Barren Island, Brooklyn use as a garbage dump. Waste and animal carcasses from Brooklyn, Manhattan, and the Bronx was sent to Barren Island, while New York City's other two boroughs, Queens and Staten Island, had their own garbage disposal sites. The Sanitary Utilization Company disposed of glass bottles and other non-processable items on the northern coast of Barren Island. Some valuable trash, such as jewelry, also ended up on Barren Island. The island's residents did not mind the smell of the processed garbage. However, the incinerator's scents were so noxious that residents on "mainland" Brooklyn, away, could not stand the odors. In 1899,
Staten Island Tunnel funded by the city, the tunnel was expected to help expand the then-sparsely populated borough in a similar manner to the population and development explosions seen in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Under the Dual Contracts, three routes were proposed—two to Brooklyn and one to Manhattan—which would connect the Staten Island Railway's rapid transit service (SIRT) to existing subway lines. The Manhattan proposal, often called the "direct route," would have connected with the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT)'s lines under Battery Park, near the current Brooklyn–Battery Tunnel. "Direct Route A" would have utilized a five-section tunnel under the New York Harbor,