the city club and new york city mayor jimmy walker objected to the highway on the grounds that it would block waterfront-bound freight traffic. they believed that the plans should wait until the surface railroad tracks were removed in the area, at which point the elevated highway might not be necessary. parallels were drawn with elevated passenger railroads, which were being torn down at the time; henry curran of the city club called elevated structures "a misfit in new york". the city club also objected to more passenger cars in downtown manhattan.