R40 (New York City Subway car)

The R40 was a New York City Subway car model built by the St. Louis Car Company from 1967 to 1969 for the IND/BMT B Division. There were 400 cars in the R40 fleet, arranged in married pairs. Two versions of the R40 were manufactured: the original 200-car R40 order built in 1967–1968, and the supplementary 200-car R40A order built in 1968–1969, with the last 100 cars of the supplementary order re-designed with straight ends. The 200 original R40s and the first 100 R40As were unique for their futuristic 10-degree slanted end (designed by the firm Raymond Loewy and Associates, and William Snaith Inc.) and were nicknamed the R40 Slants or simply Slants. Due to safety concerns, the final 100 cars of the R40A order were re-designed with traditional straight-ends by Sundberg-Ferar and became known unofficially as the "R40M" (M for modified).

The first R40s entered service on March 23, 1968. Various modifications were made over the years to the R40 fleet, including a complete overhaul from 1986–1989 by Sumitomo Corp. of America. The R160 subway car order replaced all of the R40s and R40As from 2007 to 2009; the last slant-ended train ran on June 12, 2009, while the last straight-ended R40As ran on August 28, 2009. After being retired, most R40s and R40As were stripped and sunk into the Atlantic Ocean as artificial reefs, but a pair of R40 slants and several straight-ended R40As have survived.