Third Avenue Railway Company (New York City) No. 631 at Seashore Trolley Museum

Although the streamlined PCC car had been developed, New York's vast Third Avenue Railway, which served Manhattan and the Bronx, was to impoverished to afford them because of a politically mandated nickel fare. But, even in the face of threats by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia and other politicians to drive "outmoded" streetcars (and elevated railways) out of Manhattan, the company bravely undertook, in its own shops, construction of what would be the last group of conventional cars built in this country.