One to 101: Cruising Our Coasts

The Pulaski Skyway is huge, hulking, and hazardous. And it just might be the most beautiful sight in New Jersey. So contends the author of this article extolling the joys of traveling this historic highway and bridge. The author provides an historical backdrop to the present sights of the New Jersey roadways. The Pulaski Skyway, completed in 1932, was the highest and longest viaduct in the world devoted to motor vehicles. Before the Skyway was built, the Jersey City to Newark stretch was the most time-consuming gap on the Lincoln Highway (then the busiest highway in the world). The recently completed Holland Tunnel swept motorists out of New York City and quickly deposited them in the middle of nowhere. The Skyway was built to alleviate this problem. The author describes the naming of the Skyway after General Casimir Pulaski (the "Father of the American Cavalry"), the current problems with safety and accidents on the Skyway, the use of the bridge in movies and popular culture (a gigantic creature straddled it during Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds" broadcast), the views from on top of the bridge, and the interesting sights to be found underneath and nearby the bridge. The article is illustrated with full-color photographs.