One hundred years ago, the city of Cincinnatti, Ohio, decided to build a system of underground tunnels. These tunnels were abandoned even before being used for the first time what made the Cincinnatti subway a national shame.
The story that we are going to tell you in the following Supercurioso article, happened at the beginning of s. XX. At this time, there were great problems of congestion in the streets so it was thought that a good solution would be the underground transport . Cincinnati was, at that time, one of the 10 largest cities in the United States.
The leaders of this city came up with the idea of building their own underground railroad after seeing an illustration in the Cincinatti Chart in 1884. It was an illustration of channels that had been drained, as they were becoming a habitat for harmful mosquitoes The solution was to cover them by a street which allowed all the traffic of trains to pass through these underground channels. They were so admired by this illustration that they decided to create a similar proposal for the Miami and Erie Canal.
Plan for the new Cincinnatti metro
In 1910 the project to build the new Cincinnatti metro was devised , an underground system of 26 kilometers that was going to surround the city. The majority of the inhabitants of the city gave their approval to the project and its construction finally began in 1920. Henry Thomas Hunt led the project and in 1911 the Ohio State Legislature leased a part of the canal for construction.
The plan was to build an underground branch that would go to the center of the city . On the streets of Brighton and Saint Bernard, the Cincinnatti metro had to surface and extend over the Ohio River.
The Municipal Council authorized the issuance of 6 million in bonds, with an interest rate of 4.25% to cover construction expenses. The population agreed to allocate such amount to the construction of the Cincinnatti metro. But the first setback was not long in coming. The United States entered the First World War , so the work stopped because at that time the issuance of bonds was not allowed.
So only three years after starting the works, the work was abandoned and the main causes that justified this fact were the increase in costs after the war, the constant political disputes and the Great Depression.
At the end of the war the construction works were resumed although with an increase in the price of the construction, so it was necessary to cancel part of this construction. It was soon evident that the original plan to build a new Cincinnatti subway had failed. At that time the policy came on the scene. Numerous fights of the different political parties happened that did not do other thing than to enclave still more the project.
In January 1929, finally, the mayor of Cincinnatti suspended the Rapid Transit Commission in charge of the project and took control. Every effort was made to raise enough funds to complete the works but a new setback made it impossible; the Wall Street accident of 1929.
At that time cars also began to become increasingly popular and that only served as an argument to critics who were against the construction of the Cincinnati subway.
But the people, in spite of all the details that had happened, still believed in the construction of this underground railway, but unfortunately, a new setback undid any hope. The Second World War and the Great Depression put an end to any opportunity to complete the project.
The result was that after the time invested, almost 50 years, the money spent and even the lives of some workers who claimed the project, all was in vain and there was a debt of 13 million dollars that was not paid until 1966.
The only good news from this whole story is that the Cincinnatti subway is still in good condition and is not completely closed , the Cincinnati Advance company makes trips through the tunnels twice a year, so the curious can legally visit the longest abandoned subway system in the United States. Also, if you are one of those who are looking for adventures, you should know that some of the visitors of these tunnels claim to have witnessed certain supernatural events. Who knows, maybe it's the ghosts of the workers who lost their lives in the construction of the subway.
What do you think about the history of the Cincinnatti subway? Would you like to be one of those adventurers and take a spooky tour of its tunnels? Join us and we will be happy to read you!