Newark Light Rail
A Newark Light Rail train crosses Broad Street byBears & Eagles Riverfront Stadium inNewark, New Jersey
Overview
Owner	New Jersey Transit
Locale	Essex County
Termini	Newark Penn Station Grove Street (City Subway Line) Newark Broad Street (Broad Street Extension)
Stations	17
Website	njtransit.com
Service
Type	Light rail
System	New Jersey Transit
Services	2
Operator(s)	New Jersey Transit Bus Operations
Rolling stock	21 Kinki Sharyo LRVs
Ridership	5,431,305[1]
History
Opened	May 26,1935 (City Subway)[2] July 17, 2006 (Broad Street Extension)[3]
Technical
Line length	6.2 mi (10.0 km)[4]
Track gauge	4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)standard gauge
Minimum radius	33 ft (10.058 m)[5]
Electrification	Overhead line, 750 V DC
Operating speed	50 mph (80 km/h)
Route map Show interactive map Show system map Legend Watsessing Avenue NJTMontclair-Boonton Line proposed extension Orange Branch Grove Street     Silver Lake Orange Branch Branch Brook Park Heller Parkway Davenport Avenue  29┃Bloomfield Avenue  Bloomfield Avenue Park Avenue I-280  21┃Orange via Orange  Orange Street  23┃Central Avenue  Norfolk Street Warren Street/NJIT  21┃Orange via Market  Washington Street Military Park NJTMorristown Line & Montclair-Boonton Line Newark Broad Street     NJTMorristown Line & Montclair-Boonton Line Riverfront Stadium Harriet Tubman Square┃Atlantic Street Cedar Street Subway NJPAC/Center Street Public Service Terminal Northeast Corridor toBoston PATH toWorld Trade Center Newark Penn Northeast Corridor toWashington Key light rail &rapid transit main line &commuter rail formersurface lines Newark City Subway Broad Street Extension This diagram: view talk edit Show route diagram map

TheNewark Light Rail (NLR) is alight rail system servingNewark, New Jersey, and surrounding areas, owned byNew Jersey Transit and operated byits bus operations division. The service consists of two segments, the originalNewark City Subway (NCS), and the extension toBroad Street station.^[6][7] The City Subway opened on May 26, 1935, while the combined Newark Light Rail service was officially inaugurated on July 17, 2006.^[3]

The Newark City Subway is the longer and older of the two segments.^[8] It is a"subway–surface" line^[9][10] which runs underground from Penn Station to Warren Street, and above-ground north of Warren Street. Before becoming a part of the Newark Light Rail service, it was also known as the#7-City Subway line, an NJT Bus Operations route number carried over from its days when it was part ofPublic Service'sTransport of New Jersey subsidiary. The number still applies internally. During subway system closures, replacement buses would also bear the route number "7 City Subway".

The segment is 5.3 mi (8.5 km) long and runs between Grove Street inBloomfield andNewark Penn Station, a major transportation hub with connections to thePATH rapid transit system toManhattan, multiple bus routes, and bothAmtrak andNew Jersey Transit Rail Operations trains.

The line opened in 1935 along the oldMorris Canal right-of-way, from Broad Street (now known asMilitary Park) to Heller Parkway (now replaced by the nearbyBranch Brook Park station).^[11]Works Progress Administration artists decorated the underground stations withArt Deco scenes from life on the defunct Morris Canal. The southernmost part, south of Warren Street, was capped with a new road, known asRaymond Boulevard. Only onegrade crossing was present on the original subway; the line crosses Orange Street at grade so it can pass over the below-gradeDelaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (now NJTMorristown Line) immediately to the north. The original Newark City Subway line had its ownright-of-way and did not share city streets with local traffic, except at the Orange Street grade crossing.

Operation of the complete subway to the newly builtPenn Station was delayed until 1937. The terminal below Penn Station has five tracks, two incoming and three outgoing, connected by two loop tracks. This part of the subway included a grade-separated junction with a connection to the lower level of theNewark Public Service Terminal that was used for only a few months (June to September).

An extension to a wooden station at North 6th Street or Franklin Avenue was opened in 1940, located north of the present Branch Brook Park station. In 1953 the line was cut back about one block to accommodate construction of a turning loop, and a new station, still called Franklin Avenue, was opened adjacent to Anthony Street. The station was enlarged in 2002 and renamed Branch Brook Park.

The subway was operated by Transport of New Jersey (formerly Public Service Coordinated Transport) as its No. 7 line. Other streetcar routes used parts of the subway, reaching street trackage at the locations shown below, ending as each route was closed and replaced by bus service:

• Public Service Terminal connection (andCedar Street Subway), 1937 only: #13 Broad, #17 Paterson, #27 Mount Prospect, #43 Jersey City
• Warren Street ramp, 1935–1951: #21 Orange—West Orange via Market Street
• Central Avenue ramp, 1935–1947: #23 Central
• Orange Street crossing, 1935–1952: #21 Orange—West Orange via Orange Street
• Bloomfield Avenue ramp, 1935–1952: #29 Bloomfield

Until June 5, 1952, theRoseville Car House, on the south side of Main Street (on the No. 21 line) near the eastern city line ofEast Orange, was used for the No. 7 line. From that time until 2002, Newark Penn Station was used for storage and maintenance. A new shops and yard complex opened at the end of the extension to Grove Street.

Starting in January 1954, 30PCC streetcars bought fromTwin City Rapid Transit provided all service on the route. They were single-ended, requiring construction of a new turning loop at the Franklin Avenue terminal. The cars had been built 1946–1949 by theSt. Louis Car Company and were sold by TCRT when that system went through a conversion to buses. Four cars were scrapped over the years, and two were sold toShaker Heights Rapid Transit in 1978.

New Jersey Transit took over operations in 1980.

In 2001, newlight rail cars built byKinki Sharyo in Japan in 1999 replaced the PCCs. The last day of PCC service was August 24, 2001.^[12]

Some of the PCCs are stored in the Newark City Subway shop. Eleven were sold in 2004 to theSan Francisco Municipal Railway for use on itsF Market heritage streetcar line.^[13] One PCC, #15, was delivered to theConnecticut Trolley Museum in 2013 for restoration and display. One of the Shaker Heights cars has been restored by theMinnesota Transportation Museum, which operates it on a short stretch of track in westernMinneapolis.

In 2005, eight PCCs were given to the City ofBayonne to be rehabilitated and operated along a proposed 2.5-mile (4 km) loop to serve thePeninsula at Bayonne Harbor, formerlyMilitary Ocean Terminal at Bayonne (MOTBY). The proposed line would be connected to the34th Street station of theHudson-Bergen Light Rail.^[14]

On September 4, 2004, Broad Street Station was renamed Military Park Station, to avoid confusion with the terminal of the new route to theNewark Broad Street Station at University Avenue, operated by New Jersey Transit.

On June 22, 2002, the Newark City Subway was extended to the suburbs ofBelleville andBloomfield along what had been the formerErie Railroad Orange Branch, now underNorfolk Southern ownership. New stations were opened atSilver Lake andGrove Street, and the Heller Parkway and Franklin Avenue stations were combined into a new Branch Brook Park station. The loop at Franklin Avenue was removed, since the new vehicles are bidirectional, unlike the old PCCs. A new loop, however, is in place at the Grove Street facility. All the street crossings on the extension areat-grade.^[15]

The original agreement gave sole operating privileges to Norfolk Southern between 11 pm and 5 am daily, but a new agreement allows passenger service to operate at all hours, with late-night service commencing on January 8, 2005. In exchange, Norfolk Southern can now operate during all off-peak hours, when passenger trains are infrequent.

The Broad Street Extension is the second segment of the Newark Light Rail. It was planned as the first phase of theNewark-Elizabeth Rail Link. The line is one mile (1.6 km) long and connects Newark Penn Station toBroad Street Station. It branches off the older City Subway using the existing junction that had led to thePublic Service terminal.^[16]

A new tunnel leads from the junction to a portal about two blocks north. The remaining section runs above ground. For a few blocks, the two tracks run on different streets a block or two apart. Both tracks serve theNew Jersey Performing Arts Center at Center Street. The outbound track makes stops atAtlantic Street and at the Riverfront Square development (formerly a baseball stadium) at theRiverfront Stadium station. The inbound track makes a stop atWashington Park. The extension opened on July 17, 2006.^[3][17][18]

Construction began in 2002 with an estimated cost of $207.7 million, or about $40,000 per foot of track;^[19] it was completed within budget.^[20] Projections were for 4,000 average weekday boardings after one year, growing to about 7,000 in 2010. Actual weekday boardings in 2010 for both Newark Light Rail lines combined were reported at 9,000.^[21]

The art work at the new stations has a common theme, "Riding with Sarah and Wayne." It is a tribute to Newark-born jazz greatsSarah Vaughan andWayne Shorter, and includes the lyrics to Vaughan's signature song, "Send in the Clowns," and colored bricks representing the music notes.

The Broad Street Extension was intended to ease connections between Newark's two rail stations. The two separate stations are a legacy of their roots in two separate railroads. Broad Street Station was once owned by the Lackawanna Railroad and its successor, theErie Lackawanna Railway, while Penn Station was built and owned by thePennsylvania Railroad. Previously, passengers wanting to transfer between Amtrak and the former PRR/Conrail commuter lines and the former (Erie) Lackawanna commuter lines had to make their own way (usually by taxi or bus) between the two stations.

The Newark Light Rail is equivalent to a one-zone bus ride: a one-way ticket costs $1.80 (as of July 1, 2024), and is valid on the entire system for one hour after the ticket is validated. A special $0.85 "Underground" fare is available for trips that use only the subway between Warren Street and Penn Station, not the surface portion. Through-ticketing is available for connecting bus routes. Monthly and weekly NJ Transit bus and rail passes valid for one or more local bus zones, as well as transfers purchased on buses, are also accepted.^[22]

The Newark Light Rail, like most light rail systems in the United States, operates on aproof-of-payment system, in which riders must present their tickets upon request during random fare inspections by police officers, transit workers, or fare agents. Passengers must purchase tickets atticket vending machines (TVMs) located on station platforms or near station entrances. The tickets can also be purchased via the New Jersey Transit mobile app. One-way, round-trip, and ten-trip tickets must then be validated, either by the app or with paper tickets, through automated validators located near the TVMs, which stamp the date and time on the ticket for 60 minutes of use. NJ Transit's fare inspectors randomly check tickets on trains and at stations; fare evasion carries a fine of up to $100.^[23] On thePCC streetcars, cash fares (exact fare) were paid on board via farebox, except for a brief period starting in October 1999 prior to the introduction ofLRVs, when proof-of-payment fare collection was instituted.

Location	Station	Opened	Transfers	Ridership (2022)[24]	Notes
Newark	Newark Penn	June 20, 1937	Amtrak:Northeast Corridor services NJ Transit Rail:■ Northeast Corridor Line,■ North Jersey Coast Line,■ Raritan Valley Line PATH:NWK-WTC NJ Transit Bus Greyhound,BoltBus	898
	Military Park	May 26, 1935[25]	NJ Transit Bus	No Data	Named Broad Street until September 4, 2004.[26] Served theNewark Public Service Terminal
	Washington Street		NJ Transit Bus	532
	Warren Street/NJIT		NJ Transit Bus	549	Named Warren Street until 2011.[27]
	Norfolk Street		NJ Transit Bus	587
	Orange Street		NJ Transit Bus	735
	Park Avenue		NJ Transit Bus	923
	Bloomfield Avenue		NJ Transit Bus	865
	Davenport Avenue			411
	Heller Parkway	May 26, 1935[25]			Closed June 21, 2002.[28]
	Branch Brook Park	November 22, 1940[29]	NJ Transit Bus	1,343	Named North Sixth Street until 1953 and Franklin Avenue until August 27, 2001.[30]
Belleville	Silver Lake	June 22, 2002[28]	NJ Transit Bus	388
Bloomfield	Grove Street		NJ Transit Bus	458

All stations are in Newark.

Station	Opened	Transfers	Ridership (2022)[31]	Notes
Newark Penn	June 20, 1937	Amtrak:Northeast Corridor services NJ Transit Rail:■ Northeast Corridor Line,■ North Jersey Coast Line,■ Raritan Valley Line PATH NJ Transit Bus Greyhound,BoltBus	898
NJPAC/Center Street	July 17, 2006[32]		3,650
Line splits into one-way directions
Harriet Tubman Square	July 17, 2006[32]	NJ Transit Bus	95	Southbound only
Atlantic Street			4	Northbound only
Riverfront Stadium			38
Lines re-converge entering Broad Street
Broad Street	July 17, 2006[32]	NJ Transit Rail:■ Gladstone Branch,■ Montclair–Boonton Line,■ Morristown Line NJ Transit Bus	253

On weekdays, service operates separately between the two sections. On weekends, service operates jointly.

The Newark Light Rail system uses a new-model vehicle built byKinki Sharyo of Japan. This model is the same one used by theHudson-Bergen Light Rail system, although the ones used on the Newark Light Rail were built with slight modifications to the trucks and wheels due to the different rails used. Like the HBLR vehicles, the NLR vehicle is a double-articulated vehicle with three sections. Each of the two end sections has an operator's cab at the far end, thus eliminating the need for the vehicle to turn itself around physically in order to reverse direction. Each end section also has seating for 16 passengers on an upper level, and seating for 13 passengers on the lower level, including one specialfold-down seat next to an empty space that a passenger using a wheelchair may use. With these two sections, and a middle section that seats ten passengers (five on each side), the vehicle can comfortably accommodate 68 seated passengers and two wheelchairs. An additional 122 passengers could stand in the vehicle, if necessary. Vehicles can be coupled into two-unit sets. A contract to expand 10 of the 20 LRVs assigned to the Newark Light Rail system for the purpose of increasing passenger capacity was approved on July 9, 2014.^[33]

TheSeashore Trolley Museum in Kennebunkport, ME acquired PCC #5 in 2011.^[34] The car represents the first piece of NJT rolling stock in the museum's collection. The car is currently undergoing restoration and rehabilitation work so that it may operate on the museum's1+1⁄2-mile demonstration railway. Car #5 joins the museum's already-extensive collection of PCC cars from numerous cities, includingBoston,Pittsburgh,Dallas, San Francisco,Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Kansas CIty.

• December 22, 1910: ThePublic Service Corporation first announces plans to build the subway, initially including a line under Broad Street from Bridge Street to Clinton Avenue^[35]
• October 3, 1934: The subway opens from Broad Street to Heller Parkway.^[29] The No. 21 line is routed onto the subway via the Warren Street Ramp and level junction at the Orange Street grade crossing. The No. 23 line is routed via the Norfolk Street Ramp. The No. 29 line starts using the Bloomfield Avenue Ramp.
• June 20, 1937: The extension to Newark Penn Station opens. This is the same day that the Hudson and Manhattan Railroad (present-dayPATH) withdraws service from its Park Place terminal and first operates into its new alignment at Newark Penn Station. The No. 13, #27 and No. 43 lines are rerouted to Penn Station via theCedar Street Subway; the No. 27 and No. 43 had used the lower level of theNewark Public Service Terminal.
• June 21, 1937: The No. 17 line is rerouted via the Cedar Street Subway.
• July 18, 1937: The No. 13 and No. 17 lines stop using the Cedar Street Subway.
• December 29, 1937: The No. 27 line stops using the Cedar Street Subway.
• May 1, 1938: The No. 43 line stops using the Cedar Street Subway, ending all service on that connection.
• November 22, 1940: The extension to North 6th Street (later Franklin Avenue) opens.
• December 14, 1947: The No. 23 line stops using the Norfolk Street Ramp.
• March 1, 1951: The No. 21 line stops using the Warren Street Ramp.
• March 29, 1952: The No. 21 line stops using the level junction at the Orange Street grade crossing.
• March 30, 1952: The No. 29 line stops using the Bloomfield Avenue ramps.
• January 8, 1954: The first PCC car uses the subway.
• October 1980: NJ Transit takes over operations.
• August 21, 1999: The subway is closed for two weeks for an overhaul.
• September 7, 1999: The subway reopens.
• August 24, 2001: The PCC cars are retired from service.^[18]
• August 27, 2001: The new light rail vehicles begin operation.^[36]
• June 21, 2002: Heller Parkway closes.^[37]
• June 22, 2002: Silver Lake and Grove Street open.^[37]
• September 4, 2004: Broad Street is renamed Military Park.^[26]
• January 8, 2005: Additional late-night service is provided to Grove Street.^[38]
• July 17, 2006: The Newark City Subway extension opens, with service betweenNewark Penn Station andNewark Broad Street. Service is rebranded as the Newark Light Rail.

The Newark City Subway has had a few accidents over the years:

• September 22, 1981 – Nine passengers injured when an incoming trolley rammed into the rear of a stationary trolley at Newark Penn Station.^[39]
• April 15, 2003 – A light rail vehicle was partially derailed at the grade crossing nearOrange Street Station when a box truck rammed the vehicle from the side. The signal was in the light rail vehicle's favor.^[40]
• August 23, 2008 – A dump truck making an illegal right turn crashed into a light rail vehicle at theWashington Park Station of the Broad Street segment causing it to partially derail. One passenger was injured.^[41]
• August 28, 2014 – A light rail vehicle crashed into a SUV between Atlantic Avenue and Broad Street. No passengers were injured.^[42]
• April 6, 2016 – A light rail vehicle was hit by a car on South Franklin Avenue. No passengers were injured.^[43]

• In November 2011 scenes for the movieThe Dark Knight Rises were filmed atMilitary Park station.^[44]

• Hudson–Bergen Light Rail
• River Line
• Light rail in the United States
• List of tram and light rail transit systems

• Edward Hamm, Jr.,The Public Service Trolley Lines in New Jersey.
• DOT Docket FRA-2000-7335-7 and −8.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toNewark Light Rail.

• NJ Transit – Light Rail Schedules
• Newark Light Rail & Proposals on Google Maps
• NYCSubway.org – Newark City Subway
• Abandoned Stations – Newark City Subway platforms
• Newark, New Jersey: The City Subway (Jon Bell website)

• Rail transportation in the New York metropolitan area
• Newark Light Rail
• 1935 establishments in New Jersey
• 750 V DC railway electrification
• Light rail in New Jersey
• New Jersey streetcar lines
• NJ Transit Rail Operations
• Public art in Newark, New Jersey
• Railway lines opened in 1935
• Rapid transit in New Jersey
• Standard-gauge railways in the United States
• Transportation in Essex County, New Jersey
• Transportation in Newark, New Jersey
• Underground rapid transit in the United States

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