M, while cars number 1230-1249 were owned by the Pennsylvania Railroad (later the Penn Central), the operating partner for the Journal Square<>Newark segment. After 1967 the PA leased these "PRR cars" from Conrail, the successor to the PRR, until the PA authority folded the Journal Square <> Newark route into the main system, also abolishing the fare surcharge. 

The K-cars, besides being air conditioned, something unusual at the time for transit, offered a very high level of passenger comfort. They were unusually quiet, not merely in comparison with the half century old cars which they were replacing but also in absolute terms. The ride too was a more refined ride than was usual in transit vehicles. In some ways passenger comfort actually suffered when the new PA car series began replacing the K-cars. [Here is a summary history of the K-car by Frank Miklos the treasurer of NJERHS.]

One of the first major steps the PA took was to begin replacing the Tubes fleet, the overwhelming majority of which had been in service for over half a century and which had been victim to "deferred maintenance" for several decades.

On April 8, 1965 the PA placed the first 6 of the 162 new air conditioned cars into service under the name "Class PA-1" and all the old "black cars" were to be retired or converted to work train service by the end of that year. The new series bore car numbers 100-151 and 600-709; the PA-2 series (car numbers 152-181 and 710-723) began going into service in 1977. Both these series were built by the United States firm, St. Louis Car Division of General Steel Industries, Inc.

By 1972, however, when bids were solicited for the new PA-3 series of cars  (cars 724-769), the United States had become a land focussed on private automobile transportation and American builders of rapid transit equipment had disappeared. Thus, there were no suitable offers from United States firms.  And so the PA-3 series was supplied by the Canadian firm, Hawker-Siddley Canada Ltd. 

Now there was another "first" for the Tubes: besides having the the first series of fully air conditioned cars (K-Series),  besides having the first fully air conditioned fleet in the world, besides having the first fully air conditioned subway station in the world (World Trade Center), besides having the first long passenger transport beltway (at Erie), the Tubes now were the first American transit  system to purchase foreign subway cars (and with public money). This caused a storm of outrage from organized labor and the dispute went so far as to involve the United States Congress. Although the US transit building industry has recovered somewhat in the intervening years, the PA-4 Series of cars (car numbers 800-894 from 1987) was also supplied by a foreign firm, Kawasaki Heavy Industries Ltd., although the cars were partially assembled in the United States.

By the late 1980s the PA-1, PA-2 and PA-3 car series had been rebuilt to match the technical specifications of the PA-4 series (these rebuilt cars have an  "R" as part of their car number) and there now was a unified fleet with only minor variations. (For example, the PA-4 series has a stainless steel body and trucks as well as six double doors instead of the 4 in the older series. There also is  a slightly different window layout than that found in the PA-1 through 3 series.)  When the PA-1 through PA-3 series were rebuilt, of immediate interest to most passengers was that they had lost their cross seats and now there was only side seating, as the PA-4 series had had from the beginning. Each car now has 35 seats with room for 130 standees. 

The cars weigh approximately 69,000 pounds, are 51 feet long and have a  width of approximately 9 feet 4 inches. The nominal top speed of the cars is given at 70 mph but the top service speed is approximately 55 mph. 

At one period the PA installed shields at the ends of the cars which were named after cities and towns inside the Port Authority's geographic area, i.e. a  twenty-five mile radius circle on the Statue of Liberty. A few of the cars so designated are #139 (PA-1, C car) Montvale; #143 (PA-1, C-car) Freehold; #612 (PA-1) Wyckoff; #750 (PA-3) West New York; #160 (PA-2, C-car) River Edge; #745 (PA-3) Madison.  Click this image for a close up of one of the shields.

 There have been ongoing rebuilds of the PA order cars to include such things as meeting Federal ADA standards, as seen in this photo from www.nycrail.com .

By 1999 the fleet rolling stock consisted of 267 rail cars which had not been replaced since the PA-4 order so that the average age of the fleet is now 26 years. In the Spring of 2001 the PA announced plans to rehabilitate or replace all the cars in the system, purchasing 295 new cars and overhauling 95 existing vehicles. 

After the terrorist attacks that policy was reconfirmed with an expansion in the number of cars. Beginning in 2008 the PATH tubes fleet is to be almost completely replaced with 340 new cars as part of a  $499 million contract with Kawasaki Rail Car Inc. to design and build the new PATH rail cars. The new PATH cars are to have improved lighting, air conditioning and heating; cantilevered seats with room underneath for passengers to store items; prerecorded station announcements; better signs; and three door sets on each side to allow for faster loading and unloading. The Port Authority announced that it expects to have the first of the new PATH cars in service in late 2008 and re-confirmed this in the Winter of 2008. The entire fleet will be replaced by 2011.

A PATH car seldom seen in service by the public is this PATH engine bringing PATH cars to the Lackawanna Terminal's surface tracks for a festival in 2002, click to see full size. From chuchubob

Cars are maintained now in the PATH's Harrison Maintenance Facility in the Meadows between Journal Square and Harrison. For over 80 years, however, until October 12, 1990, work was carried out at the Henderson Street yards sandwiched tightly into a commercial area of Lower Jersey City a few blocks from Grove Street station. Paul Carleton has this schematic of the Grove Yards in his book The Hudson & Manhattan Railroad Revisited and a view of the yards is depicted in David Pirmann's photo. 

[Additional photos and comments on the fleet are in  Picture Gallery 3 Equipment] 

Paul Carleton presents this table of PATH equipment in his book The Hudson & Manhattan Railroad Revisited.

© B Klapouchy 1987-2008