Pulaski Skyway - Description

Description

The four-lane skyway carries the US 1/9 overlap. While it generally runs east–west between Newark and Jersey City, it is signed according to US 1 and US 9 which are generally north–south routes. The west end of the skyway is near where Raymond Boulevard merges with the viaduct carrying the freeway in Newark's Ironbound. The east end is just beyond Tonnele Circle, where US 1/9 exits to the surface, following Tonnele Avenue towards the Lincoln Tunnel and George Washington Bridge. The road becomes the four-lane Route 139 which enters the lower part of the dual-level "divided highway" through Bergen Hill to the Holland Tunnel approach. In addition to crossing the Hackensack and Passaic rivers, it also passes over the New Jersey Turnpike, with which it has no interchange. Under most of the skyway is other vehicular, rail, maritime, and industrial infrastructure built on landfilled wetlands that were once part of the New Jersey Meadowlands.

Sources differ on inclusion of the Route 1 Extension in the Pulaski Skyway. In some cases, the NJDOT includes the southern approach starting at milepost 49.00. Some maps, including a 1938 map of Newark and a 1981 map of Elizabeth also have the approach road labeled as the Pulaski Skyway. Google includes the Holland Tunnel approach. The National Register of Historic Places includes the road starting at milepost 51.25 extending to the dual-level highway at its northern end. Other sources such as the New York Times and the Newark Star-Ledger refer to the Pulaski Skyway as the 3.5-mile (5.6 km) iconic bridge designed by Johannesson that was the third and last component of the new highway to be built.

There is limited access to the freeway: two single-lane ramps rise to the inner lanes of the elevated structure, requiring traffic to enter or exit from the left providing access at the Marion Section of Jersey City and South Kearny. Trucks have been prohibited for the "safety and welfare of the public" since shortly after its official dedication. They are detoured to use U.S. Route 1/9 Truck, along the route of the Lincoln Highway that carried traffic before its construction. Pedestrians and cyclists are banned, as the road has no dedicated lanes or sidewalks. The speed limit on the skyway is 45 miles per hour (72 km/h), but is not generally followed as there is nowhere for police to pull over speeders due to the absence of shoulders.

In 2011, the Texas Transportation Institute determined that the Skyway had the dubious distinction of being the sixth most unreliable road in the United States due to the unpredictability of traffic conditions and therefore travel times.

Before the 1953 highway renumbering in New Jersey, the skyway was also part of Route 25. The original designation, part of the Route 1 Extension, referred to the Route 1 that largely became Route 25 in the 1927 renumbering.