Everything about The Lincoln Tunnel totally explained
The
Lincoln Tunnel is a 1.5 mile (2.4 km) long
tunnel under the
Hudson River, connecting
Weehawken,
New Jersey and the
borough of
Manhattan in
New York City.
History
The tunnel was designed by
Ole Singstad. The project was funded by the New Deal's
Public Works Administration. Construction began on the first tube in 1934. It opened to traffic in December 1937, charging $0.50 per passenger car. The cost of construction was $75,000,000. Omero C. Catan, a salesman from Manhattan, drove the first car through the tunnel.
The original design called for two tubes. Work on the second was halted in 1938 but resumed in 1941. Due to war material shortages of metal, completion was delayed for two years. It opened on
February 1,
1945 at a cost of $80 million, with Michael Catan, brother of Omero, selected to be the first to lead the public through the tube.
A third tube was proposed by the Port Authority, but initially opposed by the City of New York, which was trying to get the Port Authority to help pay for the road improvements that the City would need to handle the additional traffic. A compromise was worked out, and the third tube opened in May 1957 to the south of the original two tunnels.
Traffic
The three tubes carry six traffic lanes in total. During the morning rush hour one traffic lane in the center tube called the
XBL is used exclusively by
buses. The New Jersey approach roadway, locally known as "the Helix" or "the Corkscrew", spirals in a full circle before arriving at the toll booths in front of the tunnel portals.
The tunnel carries about 120,000 vehicles per day, making it one of the busiest vehicular tunnels in the world. The
XBL is by far the busiest and most productive
bus lane in the
United States. The lane operates weekday mornings between 6:15 and 10:00 a.m., accommodating approximately 1,700
buses and 62,000
commuters, mainly to the
Port Authority Bus Terminal.The
XBL carries more trans-Hudson commuter trips into midtown Manhattan each day than any other mode, including commuter rail into
Penn Station.
Normally only motor traffic uses the tunnel, but every year a few bicycle tours and foot races pass through by special arrangement.
Events in the Tunnel
Shortly after noon on
September 8,
1953, two armed men, Peter Simon and John Metcalf, attempted to rob a home in
South Orange, New Jersey. The men were driven off by the residents, one of whom reported the license plate on their car to the police, who put out an alert. A patrolman, Nicholas Falabella, noticed the car just as it passed the toll booth and ordered the driver to stop the vehicle. The driver sped off into the tunnel, firing at the police. A Port Authority policeman, Donald Lackmun, was hit in the leg. The police commandeered a delivery truck and gave chase, exchanging gun fire with the renegade car while weaving in and out of traffic. In all 28 shots were fired, ten by the gunmen and 18 by the police. The vehicle came to a stop about three fourths of the way through the tunnel. Simon was hit in the head.
Route numbers
With the cancellation of the
Mid-Manhattan Expressway, intended to carry
Interstate 495 through New York City to the
Queens Midtown Tunnel and onto the
Long Island Expressway, the
NYDOT and
NJDOT demoted the Lincoln Tunnel, Queens-Midtown Tunnel, and the freeway link to
NJ 3 as state routes. Some signs still list the tunnels as I-495. Although the
Federal Highway Administration still considers the midtown tunnel to be an Interstate, the Lincoln Tunnel is no longer on the Interstate system. In New Jersey, the freeway was officially demoted to
NJ 495 and very few signs still read "I-495".
34th Street links the disjointed segments of I-495.
Culture
The Oscar winning acclaimed film Midnight Cowboy (1969) shows the Midtown skyline just as the bus carrying Joe Buck from Texas curves down the "helix" approach and into the tunnel.
In Stephen King's book The Stand, two of its characters exit New York through the Lincoln Tunnel. The city is dead after a virus epidemic and the tunnel is clogged with cars and corpses.
In the 2003 film Elf the lead character (Will Ferrell) walks through the Lincoln Tunnel to get to New York City.
In the title sequence of the HBO series The Sopranos, main character Tony Soprano is seen exiting the Tunnel's north tube as he heads for the New Jersey Turnpike.
In, the dispatcher reports a crime in which terrorists are destroying a gasoline truck at the Lincoln Tunnel.
In the novel Terrorist by John Updike, main character Ahmad is going to blow up the tunnel with a truck full of chemicals.
The 2008 video game Grand Theft Auto IV features a replica of the Lincoln Tunnel called the "Booth Tunnel" in the fictional Liberty City as a reference to Abraham Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth.Further Information
Get more info on 'Lincoln Tunnel'.
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