Archer Avenue Lines

The Archer Avenue Lines are two rapid transit lines of the New York City Subway, mostly running under Archer Avenue in the Jamaica neighborhood of Queens. Conceived as part of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's 1968 expansion plans, they opened on December 11, 1988.

The two lines are built on separate levels, served by trains from the IND Queens Boulevard Line (E trains) on the upper level, and the BMT Jamaica Line (J Z trains) on the lower. Since the two levels share no track connections and have different chainings and radio frequencies, they are two separate lines—the B2 (IND) Division Archer Avenue Line (upper level) and the B1 (BMT) Division Archer Avenue Line (lower level).

Extent and service

The following services use the Archer Avenue Line:

The two Archer Avenue Lines begin at a northern (geographic eastern) terminal, Jamaica Center – Parsons/Archer (E J Z trains), as a bi-level subway, each level having two tracks. The two lines run compass west along Archer Avenue to another station at Sutphin Boulevard – Archer Avenue – JFK Airport, where connections can be made to the Long Island Rail Road and AirTrain JFK. West of this station, the two levels diverge. The lower level tracks (J Z trains) continue roughly compass northwest, emerging from a portal near 89th Road and 130th Street and paralleling the Main Line of the LIRR before turning west onto the elevated structure of the BMT Jamaica Line at about 127th Street. The upper level tracks (E trains) turn compass north under the Van Wyck Expressway, with another station at Jamaica Avenue. Just north of Hillside Avenue, they meet the four tracks of the IND Queens Boulevard Line at a flying junction, with connections to both the local and express tracks.

Archer Avenue

Archer Avenue, sometimes known as Archer Road outside the Chicago, Illinois city limits, is a diagonal thoroughfare running northeast-to-southwest between Chicago's Chinatown and Lockport, Illinois. Archer follows the original trail crossing the Chicago Portage between the Chicago River and the Des Plaines River, and parallels the path of the Illinois and Michigan Canal and the Alton Railroad. As a main traffic artery, it has largely been replaced by the modern Stevenson Expressway.

The street was named after the first commissioner of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, William Beatty Archer. One early map of Chicago (ca. 1830) listed what may have been the future Archer Road as "The Road to Widow Brown's".

Archer Avenue was made famous by Finley Peter Dunne in his books and sketches about the fictional saloonkeeper Mr. Dooley, whose tavern was on "Archey Road". The fictional Dooley "lived" in the real-life Bridgeport, Chicago neighborhood.

Archer Avenue is also famous as the purported haunting place of Resurrection Mary, a vanishing hitchhiker who is said to travel between the Willowbrook Ballroom and Resurrection Cemetery.