The R12 was a New York City Subway car, the first city-owned rolling stock for the IRT division. Built by American Car and Foundry Company in 1948, these cars were very similar to the R10s, except the R12 was smaller. In addition, while the R10s had air-operated door engines (and were the last cars ordered as such), the R12s had electric door engines.
They began service on the IRT Flushing Line (7 <7> trains) route in Queens and Manhattan and ran there until 1964 with the delivery of R36s. The R12 cars were then transferred to operate on other IRT division routes originating in Manhattan, the Bronx, or Brooklyn throughout their service lives. One particular assignment included fifty of them being sent to the Third Avenue elevated line in the Bronx in August 1969 and ran there until that route's closing on April 29, 1973.
The R12 had a few paint schemes: originally two-tone gray with orange stripes, then a solid bright red, and finally, in the MTA's silver with blue stripe scheme. The last R12 was removed from service in September 1981 and the fleet become work cars afterward.
Car 5760 was restored to its original paint scheme and has been part of the New York Transit Museum collection since July 1976. Car 5782 is at the 207th Street Yard in the MTA blue/silver livery paint scheme.
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