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127-546: Industry City (also Bush Terminal ) is a historic intermodal shipping, warehousing, and manufacturing complex on the Upper New York Bay waterfront in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn , New York City . The northern portion, commonly called "Industry City" on its own, hosts commercial light manufacturing tenants across 6,000,000 square feet (560,000 m) of space between 32nd and 41st Streets, and

254-570: A trust fund for one of his nieces. Bush was succeeded by A.P. Timmerman as chairman of Bush Terminal Company, and by J.L. Hanigan as president of the company. A statue to him was dedicated in 1950 at Bush Terminal's administration building. By that year, the Bush Terminal Company only employed about 700 people, though about 40,000 people either were directly supported by jobs at Bush Terminal or lived nearby. The company had 300 manufacturing tenants spread across 120 buildings. In 1951,

381-549: A " quixotic " business venture. The Bush Company purchased an additional plot of land from the Hunt family in 1901, spanning between 41st and 50th Streets. At the time, the company already operated properties at the western ends of 41st and 42nd Streets, facing the waterfront. The Bush Company terminal business became the Bush Terminal Company in 1902 when Irving T. Bush bought the land from the Standard Oil Co. The same year,

508-570: A 1920 article in the Bush Company's magazine mentioned that the complex had 122 warehouses. The warehouses were used to store both raw and manufactured goods from Manhattan, in addition to materials offloaded from incoming ships and merchandise headed for distribution. The Bush Terminal Company also maintained a fleet of four steam lighters and seven tugboats that carried goods between the terminal and piers in Manhattan. By 1920, distribution

635-726: A Medal of Honor during one of these engagements. His larger 185-foot-long (56 m) diesel yacht, Coronet , built for him in Germany in 1928 and placed under his wife's name during the Great Depression, was bought by the Navy during World War II and patrolled the Caribbean as the USS Opal (Pyc-8) before being transferred to Ecuador in 1943, where it was scrapped in 1960. Bush left behind Bush Terminal, which not only provided

762-507: A brief list of notable American businessmen (including hotelier Ellsworth Milton Statler ) who were examples of the type of businesspeople whose "industrious, diligent, vigilant foundation-laying" could lead to successful business enterprises. Bush was frequently mentioned in newspaper and magazine articles and wrote a number of business-related stories of his own, including stories in Nation's Business , Harper's Weekly , and as president of

889-522: A club for buyers visiting New York. The Bush Terminal Company attempted a similar melding of commercial displays and social space at Bush House in London , built in three phases during the 1920s, but the concept was not fully carried through at that project. Despite the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, the Bush Terminal Company was initially unaffected. In early 1930, Irving Bush created

1016-514: A common courtyard with wings. The structure had a frontage of 460 feet on the west side of Second Avenue. Its wings ran westward from Second Avenue along 39th Street and 40th Street. It extended 335 feet each to a private street located off the bulkheads. The court measured 210 feet by 55 feet. The property on which the edifice was erected was purchased in part from the New York Dock Company for $ 30 million. The building's completion

1143-501: A court order from Inch. Legal disputes between Bush and the trustees continued, including a libel suit filed by the trustees against Bush that later had to be re-litigated. Operations at the terminal itself continued relatively unaltered through the 1930s. However, vacancy rates reached as high as 35% during the Depression. The United States Postal Service decided to relocate the area's post office out of Bush Terminal in 1934 because

1270-524: A crane. Handling equipment can be designed with intermodality in mind, assisting with transferring containers between rail, road and sea. These can include: According to the European Commission Transportation Department "it has been estimated that up to 25% of accidents involving trucks can be attributable to inadequate cargo securing". Cargo that is improperly secured can cause severe accidents and lead to

1397-624: A curved roof and insufficient strength for stacking. From 1928 the London, Midland & Scottish Railway offered "door to door" intermodal road-rail services using these containers. This standard failed to become popular outside the United Kingdom. Pallets made their first major appearance during World War II , when the United States military assembled freight on pallets, allowing fast transfer between warehouses , trucks, trains, ships , and aircraft . Because no freight handling

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1524-565: A federal prison, a privately operated manufacturing and commercial complex, and a garment manufacturing district operated by the NYCEDC. Today, the Bush Terminal site comprises roughly 71 acres (29 ha), including 16 former factory buildings and 11 warehouses built in the early 20th century. Renovations and expansions began in the 2010s. A major expansion of Industry City, which would add 3,000,000 square feet (280,000 m) of space to

1651-420: A fifth and sixth factory building were announced in mid-1909, with the same dimensions as the existing factory structures. Early tenants included those in the printing and paper industries, and many of these tenants would remain through the 1950s. In 1912, Irving Bush proposed that the city buy the Bush Terminal Company's piers, since the city had desired to purchase the company's waterfront land. Later that year,

1778-626: A fleet of tugboats specifically for car floats, each with three crews. Each tug pulled three or four car-float barges, which each measured 277 by 41 feet (84 by 12 m) and could hold up to 17 freight cars at a time. By 1957, two tugboats were still operating, both of which dated to 1905 and 1906. In its most active years, the Bush Terminal/Industry City complex contained seven covered piers, which each extended over 1,200 feet (370 m) into New York Harbor. Each pier measured 1,400 by 150 feet (427 by 46 m), and contained

1905-466: A landmark 30-story Neo-Gothic skyscraper on 42nd Street in Manhattan, just east of Times Square. The tower was conceived as display space for the manufacturers and shippers of Bush Terminal and New York. An even more ambitious venture was Bush's attempt to meld commercial displays and social space in London at Bush House , an elaborate and large office building built in three phases during the 1920s, but

2032-566: A man standing 1,000 feet (300 m) away; 274 injuries; and "major destruction" in a 1,000-foot (300 m) radius, including broken windows in buildings up to 1 mile (1.6 km) away. People reported hearing the explosion as far as 35 miles (56 km) away. However, none of the firefighters on land or water were injured because the shrapnel went over their heads. The follow-up report suggested several changes in policy to prevent similar future accidents, such as fire-risk training for all dock workers, and special markings for explosives. Damage from

2159-471: A mechanism for intermodal shipping known as double-stack rail transport has become increasingly common. Rising to the rate of nearly 70% of the United States' intermodal shipments, it transports more than one million containers per year. The double-stack rail cars design significantly reduces damage in transit and provides greater cargo security by cradling the lower containers so their doors cannot be opened. A succession of large, new, domestic container sizes

2286-487: A new standardized steel Intermodal container based on specifications from the United States Department of Defense began to revolutionize freight transportation. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) then issued standards based upon the U.S. Department of Defense standards between 1968 and 1970. The White Pass & Yukon Route railway acquired the world's first container ship ,

2413-651: A new subsidiary, the Bush Services Corporation, which would allow small manufacturers in Bush Terminal to sell directly to manufacturers, thus eliminating the need for wholesalers as middlemen. Later that year, a direct seaplane route was established between Bush Terminal and Philadelphia . In 1931, in advance of a projected increase in business, the Bush Terminal Company planned to purchase $ 500,000 million worth of equipment, including eight electric train locomotives. To help potential tenants and customers find Bush Terminal more easily, wayfinding signs for

2540-604: A petition in Brooklyn federal court to reorganize the Bush Terminal Company, since the company was bankrupt. The reorganization was granted by Brooklyn federal judge Robert Alexander Inch . The company exited receivership on May 1, 1936. However, equity proceedings against the Bush Terminal Company were still pending, and in April 1937, the Bush Terminal Buildings Company filed for reorganization under

2667-399: A police force and fire department. World War I had halted expansion projects at Bush Terminal, and construction on these projects did not resume until 1926. In March 1927, the Bush Terminal Company completed 600,000 square feet (56,000 m) of new industrial space at Bush Terminal, bringing the amount of factory loft space to 5,600,000 square feet (520,000 m). By that time, the company

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2794-553: A private monopoly, and because the Board of Estimate's special committee had ignored his original proposals. By 1917, Bush Terminal had 26,500,000 cubic feet (750,000 m) of storage spread across 102 warehouses. The Bush Terminal Company had built 16 factory loft buildings with a combined floor area of 4,500,000 square feet (420,000 m). On December 31, 1917, the United States Navy announced that it would take over

2921-568: A rail yard. The rail yard could hold about 1,000 freight cars and was six blocks long. The terminal also owned two miles (3.2 km) of double-tracked electric railroad that ran on the streets along Brooklyn's waterfront. The tracks ran along Second Avenue from 28th to 41st Streets and along First Avenue from 41st to 64th Streets, with spurs into every factory building and into the Brooklyn Army Terminal at 58th Street. Eventually, Bush Terminal could handle 50,000 freight railcars at

3048-489: A railroad track for loading freight onto ships. Next to each pier were slips that measured 270 feet (82 m) wide by 40 feet (12 m) deep, large enough to accommodate container ships at the time. Twenty-five steamship lines used these piers, and by 1910, Bush Terminal handled 10 percent of all steamships arriving in New York. Once freight was offloaded from vessels or ready for shipment, it could be stored within one of

3175-480: A result, 64 manufacturers employing 4,500 people were ordered to vacate their spaces by the end of 1918. The eviction notice covered 276 total tenants in buildings 3, 4, 5, and 6. Although Bush reluctantly complied with the takeover, the Merchants' Association protested because the takeover would eliminate the jobs of a large workforce. Many companies at Bush Terminal also pushed back against the eviction order, citing

3302-708: A time. The tracks connected with the Pennsylvania Railroad 's New York Connecting Railroad at 65th Street, south of the Brooklyn Army Terminal. There was also a direct connection to the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company 's trackage at 39th Street, which is now operated by the South Brooklyn Railway . Around 1913, there were plans to extend the railroad northward along the Brooklyn waterfront via

3429-414: A time. The Continental Commerce Co. opened the first licensed European kinetoscope parlor in London in 1894. Bush's connection with Edison's motion pictures was brief. Soon after, during the mid-1890s, Bush started the planning and construction of Bush Terminal on the Brooklyn waterfront site where his father's former oil refinery had been located. To induce railroads to use his car floats, (i.e. using

3556-412: A young age to Brooklyn, New York , at the time an independent city. When he was in his teens, his father sold his Brooklyn waterfront oil refinery to Standard Oil and retired. Bush was educated at The Hill School , a boarding school outside Philadelphia , and joined his father's firm at age 19. The two-masted schooner yacht Coronet , a 136-foot (41 m) vessel that Rufus had built during

3683-426: Is by ship. Containers are 8-foot (2.4 m) wide by 8-foot (2.4 m) or 9-foot-6-inch (2.90 m) high. Since introduction, there have been moves to adopt other heights, such as 10-foot-6-inch (3.20 m). The most common lengths are 20 feet (6.1 m), 40 feet (12 m), 45 feet (14 m), 48 and 53 feet (15 and 16 m), although other lengths exist. The three common sizes are: In countries where

3810-481: Is more common. TOFC terminals typically have large areas for storing trailers pending loading or pickup. Thievery has become a problem in North America. Sophisticated thieves learn how to interpret the codes on the outside of containers to ascertain which ones have easily disposable cargo. They break into isolated containers on long trains, or even board slowly moving trains to toss the items to accomplices on

3937-554: Is often measured in TEU or FEU. These initials stand for " twenty-foot equivalent unit ," and " forty-foot equivalent unit ," respectively. For example, a vessel that can hold 1,000 40-foot containers or 2,000 20-foot containers can be said to have a capacity of 2,000  TEU . After the year 2006, the largest container ships in regular operation are capable of carrying in excess of 15,000  TEU . On board ships they are typically stacked up to seven units high. A key consideration in

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4064-613: Is operated by a private consortium. The southern portion, known as "Bush Terminal", is located between 40th and 51st Streets and is operated by the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) as a garment manufacturing complex. Founded by Bush Terminal Company head Irving T. Bush in the early 20th century, Bush Terminal was the first facility of its kind in New York City and the largest multi-tenant industrial property in

4191-491: Is sufficient for two containers to be loaded in a " double-stack " arrangement. In Europe , height restrictions imposed by smaller structure gauges , and frequent overhead electrification , prevent double-stacking. Containers are therefore hauled one-high, either on standard flatcars or other railroad cars – but they must be carried in well wagons on lines built early in the Industrial Revolution , such as in

4318-553: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle in 1940 mentioned that tenants took up anywhere between 5,000 to 130,000 square feet (460 to 12,080 m) of space. During the 1910s, advertisements for Bush Terminal were posted in newspapers such as the Brooklyn Daily Eagle , claiming that companies could have private railroad tracks, a "free waterfront," and "a million-dollar factory at your present rental or less", and that

4445-695: The Clifford J. Rogers , built in 1955, and introduced containers to its railway in 1956. In the United Kingdom the modernisation plan, and in turn the Beeching Report , strongly pushed containerization. British Railways launched the Freightliner service carrying 8-foot (2.4 m) high pre-ISO containers. The older wooden containers and the pre-ISO containers were rapidly replaced by 10-and-20-foot (3.0 and 6.1 m) ISO standard containers, and later by 40-foot (12 m) containers and larger. In

4572-653: The Coronet was the first registered yacht to cross Cape Horn from East to West. After crossing the Pacific Ocean , the Coronet stopped in China, Calcutta , Malta (and elsewhere), giving him a view of the world that few had at the time. The Coronet was sold before Rufus's death in 1890, when Rufus accidentally drank a fatal dose of aconite . Rufus T. Bush left an estate estimated at $ 2,000,000 to his wife and two sons. The family heirs quickly incorporated under

4699-504: The New York City Board of Estimate received a proposal for the city to establish a freight terminal on the Brooklyn waterfront between 36th and 43rd Streets, and purchase that stretch of land from the Bush Terminal Company, as well as the Bush Terminal railroad and the entirety of Bush Terminal at the time. Under the plan, the existing Bush Terminal, the railroad, and the new city-owned terminal would continue to be operated by

4826-459: The North River , Manhattan. A 1929 article in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle mentioned that during World War I, Bush Terminal handled about 70% of the ammunition, clothing, and food that went to American soldiers abroad. The federal government quietly returned Bush Terminal to private ownership after the war. It paid out claims to the Bush Terminal Company for the use of the terminal space, though

4953-602: The Rhine / Danube in Europe and the Mississippi River in the U.S. The term landbridge or land bridge is commonly used in the intermodal freight transport sector. When a containerized ocean freight shipment travels across a large body of land for a significant distance, that portion of the trip is referred to as the "land bridge" and the mode of transport used is rail transport . There are three applications for

5080-587: The Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Honolulu . Like other wealthy Americans, Bush collected art. His portrait painting of the Russian princess Maria Worontzova (a name anglicized as Vorontsov ) by Franz Xaver Winterhalter was inherited by his niece, and was auctioned at Sotheby's in 2003. Bush's acquisition of a portrait of Henry VII by Jehan de Perreal , a work from the early 16th century, made

5207-705: The landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. to design the grounds of the Florida estate. Olmsted was known not only as the son of Central Park 's designer, but among numerous other accomplishments, was notable for re-designing the White House grounds in 1930. After moving from his townhouse at East 64th Street, Bush lived in the 17-floor tower at 280 Park Avenue, Manhattan, New York, designed by Warren and Wetmore , architects of Grand Central Terminal in New York City, Michigan Central Station in Detroit and

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5334-576: The loading gauge allows it. It is also common in North America and Australia to transport semi-trailers on railway flatcars or spine cars , an arrangement called "piggyback" or TOFC ( trailer on flatcar ) to distinguish it from container on flatcar (COFC). Some flatcars are designed with collapsible trailer hitches so they can be used for trailer or container service. Such designs allow trailers to be rolled on from one end, though lifting trailers on and off flatcars by specialized loaders

5461-713: The "Marginal Elevated Railway". The railroad would have used an elevated viaduct, similar to the High Line in Manhattan, between Bush Terminal and the piers at Fulton Ferry Landing (now Brooklyn Bridge Park ) in Brooklyn Heights . However, this marginal railroad was never built. In addition, the Bush Terminal Company ran a car float operation in which freight cars were loaded aboard car-float barges with railroad tracks, which traveled across New York Harbor to and from car float piers in New Jersey. The company had

5588-585: The Art Institute of Chicago; and Clark. Bush was in the news from a young age, when he was mentioned in stories of the Coronet ' s circumnavigation. He married Belle Barlow, with whom he had two daughters, Eleanor and Beatrice. Divorcing her, he married Maud Beard and had one son, Rufus, named after Irving's father. His 1930 divorce in Reno, Nevada , and remarriage one hour later to dentist, artist, socialite, and philanthropist Marian Spore Bush made

5715-641: The Bronx , which was close to rail connections. However, the proposal to build a market at Bush Terminal was controversial among merchants because it would take profits away from the Brooklyn Terminal and Bronx Terminal Markets, as well as from the Washington Terminal Market in Manhattan, and it was ultimately not built. Irving T. Bush died in 1948. In his will, he stipulated that all Bush Terminal profits that went to him would go to

5842-607: The Brooklyn Army Terminal and Bush Terminal. Sunset Park began to suffer economic decline during the Great Depression, which worsened with the demolition of the Fifth Avenue Elevated . Bush Terminal and the Sunset Park waterfront were disconnected from the rest of the neighborhood by the 1941 construction and subsequent widening of the Gowanus Expressway ( Interstate 278 ) above Third Avenue. After

5969-583: The Bush Company—organized six warehouses and one pier on the waterfront of South Brooklyn as a freight-handling terminal. There had only been one warehouse on the Bush Terminal site in 1890. Before that, the land contained an oil refinery belonging to the Bush & Denslow company of Rufus T. Bush , Irving T. Bush's father. Standard Oil bought this refinery in the 1880s and dismantled it, but after Rufus T. Bush's death in 1890, Irving T. Bush later bought

6096-462: The Bush Terminal Company started grading land on the former Hunt estate. It was ultimately planning to construct 18 factory loft buildings and 73 warehouses, as well as seven piers. The first pier opened in May 1903. Significant progress had been made by 1905: five of the piers were complete, and the Bush Terminal Company owned ten of the twelve blocks of waterfront between 39th and 51st Streets, as well as

6223-400: The Bush Terminal Company's real-estate, shipping, and industrial divisions were merged with the real-estate company Webb and Knapp , though the Bush Terminal Buildings Company remained separate. As part of the merger, $ 5 million in improvements was proposed for Bush Terminal, and the management of the Bush Terminal Company was allowed to continue operating as normal. It was around this time that

6350-562: The Bush Terminal Company. That September, a special committee for the Board of Estimate approved the plan. However, the New York Merchants Association opposed the city's proposal to purchase Bush Terminal, because the Bush Terminal Company would then have a monopoly on the railroads along the Brooklyn waterfront. The city's commissioner of docks , Calvin Tomkins , also opposed the proposal because of concerns over

6477-646: The Chamber of Commerce. Forbes , in its first, one-time "Rich List" of 1918 (before starting the annual Forbes 400 in 1982), cited Irving T. Bush "of Bush Terminal fame" as one of those "undoubtedly earning several million a year" and just less wealthy than the 30 wealthiest Americans on the list, along with William C. Durant , founder of General Motors and William Wrigley Jr. , the chewing gum magnate and Chicago Cubs baseball team owner. In 1917, B.C. Forbes also placed Bush alongside Elbert Henry Gary (the namesake of Gary, Indiana ). Forbes named Bush within

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6604-779: The First World War by Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt , Bush complied with government demands. He even helped to design the Brooklyn Army Terminal for General Goethals in 1918. Bush was named Chief Executive of the War Board of the Port of New York in 1917, during World War I . This would later become the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey . During this period before and during World War I, Bush planned and had built Bush Tower ,

6731-555: The NYCEDC as part of the Bush Terminal manufacturing complex. These structures were developed by the South Brooklyn Industrial Development Corporation starting in 1989. The campus comprises 36 acres (15 ha) of land and 1,400,000 square feet (130,000 m) of renovated floor space. The entire complex was originally called Bush Terminal and formerly stretched further north to 28th Street. The section north of 32nd Street, comprising

6858-425: The Navy could use it. The U.S. Navy wanted to outright purchase Bush Terminal, and it was soon in negotiations with the Bush Terminal Company over the terminal's valuation. In June 1918, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, and eventual President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote to Irving Bush to tell him that the navy would also be commandeering four of Bush Terminal's twelve manufacturing buildings. As

6985-625: The New York Chamber of Commerce, an article in Collier's . Doubleday published his autobiography, Working with the World , in 1928. Within recent decades, scholarly architects have described and critiqued the buildings that Bush commissioned. Perhaps by way of expression of the Dutch ancestry of his family (and of New York), his 1905 townhouse at 28 East 64th Street in Manhattan, built by

7112-769: The New York Connecting Railroad, the U.S. Navy wanted to operate the Bush Terminal for the duration of the war, paying a fee for the takeover. The piers of the terminal became part of the United States Army's New York Port of Embarkation . At the war's end the New York Port of Embarkation included eight piers in Brooklyn, including six Bush Terminal piers and two Army Supply Base piers; 120 Bush Terminal warehouses; twelve piers and seven warehouses in Hoboken, New Jersey ; and three piers in

7239-536: The U.S., starting in the 1960s, the use of containers increased steadily. Rail intermodal traffic tripled between 1980 and 2002, according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR), from 3.1 million trailers and containers to 9.3 million. Large investments were made in intermodal freight projects. An example was the US$ 740 million Port of Oakland intermodal rail facility begun in the late 1980s. Since 1984,

7366-532: The United Kingdom, the big four railway companies offered services using standard RCH containers that could be craned on and off the back of trucks. Moving companies such as Pickfords offered private services in the same way. In 1933 in Europe, under the auspices of the International Chamber of Commerce , The Bureau International des Containers et du Transport Intermodal (BIC; English: International Bureau for Containers and Intermodal Transport)

7493-521: The United Kingdom, where loading gauges are relatively small. 610 mm ( 2 ft ) narrow-gauge railways have smaller wagons that do not readily carry ISO containers, nor do the 30-foot (9.14 m) long and 7-foot (2.13 m) wide wagons of the 762 mm ( 2 ft 6 in ) gauge Kalka-Shimla Railway . Wider narrow gauge railways of e.g. 914 mm ( 3 ft ) and 1,000 mm ( 3 ft  3 + 3 ⁄ 8  in ) gauge can take ISO containers, provided that

7620-419: The United States. The warehouses were built between 1892 and 1910, the railroad from 1896 to 1915, and the factory lofts between 1905 and 1925. During World War I , Bush Terminal was used as a United States Navy base, and returned to private ownership after the war. At its peak, Bush Terminal covered 200 acres (81 hectares), bounded by Gowanus Bay to the west and north, Third Avenue to the east, 27th Street to

7747-409: The amenities at the terminal. The Bush Terminal Company recorded material losses the next year. The U.S. Navy tied its rail lines into those of the Bush Terminal. Irving Bush helped to design Bush Terminal's southern neighbor, the Brooklyn Army Terminal, which was completed in 1919. Because of the railroad connection between Bush Terminal and the Brooklyn Army Terminal, and then to the mainland U.S. via

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7874-678: The area serves as a common relay point for containerized freight moving across the country. Many of the motor carriers call this type of drayage “crosstown loads” that originate at one rail road and terminate at another. For example, a container destined for the east coast from the west will arrive in Chicago either via the Union Pacific or BNSF Railway and have to be relayed to one of the eastern railroads, either CSX or Norfolk Southern. Barges utilising ro-ro and container-stacking techniques transport freight on large inland waterways such as

8001-425: The barges that transported railroad cars across New York Harbor), Bush had to resort to ordering dozens of carloads of hay from Michigan himself. To show shippers that using the wharves and warehouses at the new terminal could be profitable, Bush entered the banana business. Within two decades, the complex originally derided as "Bush's Folly" became a great success. Though the complex was seized for government use during

8128-409: The blaze; twenty-six minutes later, the fire reached 37,000 pounds (17,000 kg) of Cordeau Detonant Fuse , setting off an explosion. Earlier in the day, the burlap bags holding an additional 11,415 pounds (5,178 kg) of rubber scrap had broken, and investigators believed that pieces of the highly inflammable scrap had been strewn across the dock. The blast resulted in 10 deaths, including that of

8255-446: The block bounded by First Avenue, Second Avenue, 39th Street, and 41st Street. The structures contain a combined 6,000,000 square feet (560,000 m) of floor space. All of the buildings were part of the Bush Terminal Company's "Industrial Colony", built in the late 1900s and early 1910s. Directly south of Industry City, between First Avenue, 40th Street, Second Avenue, and 51st Street, is a collection of 11 former warehouses operated by

8382-536: The city's largest shipping companies—moved out of the terminal in 1957, having occupied Bush Terminal since 1902. In 1957, the city announced that a marine terminal for the Mitsui Steamship Company would be built near Industry City between 36th and 39th Streets. In conjunction with the construction of the Mitsui terminal, the pier at 35th Street, which had been wrecked in the Bush Terminal explosion

8509-514: The complex covered over 200 acres (81 ha) of land. Other advertisements depicted companies moving to Bush Terminal in large numbers, "boosting" Brooklyn. Bush Terminal employed 35,000 by 1928, and even had a private court system for self-policing. There were four tribunals ; one each for marine employees, railroad workers, trucking employees, and mechanical employees. These handled both civil cases , such as those for job demotions seen as unfair, and criminal cases , such as those for fraud. There

8636-600: The complex, was announced in 2017. The section of Bush Terminal operated by the NYCEDC is also being renovated into the "Made in NY" campus, a film, TV, and fashion manufacturing complex that was set to open in 2020, but was delayed. The privately owned Industry City complex includes 16 structures and 35 acres (14 ha) of land on the Brooklyn waterfront, adjacent to New York Harbor . It is subdivided into eight former factory buildings between Second Avenue, 33rd Street, Third Avenue , and 37th Street, numbered 8 to 1 from north to south. Two more buildings, numbered 19 and 20, occupy

8763-404: The concept was not fully carried through at that project. Bush House became known around the world as the headquarters of the BBC World Service , which broadcasts in many languages. The BBC moved out in 2012. Bush served as president of the Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York from 1922 to 1924. Prior to holding that position, Bush served as the chairman of the executive committee in

8890-446: The construction of Bush House in London. A prolific author, his life and works attracted attention from the national press, influential figures, and major publishers and journalists. Irving T. Bush's family name comes from Jan Bosch, a native of the Netherlands , who immigrated to New Amsterdam (now New York) in 1662. Born in Ridgeway , Lenawee County, Michigan , a small town southwest of Detroit , Bush moved with his family at

9017-445: The end of World War I, Bush Terminal was an integral part of the economy of what is now Sunset Park . The terminal's fortunes rose with those of the borough of Brooklyn, which had over 2.5 million residents by 1930. Bush Terminal employed thousands directly and many thousands more worked for firms within Bush Terminal. By 1928, Bush Terminal had 35,000 workers, and it was so large that the terminal employed its own court system, as well as

9144-596: The explosion is still apparent at Industry City; iron on the fire escapes is mangled, and several windows contain embedded shrapnel. From the early 1950s through the 1960s, the Topps company, which primarily made chewing gum and baseball cards , manufactured baseball cards at Industry City. Topps moved production to Pennsylvania in 1965, though its offices remained in Bush Terminal until 1994, when it moved to Manhattan. A major tenant—the Norton Lilly & Company , among

9271-601: The facility's buildings had 263,740 window panes in their walls and 138 miles (222 km) of fire sprinklers running within them. Industry City includes the Bush Terminal Company Building (now Buildings 19 and 20), a loft structure located on Second Avenue between 39th and 40th Streets. Construction on the building started around 1911, It was eight stories tall with three distinct buildings connected in U-shaped manner. The primary structure possessed

9398-518: The federal government, which used 1,500,000 square feet (140,000 m) of storage space at the terminal. In mid-1941, the U.S. Army moved some civilian workers into more than 500,000 square feet (46,000 m) at Bush Terminal, spread across three buildings along First Avenue, because there was no more space at Brooklyn Army Terminal. Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1944 presidential campaign tour around New York City, which occurred in October 1944, started at

9525-616: The firm of Kirby, Petit & Green , was "flamboyantly Jacobean , with a high, almost Flemish gable ". Bush commissioned southern California architect Wallace Neff to design his winter home at Mountain Lake Estates in Florida, near the residence (and later tower ) of his father's former business partner, Edward W. Bok . Neff, who had recently been named "architect to the stars" by the Los Angeles Times , designed few houses outside California. He also commissioned

9652-458: The former Naval Fleet Supply Base, is no longer part of Bush Terminal. One of the buildings between 29th and 31st Street, called Federal Building No. 2, are a privately owned shopping complex called Liberty View Industrial Plaza. It was bought by Salman Properties in 2011, and before that, it had been vacant since 2000. The site of the other structure, Federal Building No. 1, is occupied by Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn (MDC Brooklyn), which

9779-401: The front page of The New York Times as well as the "Milestones" section of Time magazine. Irving had met Marian, a fellow Michigan expatriate, when they worked together on a breadline in New York City's impoverished Bowery during the late 1920s. After their marriage they lived at 280 Park Avenue along with Mrs. Marian Spore Bush's niece Helen Tunison, who after Irving's death, dedicated

9906-441: The ground. Trucking is frequently used to connect the "linehaul" ocean and rail segments of a global intermodal freight movement. This specialized trucking that runs between ocean ports, rail terminals, and inland shipping docks, is often called drayage , and is typically provided by dedicated drayage companies or by the railroads. As an example, since many rail lines in the United States terminate in or around Chicago, Illinois,

10033-480: The harbor might freeze during the winter, making a car float unsustainable. Irving T. Bush resorted to sending an agent to Michigan with instructions to buy 100 carloads of hay, then to attempt to have the hay sent in its original railcar to Bush's terminal in Brooklyn. Railroad companies in the eastern U.S. declined their western agents' request to send the hay until the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad agreed to accept

10160-530: The intersection with Pearl and Bridge Streets. The relatively small yet notable five-story office building was located on the site of Manhattan's first church, built in 1633, and one book described the structure as having a "Gothic design with a strong flavor of Dutch." The company also funded construction of Bush Tower , a 30-story skyscraper near Times Square in Manhattan , where tenants of Bush Terminal were offered display space to showcase their goods, above

10287-498: The land back using his father's inheritance. In 1891, the Bush Company completed a one-story office building at the intersection of First Avenue and 42nd Street. Irving Bush built six warehouses on the site between 1895 and 1897, but soon observed their inefficiency: "The ships were on one shore, the railroads on another, and the factories were scattered about the city on any old street without any relation to either kind of transportation. I thought: 'Why not bring them to one place, and tie

10414-445: The largest olive-oil producers in the U.S., according to The New York Times . On December 3, 1956, Industry City was the site of what might have been the largest explosion in New York City history. Dockworkers were using an oxyacetylene torch to perform routine maintenance work when, at about 3:15 p.m. that day, sparks ignited 26,365 pounds (11,959 kg) of ground foam rubber scrap. Employees abandoned initial efforts to control

10541-441: The last few years the use of several, relatively new and unknown Load Securing methods have become available through innovation and technological advancement including polyester strapping and -lashing, synthetic webbings and Dunnage Bags , also known as air bags. Container ships are used to transport containers by sea. These vessels are custom-built to hold containers. Some vessels can hold thousands of containers. Their capacity

10668-480: The last of the funds was not allocated until 1943, twenty-five years after takeover. In October 1919, the Bush Terminal Company announced the creation of a department for sporting-goods manufacturers at Bush Terminal. The company was designated with selling off excess cloth from the Army and Navy, which were considered war surplus. The twelve factory loft buildings that had been built by 1918 housed about 300 companies. By

10795-441: The loss of cargo, the loss of lives, the loss of vehicles, ships and airplane; not to mention the environmental hazards it can cause. There are many different ways and materials available to stabilize and secure cargo in containers used in the various modes of transportation. Conventional Load Securing methods and materials such as steel banding and wood blocking & bracing have been around for decades and are still widely used. In

10922-518: The lowest weight possible (and very important, little difference in the viable mass point), and low space, specially designed containers made from lightweight material are often used. Due to price and size, this is rarely seen on the roads or in ports. However, large transport aircraft make it possible to even load standard container(s), or use standard sized containers made of much lighter materials like titanium or aluminium . Irving T. Bush Irving Ter Bush (July 12, 1869 – October 21, 1948)

11049-607: The mid-1880s, influenced Irving's life, for the ocean race between the Coronet and the yacht Dauntless in March 1887 made Rufus T. Bush and the victorious Coronet famous—the New York Times devoted its entire first page for March 28, 1887 to the story. Rufus and Irving then circumnavigated the globe on the Coronet in 1888. Though they traveled overland and did not join the yacht until it arrived in San Diego in 1889,

11176-420: The middle of the car between the bogies or trucks. Some container cars are built as an articulated "unit" of three or five permanently coupled cars, each having a single bogie rather than the two bogies normally found on freight cars. Containers can be loaded on flatcars or in container well cars . In North America, Australia and Saudi Arabia, where vertical clearances are generally liberal, this depression

11303-405: The most modern amenities available in the 1900s and 1910s, such as fireproof metal facades and a fire sprinkler system. The floors of the loft buildings could carry loads of up to 200 pounds per square foot (980 kg/m). The loft buildings had a combined 150 freight elevators. They were mostly U-shaped to facilitate loading at the rail sidings between the two wings of each building. By the 1970s,

11430-503: The name The Bush Co. Bush, as a 21-year-old clerk for Standard Oil, could have lived off his inherited wealth and retired from the business life. Bush was chair of the Continental Commerce Co., which had exclusive rights to market Thomas Edison 's Kinetoscope overseas. The kinetoscope was the earliest motion picture viewer. Unlike later movie projectors , kinetoscopes could show a moving image to only one person at

11557-546: The news in 1929. In 1922 Bush became one of the founding trustees of New York City's Grand Central Art Galleries , an artists' cooperative established that year by John Singer Sargent , Edmund Greacen , Walter Leighton Clark , and others. Also on the board were the Galleries' architect, William Adams Delano ; Robert W. DeForest , president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Frank Logan, vice-president of

11684-403: The north, and 50th Street to the south. The surrounding area declined after World War II , and by the 1970s, the ports in Bush Terminal had been filled. The complex was rebranded as Industry City during the post-war years, though the Bush Terminal name remained in popular use. In the 1970s and 1980s, sections of Bush Terminal were demolished or converted for other uses, including a shopping mall,

11811-468: The offer and negotiate directly with the new terminal, after which other railways followed. To demonstrate that ocean vessels could dock at the piers, Irving T. Bush leased ships and entered the banana business, and in doing so, made a profit. Likewise, to induce businesses to store goods at his terminal's warehouses , he warehoused coffee and cotton himself. Once Bush Terminal succeeded and expanded, sources credited Bush's "keen foresight" for undertaking such

11938-408: The overhead wiring was too low to accommodate it. However, India is building some freight-only corridors with the overhead wiring at 7.45 m above rail, which is high enough. Containers, also known as intermodal containers or ISO containers because the dimensions have been defined by ISO, are the main type of equipment used in intermodal transport, particularly when one of the modes of transportation

12065-467: The piers and warehouses of the Bush Terminal Company. Major General George Goethals , acting Quartermaster General of the U.S. Army , praised Bush Terminal as being among the best shipping facilities in the United States. The Navy proposed to build 6,000,000 square feet (560,000 m) of storage space and four piers adjoining Bush Terminal. The United States Army also occupied warehouses within part of Bush Terminal, but it proposed to vacate that space so

12192-451: The plot bounded by Second Avenue, Third Avenue, 37th Street, and 28th Street. A sixth pier was completed within two years. By this time, the shipping industry in Manhattan was becoming congested. By early 1909, three of the factory structures had been completed, and a fourth was under construction. Each building was six stories tall, measured 600 by 75 feet (183 by 23 m), and had 270,000 square feet (25,000 m) of floor area. The complex

12319-418: The present Suezmax . Very large container ships also require specialized deep water terminals and handling facilities. The container fleet available, route constraints, and terminal capacity play a large role in shaping global container shipment logistics. Increasingly, containers are shipped by rail in container well cars . These cars resemble flatcars but have a container-sized depression, or well, in

12446-491: The president of the Bush Terminal Buildings Company, R.A.P. Walker, started advertising the terminal's buildings in newspapers as "Industry City". The Industry City name was a reference to Bush Terminal becoming one of the first industrial parks in the United States following World War II. After the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel opened, the area around Industry City became so congested with traffic that, in 1953,

12573-618: The previous year, was rebuilt. The Mitsui terminal opened in 1960. As part of the modernization of Bush Terminal/Industry City, the Bush Terminal Company also renovated two railroad car float bridges in 1960 and 1963. The construction of a containership pier between 19th and 36th Streets, along the northern section of Industry City, was approved in 1967. This later became the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal . Intermodal freight transport Intermodal transportation has its origin in 18th century England and predates

12700-561: The railway loading gauge is sufficient, truck trailers are often carried by rail. Variations exist, including open-topped versions covered by a fabric curtain are used to transport larger loads. A container called a tanktainer , with a tank inside a standard container frame, carries liquids. Refrigerated containers (reefer) are used for perishables. Swap body units have the same bottom corners as intermodal containers but are not strong enough to be stacked. They have folding legs under their frame and can be moved between trucks without using

12827-692: The railways. Some of the earliest containers were those used for shipping coal on the Bridgewater Canal in England in the 1780s. Coal containers (called "loose boxes" or "tubs") were soon deployed on the early canals and railways and were used for road/rail transfers (road at the time meaning horse -drawn vehicles). Wooden coal containers were first used on the railways in the 1830s on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. In 1841, Isambard Kingdom Brunel introduced iron containers to move coal from

12954-841: The rent was too high. At some point, the Drug Enforcement Administration ; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives ; the Internal Revenue Service , and the United States Coast Guard also occupied space in Bush Terminal. In 1938, after lithographers signed leases for nine buildings in Bush Terminal, the Bush Terminal Company announced that the leased buildings would receive extensive renovations. The federal government, whose Works Progress Administration stored supplies such as clothing in warehouses at Bush Terminal,

13081-446: The ship, the railroad, the warehouse, and the factory together with ties of railroad tracks? ' " The terminal in its early days was derided as "Bush's Folly". Railroad officials would not ship directly to Brooklyn unless the customers first had orders of freight, as it required the extra cost of loading freight cars on car floats for the trip across New York Harbor to the ferry slips at the terminal. Railroad officials also feared that

13208-543: The size of container ships is that larger ships exceed the capacity of important sea routes such as the Panama and Suez canals. The largest size of container ship able to traverse the Panama canal is referred to as Panamax , which is presently around 5,000  TEU . A third set of locks is planned as part of the Panama Canal expansion project to accommodate container ships up to 12,000  TEU in future, comparable to

13335-594: The statue of him at Bush Terminal in front of 3,000 people. Bush owned two yachts that subsequently served as patrol boats in the United States Navy. In 1917, during World War I, the navy bought his 164-foot-long (50 m) steam yacht Christabel and commissioned the vessel as the USS Christabel (SP-162) , which took part in at least two actions against German U-Boats and was credited with sinking one. (See Navy History website ) A sailor even won

13462-538: The surrounding area a direct link to Manhattan, which was seen as a benefit to the area's economy. In 1946, the administration of Mayor William O'Dwyer proposed building a food-produce market at Bush Terminal. The existing Brooklyn Terminal Market in Canarsie, Brooklyn , was too far away from convenient railroad connections, and the Bush Terminal market would compete with the Bronx Terminal Market in

13589-399: The term. The term reverse land bridge refers to a micro land bridge from an east coast port (as opposed to a west coast port in the previous examples) to an inland destination. Generally modern, bigger planes usually carry cargo in the containers. Sometimes even the checked luggage is first placed into containers, and then loaded onto the plane. Of course because of the requirement for

13716-523: The terminal were installed in the 36th Street subway station. A park at the site of an abandoned dumping ground was announced in 1934, and the Bush Terminal Company bought a fleet of new trucks for Bush Terminal the same year. In mid-March 1933, seven members of the Bush Terminal Company's board suddenly quit, citing past mismanagement. The Bush Terminal Company went into receivership two weeks afterward, on April 1, 1933, due to an inability to repay its outstanding bonds . A new 11-person board of directors

13843-537: The vale of Neath to Swansea Docks . By the outbreak of the First World War the Great Eastern Railway was using wooden containers to trans-ship passenger luggage between trains and sailings via the port of Harwich . The early 1900s saw the first adoption of covered containers, primarily for the movement of furniture and intermodal freight between road and rail. A lack of standards limited

13970-627: The value of this service and this in turn drove standardisation. In the U.S. such containers, known as "lift vans", were in use from as early as 1911. In the United Kingdom , containers were first standardised by the Railway Clearing House (RCH) in the 1920s, allowing both railway-owned and privately-owned vehicles to be carried on standard container flats. By modern standards these containers were small, being 1.5 or 3.0 meters (4.9 or 9.8 ft) long, normally wooden and with

14097-726: The vice president of the Bush Terminal Merchants' and Manufacturers' Association proposed traffic improvements in the area. By Industry City's 50th anniversary in 1955, it employed 25,000 workers working for over 100 companies, and 25 tenants occupied 41% of the 6 million square feet at the complex. More than three-quarters of the tenants, 78%, had been at Bush Terminal for more than ten years, and 10% had occupied space there for more than 40 years. Major tenants included A&P, which roasted much of its coffee at industry City; Beech-Nut , which made candy and chewing gum; Virginia Dare, which made wine and flavoring extract; and two of

14224-472: The war, " white flight ", the maritime industry's move to New Jersey, and the 1966 deactivation of the Brooklyn Army Terminal also hurt the neighborhood until it was reopened as an industrial park in the 1980s. However, Bush Terminal still remained active around this time, although it was smaller compared to before World War II. The opening of the Brooklyn–Battery Tunnel in 1950 gave Bush Terminal and

14351-473: The warehouses at Bush Terminal. Estimates varied as to the number of warehouses at Bush Terminal. According to The New York Times , the complex had 118 warehouses by 1918, ranging in height from one to eight stories, which could store a combined 25,000,000 cubic feet (710,000 m) of goods. However, The Wall Street Journal described the terminal later that year as having 121 warehouses with 38,000,000 cubic feet (1,100,000 m) of total storage space, and

14478-471: Was also a "supreme court" that handled disputes between departments, and employees were allowed to appeal cases directly to Irving Bush. The terminal also had a "Pivot Club", which was composed of longshoremen who met twice a week to draft legislation. Bush Terminal had two coal-and-oil power plants for steam and light. There was a hall for longshoremen, a bank, restaurants, and a trolley system to provide transportation for workers. An administration building

14605-607: Was an American businessman. He was the son of the wealthy industrialist, oil refinery owner, and yachtsman Rufus T. Bush . As founder of the Bush Terminal Company , Bush was responsible for the construction of the massive Bush Terminal transportation, warehousing, and manufacturing facility in Sunset Park, Brooklyn , New York City, which employed more than 25,000 people within its boundaries. Bush also commissioned Manhattan's landmark Bush Tower skyscraper on 42nd Street near New York City's Times Square and funded

14732-634: Was another large tenant. Other large tenants included the Monarch Wine Company, which leased three buildings at Bush Terminal in 1939, and spice companies such as the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company (now A&P), whose Bush Terminal tea-packing plant was once the world's largest. By 1941, ninety percent of the rentable space at Bush Terminal had been leased, and 69 of 70 one-story buildings had been rented. During World War II , some buildings in Bush Terminal were again used by

14859-411: Was appointed for the duration of receivership. The receivers started cutting costs, and by May, had eliminated $ 100,000 in expenses. In May 1935, the receivers removed Bush as the president of the Bush Terminal Company and subsidiaries. Shortly afterward, Bush unsuccessfully sued in Brooklyn federal court to have the receivers removed based on an accusation of incompetence. That November, stockholders filed

14986-536: Was built in the 1990s. Federal Building No. 1 was demolished in 1993 to make way for MDC Brooklyn. The South Brooklyn Marine Terminal , also owned by the NYCEDC, occupies the waterfront to the north and west, from 39th to 29th Streets. By 1918, the Bush Terminal Company owned 3,100 feet (940 m) of waterfront in Brooklyn, and the terminal covered 20 waterfront blocks. The complex ultimately encompassed 16 factory buildings between 28th and 37th Streets, and between 39th and 41st Streets. The buildings were outfitted with

15113-491: Was constructed circa 1895–1902, There was a police force and fire department, as well as a mailbox for airmail . A chamber of commerce for Bush Terminal, created in June 1916, successfully advocated for improvements to the area, such as infrastructure and quality of life cleanup. Other amenities provided at Bush Terminal included social clubs, schools, and community centers. Industry City was originally known as Bush Terminal, which

15240-479: Was constructing two additional loft buildings, which would increase the factory loft space by 10%, as well as power plant at Bush Terminal. A branch of National City Bank (now Citibank ) inside the terminal was opened the same year, as did a playground near the terminal. Early in the 20th century, the Bush Terminal Company commissioned architects Kirby, Petit & Green to design its headquarters building in Manhattan's Financial District at 100 Broad Street , near

15367-491: Was controlled from an 8-story steel-and-concrete service building at 39th Street west of Second Avenue. The building had two levels of railroad tracks, one for incoming freight and one for outgoing freight, and each level could accommodate six freight cars. When the complex was known as Bush Terminal, it offered economies of scale for its tenants, so that even the smallest interests could use facilities normally only available to large, well-capitalized firms. An article published in

15494-417: Was convenient enough for industries that the first two buildings had been fully rented before they had even been completed. The Bush Terminal Company also arranged to lease a tenement structure at Third Avenue and 29th Street to house workers employed at Bush Terminal. It was expected that by the time fifteen to twenty of the factories were completed, Bush Terminal would employ 10,000 to 15,000 workers. Plans for

15621-448: Was established. In June 1933, the BIC decided about obligatory parameters for container use in international traffic. Containers handled by means of lifting gear, such as cranes, overhead conveyors, etc. for traveling elevators (group I containers), constructed after July 1, 1933. Obligatory Regulations: In April 1935, BIC established a second standard for European containers: In the 1950s,

15748-611: Was introduced to increase shipping productivity. In Europe, the more restricted loading gauge has limited the adoption of double-stack cars. However, in 2007 the Betuweroute , a railway from Rotterdam to the German industrial heartland, was completed, which may accommodate double-stacked containers in the future. Other countries, like New Zealand , have numerous low tunnels and bridges that limit expansion for economic reasons. Since electrification generally predated double-stacking,

15875-700: Was named after Irving T. Bush. His family name came from Jan Bosch, who was born in the Netherlands and immigrated to New Amsterdam (now New York) in 1662; it is unrelated to the Bush political family . Bush Terminal was unique from other rail-marine terminals in New York due to its distance from Manhattan, the magnitude of its warehousing and manufacturing operations, and its fully integrated nature. Wholesalers in Manhattan faced expensive time, transportation, and labor costs when importing and then re-sending goods. In 1895, Irving T. Bush—working under his family's company,

16002-558: Was part of a plan long contemplated by the Bush Terminal Company's president, Irving T. Bush . Its construction coincided with an improvement in the industrial region between First and Second Avenues. The Bush Terminal Company erected structures like this on both sides of Second Avenue. The Bush Terminal Railroad Company owned about twenty miles (32 km) of track within the terminal by 1917, which had grown to 43 miles (69 km) of track by 1950. The terminal's railroad greatly reduced shippers' cost to haul freight from their facilities to

16129-486: Was required, fewer personnel were needed and loading times were decreased. Truck trailers were first carried by railway before World War II, an arrangement often called " piggyback ", by the small Class I railroad , the Chicago Great Western in 1936. The Canadian Pacific Railway was a pioneer in piggyback transport, becoming the first major North American railway to introduce the service in 1952. In

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