By Chris Polansky, The Bridge; February 19, 2019
On occasional moments of quiet in Brooklyn, when the sounds of honking horns and garbage trucks die down, residents can hear the lonely whistle of a freight train. Many might wonder where it’s coming from, since lines of boxcars are not a familiar sight in Kings County.
The answer is that a few freight trains still roll along the Bay Ridge Branch of the New York & Atlantic Railway, typically carrying goods bound for points east. The 12-mile stretch of track snakes across the borough from the harbor just south of the Brooklyn Army Terminal, through the low-rise blocks of Borough Park, past Brooklyn College’s stately campus, and through industrial zones in Flatlands, Canarsie and East New York, before terminating at a yard in Glendale, Queens.