Fifth Avenue Coach Company


The Fifth Avenue Coach Company was a bus operator in Manhattan, The Bronx, Queens, and Westchester County, New York, providing public transit between 1896 and 1954 after which services were taken over by the New York City Omnibus Corporation. It succeeded the Fifth Avenue Transportation Company.

History

The company was founded in 1896 when it succeeded the bankrupt Fifth Avenue Transportation Company. It initially operated existing horse-and-omnibus transit along Fifth Avenue, with a route running from 89th Street to Bleecker Street. Fifth Avenue is the only avenue in Manhattan never to see streetcar service due to the opposition of residents to the installation of railway track for streetcars. The company introduced electric buses two years later and was acquired by the newly formed New York Transportation Company in 1899.
They introduced a fleet of 15 of their own motorbuses in 1907 that operated along Fifth Avenue and on some crosstown routes. The company became independent of the New York Transportation Company in 1912.
In 1925, the year that they came under control of The Omnibus Corporation, the company purchased a majority share in the New York Railways Corporation.
When the New York Railways Corporation started converting streetcar lines to buses in 1935–36, the new replacement bus services were operated by the New York City Omnibus Corporation, which had been formed in 1926 and had shared management with The Omnibus Corporation. New York Railways Corporation was dissolved in 1936.
The New York and Harlem Railroad trolleys were replaced by Madison Avenue Coach Company, Inc. buses, and the Eighth and Ninth Avenue Railway trolleys by Eighth Avenue Coach Corporation buses, both companies owned by Fifth Avenue Coach.. Madison Avenue Coach and Eighth Avenue Coach were folded into New York City Omnibus in November 1951.
In 1954 The Omnibus Corporation sold the Fifth Avenue Coach Company to the New York City Omnibus Corporation which changed its name to Fifth Avenue Coach Lines two years later. In 1956, the company also acquired the Westchester Street Transportation Company, a bus company previously affiliated with the Third Avenue Railway. The same year, they also acquired the Surface Transportation Corporation, and allowed it to operate under a new name as a subsidiary of Fifth Avenue. After a strike in 1962, and a fight for control with financier Harry Weinberg, bus operations were taken over by the city. Buses in Westchester survived the strike and city takeover until they were acquired by Liberty Lines Transit in 1969.

Routes

The routes that were operated by the Fifth Avenue Coach Company are listed below.
RouteTerminal AMajor streets of travelTerminal B
1Washington Square ParkFifth AvenueHarlem
5 Avenue/138 Street
2Madison SquareFifth Avenue
Seventh Avenue
Edgecombe Avenue
Washington Heights
Broadway/167 Street
3Washington Square ParkFifth Avenue
St. Nicholas Avenue or Convent Avenue
St. Nicholas Avenue
Washington Heights
St. Nicholas Avenue/193 Street
4New York Penn StationFifth Avenue
Central Park North/Cathedral Parkway
Riverside Drive
Broadway
Fort Washington Avenue
The Cloisters
5/19Washington Square ParkFifth Avenue
West 57 Street
Broadway
Riverside Drive
Broadway
Riverside Drive
Washington Heights
Broadway/167 Street
6Upper West Side
West 72 Street
Central Park West
Broadway
West 57 Street
Fifth Avenue
East 72 Street
Yorkville
East 72 Street/York Avenue
9Washington Square ParkFifth Avenue
West 57 Street
Broadway
Upper West Side
West 72 Street
Central Park West
15Madison SquareFifth Avenue
Queensboro Bridge
Queens Boulevard
Roosevelt Avenue

  • Jackson Heights
Northern Boulevard/81 Street
or
  • Corona
Flushing Meadows–Corona Park
16Jackson Heights
Northern Boulevard/81 Street
81/82 Streets
Baxter Avenue
Broadway
Elmhurst
Broadway and Queens Boulevard
20Hell's Kitchen
12 Avenue/West 55 Street
57 Street CrosstownSutton Place
Sutton Place and East 59 Street