Grade Crossing at East 105th Street, January 11, 1959.

The original railroad service along these tracks was the Brooklyn and Rockaway Beach Railroad, a steam railroad established in 1865. Originally a single track (until 1894), this railroad service moved passengers from East New York to Canarsie. In 1906 a new station replaced the original steam-line station at East 105th Street. The railroad had been acquired by the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company. The BRT electrified the line north of New Lots Avenue via a third rail and the line south of New Lots Avenue was electrified with trolley wire (third rail electrification was added to stations south later). The section from East New York to New Lots was also elevated. The new station at 105th had a grade level crossing with gates controlled manually by a staff of towermen.

In 1906 the BRT line ran from Canarsie Landing to the foot Broadway Ferry at the foot of Broadway in Williamsburg (traveling over the Fulton & Broadway Elevated line west of Manhattan, now Broadway, Junction). Later it was extended to Chambers Street in Manhattan. In 1928 the original Canarsie line was connected to the 14th Street line and in 1931 it was extended to Eighth Avenue, creating the route of the current L train.

The grade level crossing at 105th Street, which was the final one in the system, closed on August 5, 1973 at 5AM when the last towerman went off duty. Once a quiet and sparsely populated area, by the late 1960s a boom in new housing developments and a planned industrial park prompted plans for a safer crossing. A new elevated station and pedestrian crossing were constructed in 1973 and renovated in 2005.