General Pulaski Skyway
General Pulaski Skyway
Carries	4 traffic lanes (no trucks)
Crosses	Passaic River and Hackensack River
Locale	Jersey City and Newark, New Jersey
Maintained by	New Jersey Department of Transportation
ID number	0704150/0901150
Design	steel deck truss cantilever with through truss spans
Longest span	167.6 meters (550 feet)
Total length	5635.7 meters (3.502 miles)
Width	17.2 meters (56 feet)
Vertical clearance	4.41 meters (14.5 feet)
Clearance below	41.1 meters (135 feet)
Opening date	November 24, 1932
Coordinates

The General Pulaski Skyway is a series of cantilever truss bridges in the northeast part of the U.S. state of New Jersey. The highway carries four lanes of U.S. Route 1/9 for 3.5 miles (5.6 km) between the far east side of Newark and Tonnelle Circle in Jersey City, passing over Kearny. It is known as a "skyway" because it travels high above the meadows to avoid drawbridges across the Passaic and Hackensack Rivers, bridging each at a height of 135 feet (41.1 m). It also crosses over the New Jersey Turnpike, many local roads, and several rail lines. The skyway is named for General Kazimierz Pułaski, the Polish military leader who assisted in training and commanding Continental Army troops in the American Revolutionary War.

Trucks are prohibited from the Pulaski Skyway for the "safety and welfare of the public",^[1] due to its outdated design. They must use an alternate route known as U.S. Route 1/9 Truck, a series of local roads through Jersey City, Kearny and Newark that carried traffic before the Skyway was built. Pedestrians and bicycles are also banned, as the road is a freeway with no sidewalks.

The Pulaski Skyway opened in 1932 as the last part of the Route 1 Extension, one of the first superhighways in the United States.^[2] The structure has undergone only minor changes, and was added to the National Register of Historic Places (as part of the Route 1 Extension) on August 12, 2005.^[3] The construction of the skyway was also notable for a labor conflict involving Jersey City mayor Frank Hague, which ended up turning him against unions.

Description

The skyway presently carries the US 1/9 overlap; while it generally runs east from Newark to Jersey City, it is signed north (and south towards Newark) because both US 1 and US 9 are generally north-south routes. At the west end of the skyway, US 1/9 continues southwest towards the Newark Airport Interchange; traffic to downtown Newark can exit at Raymond Boulevard. The east end is at Tonnele Circle, where US 1/9 exits to the surface, following Tonnele Avenue towards the Lincoln Tunnel and George Washington Bridge. The four-lane Route 139 "covered roadway" leads east over Tonnele Circle and through the New Jersey Palisades to the Holland Tunnel approach. The speed limit on the skyway is 45 miles per hour (72 km/h),^[3] but is not generally followed; there is nowhere for police to pull over speeders.^[4]

While the skyway does not often appear in popular culture, it has made several significant contributions. In the 1938 radio drama The War of the Worlds, one of the Martian machines straddled the skyway. Alfred Hitchcock's 1943 film Shadow of a Doubt and the 1999-2007 television drama The Sopranos both opened with shots of the bridge.^[5]

Four access points to the skyway are provided, two at the ends and two in the middle. The two middle access points only provide access in one direction, and consist of a single ramp that rises into the middle of the skyway, producing left entrances and exits (which are no longer used on new highways unless absolutely necessary, since they dump traffic into the fast lane). Here is a list of the exits (and corresponding entrances):

County	Location	Mile[3]	Destinations	Notes
Essex	Newark	51.43	South end of the Pulaski Skyway; US 1/9 continues south on an eight-lane embankment
			Raymond Boulevard – Newark	Southbound exit to Raymond Boulevard; northbound entrance from Roanoke Avenue
		51.85	Bridge over the Passaic River
Hudson	Kearny
		52.33	South Kearny	Southbound exit and northbound entrance; left-side two-way ramp connects to Adams Street
		53.04	Bridge over the Hackensack River
	Jersey City
		54.00	Broadway (US 1/9 Truck)	Northbound exit and southbound entrance; left-side two-way ramp connects to Halleck Avenue and Broadway
		54.61	south to I-280 – Jersey City, Kearny	Southbound exit and northbound entrance (the latter through Tonnele Circle)
			US 1/9 north (Tonnele Avenue) – Meadowlands Sports Complex, Lincoln Tunnel	Tonnele Circle; northbound entrance is on the left
			North end of the Pulaski Skyway; NJ 139 continues east towards the Holland Tunnel and Hoboken

Design and construction

Except for the crossings of the Hackensack and Passaic Rivers, the main part of the skyway, which begins west of Raymond Boulevard, almost at the west end of the highway, is a steel deck truss cantilever bridge, supported by concrete piers. Each of the two river crossings is a 1250-foot (380 m) combination of a 550-foot (170 m) subdivided (K-shaped) through Pratt truss between the supports and a 350-foot (110 m) basic Pratt truss structure connecting each end to the deck truss part of the skyway.^[7] The Jersey City end includes three short through truss spans that take the roadway over rail lines. The westernmost passes over the Port Authority Trans-Hudson rapid transit line and Conrail's Passaic and Harsimus Line. Just beyond are the two easternmost deck truss spans, after which the skyway is low enough to use simple vertical supports. A pair of adjacent through trusses bridges Conrail's Northern Branch and a now-empty space next to it. Finally, after crossing over Tonnele Circle, the highway descends to ground level and becomes Route 139.^[8]

The main deck truss portion over Kearny, between the rivers	A closeup of part of the deck truss portion	The east end of the deck truss portion, with a flat bottom	The through truss span over the Hackensack River
One of the short through truss spans, US 1/9 Truck (1928) at right	One of the left-side ramps

Design for the Holland Tunnel, the first fixed connection between New Jersey and New York City, began in 1919; construction began in 1922, and the tunnel opened in late 1927.^[9] In order to provide for a continuous highway connection on the New Jersey side, so that drivers would not have to use the narrow streets of Jersey City and Newark, the New Jersey Legislature passed a bill authorizing the extension of Route 1 from its end at Elizabeth through Newark and Jersey City to the proposed tunnel.^[10] State highway engineer Hugh L. Sloan appointed old acquaintance Fred Lavis, a consulting engineer that had worked on foreign rail lines and the Panama Canal and written four books on locating and designing rail lines, to design this Route 1 Extension.^[11]

Lavis based his design on principles that had been worked out over the years for railways, and the need to connect not only to the Holland Tunnel but also to the proposed crossing (George Washington Bridge) at Fort Lee. Frank Hague, mayor of Jersey City and boss of the state's political machine, directed the state to avoid the open cuts that were already common where the railroads crossed Bergen Hill, and to include an access ramp in Kearny to spur industrial development.^[12] Construction of the highway, which was mostly raised on embankments, and passed through Bergen Hill in a cut covered by a local roadway, began in mid-1925, and large portions in Jersey City and Newark - including the "covered roadway" (Route 139) and the embankment in eastern Newark - were opened in late 1929, about a year after the tunnel opened.^[13][14] Traffic was still forced to cross the Hackensack and Passaic Rivers on the old Lincoln Highway, which included two drawbridges that frequently stopped traffic to allow ships to pass.^[11]

Lavis's design for this section across the meadows, which would be raised on concrete piers, included two drawbridges 35 feet (10 m) above the water surface, sufficient for the majority of ships to pass underneath. He resigned in 1928, believing his work was complete, but in January 1929 the War Department objected to the continued existence of the Lincoln Highway bridges once the new highway was complete. Since the Route 1 Extension was not intended for local traffic, and replacing the drawbridges with tunnels would be expensive, a compromise was worked out by late 1929 to raise the bridges to 135 feet (40 m), greatly increasing the grade of the approaches. The concrete jacketing of the steel was removed from the plans, since the taller bridges would be heavier; this resulted in more future maintenance.^[11]

Four companies - the American Bridge Company, McClintic-Marshall Company, Phoenix Bridge Comany, and Taylor-Fichter Steel Construction Company - were awarded contracts for the so-called "Diagonal Highway", with construction to start in April 1930. The two river bridges, McClintic-Marshall's portion, were completed first,^[15][16] and the $21 million^[17] road was opened at 8:00 a.m. on November 24, 1932, Thanksgiving Day, after an official ceremony the previous day on the Kearny ramp.^[18][19] Owing to the Great Depression and problems with funding, Governor A. Harry Moore directed the Highway Commission on October 25, 1932 to make a formal request to the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads to charge tolls on the Diagonal Highway. It was thought that tolls would be illegal due to federal aid being used to build the road, but it might be possible to transfer the $600,000 of federal aid to another project.^[20] A bill was introduced into the state legislature on May 1, 1933 asking to add tolls to the road (then known as the "sky way"), at a rate of 10 cents for cars and 20 cents for trucks. The legal obstacle of federal aid was also resolved by getting approval to transfer the funds,^[21] but tolls were never added.

In addition to US 1/9, prior to the 1953 renumbering, the skyway was also part of Route 25;^[22] this designation appears in contemporary planning documents. The original designation, part of the Route 1 Extension, referred to the Route 1 that largely became Route 25 in the 1927 renumbering.^[23] US 1/9 was moved from the old Lincoln Highway (which soon became US 1/9 Truck) to the skyway when it was completed.

During planning and construction, and for about half a year after opening, the road had no official name, being known as the Diagonal Highway, Newark-Jersey City Viaduct, or High-Level Viaduct. On May 3, 1933, the New Jersey Legislature passed a bill naming the road after Pulaski, sponsored by Assemblyman Eugene W. Hejke of Jersey City.^[24] An official ceremony was held on October 11, 1933, including the unveiling of signs with the new designation.^[25]

A survey taken during 1933 proved that the road saved time. Not only was the distance shortened by 0.5 mile (0.8 km), but it took about six minutes less to travel the new route. Trucks gained even more time, saving anywhere from five to eleven minutes. It was found that the highway also diverted a good deal of traffic from other routes.^[26]

Truck and other safety issues

The slippery concrete surfacing, steep left-side ramps, center breakdown lane, and wide-open alignment built for high speeds all contributed to a high number of crashes. Mayor Frank Hague of Jersey City passed an ordinance in November 1933 banning trucks from its section of the skyway, which effectively banned them from the whole road.^[27] Enforcement began on January 15, 1934, when Jersey City police began arresting truck drivers using the skyway.^[28] The New Jersey State Highway Commission approved the ban on January 23.^[29][30]

As a result of controversy caused by the ban, on February 6, 300,000 ballots were distributed to motorists on the skyway, asking whether trucks should be banned. Mayor Hague promised to go with the majority,^[31] which agreed with the ban. The matter was also taken to court, with one of the truck drivers convicted arguing that the ban was an unreasonable restraint of interstate commerce, and that since the federal government contributed money towards the road, Jersey City lacked the power to ban trucks. On August 14, Justice Thomas W. Trenchard of the New Jersey Supreme Court upheld the ban, stating that "the court is not at liberty to substitute its judgment for that of the municipality's as to the best and most feasible manner of curing traffic evils and traffic congestion where such regulation bears a direct relationship to public safety and is reasonable and not arbitrary."^[32] The Tonnele Circle Viaduct, a new offramp allowing trucks from the Holland Tunnel to bypass Tonnelle Circle, opened in September 1938.^[33]

On May 21, 1952, large numbers of trucks were spotted by Jersey City police entering the city on the skyway. Upon pulling over the drivers, they were told that the exit in Newark for the truck route was closed for construction. A call to Newark police confirmed the situation. Hudson County police refused to force trucks to exit before Jersey City, since there was no state law banning trucks from the skyway. Jersey City Police Chief James McNamara gave in, and trucks were temporarily allowed to use the skyway, though only in one direction.^[34]

When the road was first opened, it carried five lanes; the center one was intended as a breakdown lane, but was in actuality used as a suicide lane for passing slower traffic.^[30] By the 1950s, the skyway was seeing over 400 crashes per year; an aluminum median barrier was added in mid-1956, in addition to a new coat of pavement designed to make the road less slippery.^[35][36][37]

The skyway was a constraint in the building of the perpendicular New Jersey Turnpike near the west end in 1951. The turnpike had to be built low enough to provide enough clearance underneath the skyway, but high enough to clear the nearby Passaic River. Turnpike engineers could have built over the skyway (at a much higher cost) or built under the skyway's trusses; the latter option was chosen.^[38][39] As part of a 2005 seismic retrofit project, the Turnpike Authority lowered the bridge to increase vertical clearance and allow for full-width shoulders, which had been constrained by the location of the skyway supports.^[40] The Newark Bay Extension of the New Jersey Turnpike (I-78) opened in September 1956, finally allowing Holland Tunnel-bound trucks to bypass the old surface road.^[41]

In the aftermath of the I-35W Mississippi River bridge collapse in Minneapolis, Minnesota in August 2007, local officials called for a renovation of the skyway and its non-redundant trusses. The renovation work, costing $10 million and expected to take one year to complete, is aimed at preventing metal fatigue and other structural instabilities that are believed to have caused the Minneapolis disaster.^[42] The New Jersey Department of Transportation had identified the skyway as one of eight "high priority" bridges in need of repairs.^[43]

Labor issues

The construction of the Pulaski Skyway ended up in the middle of a dispute between Jersey City mayor Frank Hague, who ran a statewide political machine, and Theodore M. Brandle, a "labor czar" allied with Hague. Brandle and Hague had become friends through Hague's efforts to get the approval of unions. Brandle helped organize the Branleygran Company, a construction bond underwriter, which Hague channeled construction projects towards. During the mid-1920s redevelopment of Journal Square, Brandle's Labor National Bank, founded in June 1926, acquired a new 15-story headquarters. (This Labor Bank Building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.^[44]) Essentially Brandle controlled any construction projects in northern New Jersey, and any strikes he might call would be backed by Hague's police.^[45]

The relationship between Hague and Brandle started to go bad in late 1931, during the construction of the Jersey City Medical Center, an important project to Hague. Leo Brennan, a contractor approved by Hague without consulting Brandle, who was building a backup power station for the hospital, refused to work with Brandle's card-file system, by which he kept track of union members and blacklisted those whom he disliked. The annoyed Brandle called a strike, but Brennan's workers refused; the police shut down the site after a brawl, but Brennan got court approval to continue. To placate Brandle, who threatened a strike that would stop all construction work on the center, Hague paid off Brennan and hired another contractor that Brandle had approved.^[46]

For the construction of the Pulaski Skyway, which began in April 1930, Hague chose four members of the National Erectors' Association, an organization of "open shop" (anti-union) steel contractors. Performance bonds were paid in cash, bypassing Branleygran, and the companies hired the Foster Industrial and Detective Agency to guard the site against Brandle's threat to "unionize this job or else". Brandle organized picket lines of loyal union men, and the two sides frequently fought in the streets or in the work area. Brandle's sole victory was a five-day stoppage in July 1931 by 165 nonunion workers, who were interested in higher pay and afraid of the ongoing fights, but decided against joining the union.^[47] During the LaFollette Civil Liberties Committee hearings, it was discovered that, in order to save about $50,000 in salary, the American Bridge Company, one of the four contractors, spent almost $300,000 on keeping its "open shop".^[48]

The first casualty of the labor battle was a picketer, shot and temporarily paralyzed by a perimeter guard on November 14, 1931 for throwing stones at workers. Several months later, on February 27, 1932, a car carrying six workers to the construction site was surrounded by union men, who began to beat them with iron bars. One of the workers, William T. Harrison, was dead by the next morning; Hague broke all ties with Brandle and ordered the police to "wage relentless war against the Brandle gang-rioters". 21 ironworkers were indicted in April as suspects in the Harrison murder.^[49] The trial was held on December 6, 1932, two weeks after the completion of the skyway. Every defendant was found not guilty, since county prosecutor John Drewen was unable to place any of them at the scene of the crime, and witnesses and defendants testified that they had been forced under torture or the threat of prosecution to sign affidavits and confessions.^[50] In addition to this murder, 14 lives were claimed by work-related accidents during construction.^[51]

Hague refused to allow Brandle and the unions to win, and began to force unions to foreclose through his control of the courts. On the public side, Hague attacked the "labor racketeers" with words, and the local newspapers gladly went along. In 1937 and 1938, Hague turned Jersey City into a police state to fight the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), which was trying to inform workers of their rights under the 1935 National Labor Relations Act. Socialist Norman Thomas was prevented from speaking in Jersey City and Newark by Hague and his friends.^[52] This and other similar cases turned the national spotlight on Hague, and he was attacked by the New Yorker and Life in early 1938. Finally, in 1947, Governor Alfred E. Driscoll cut off Hague's judicial power, and the mayor retired.^[53]

References

• Hart, Steven (2007). The Last Three Miles: Politics, Murder, and the Construction of America's First Superhighway. The New Press. ISBN 978-1-59558-098-6. 

External links

• Historic American Engineering Record: Pulaski Skyway, Spanning Passaic & Hackensack Rivers, Jersey City, Hudson County, NJ
• Pulaski Skyway at nycroads.com
• Pulaski Skyway in the Structurae database