Belt Parkway

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Belt Parkway
Reference Route 907B, C, and D.
Length:	25.3 mi[1] (41 km)
Formed:	1941
West end:	I-278
Major junctions:	I-678 NY-878 I-278
East end:	Southern State Cross Island
New York State Reference Routes

The Belt Parkway, also known as the Belt System or Circumferential Parkway, is a series of New York City limited-access highways that form a complete circle around the Boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens.

[edit] History

The Belt Parkway was proposed by builder and highway advocate Robert Moses in 1930 to provide modern highway access to Manhattan and to connect to, and use similar design principles to, parkways already constructed on Long Island and Westchester County, New York. Construction began in 1934. The full loop was completed when the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (also known as the BQE) finished in 1960.

[edit] The Belt System

Entering the Belt Parkway eastward from the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. The sign in the foreground reads: Brooklyn: How Sweet It Is!

Belt Parkway, Mill Basin Drawbridge, with typical traffic volume

Though some signage bears the name "Belt Parkway," the original plan never called for a highway of that name, rather a system of different named parkways called the "Belt System." The Belt System is made up of a series of interconnecting highways, none of which are actually the single Belt Parkway. Originally there were:

• part of the Grand Central Parkway (GCP) running west from the Triborough Bridge to a point east of LaGuardia Airport, where the GCP veers south and east, then the
• Whitestone Expressway (originally Whitestone Parkway) from the junction of the GCP northeast to the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge, then becoming the
• Cross Island Parkway from the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge east and then south near the border of Nassau County, New York to a connection with the Southern State Parkway then south on the
• Laurelton Parkway, a short connector that then turns west as the
• Southern Parkway (distinct from the Long Island Southern State Parkway mentioned above) in the median of Conduit Boulevard, turning south at Cross Bay Boulevard to become
• Shore Parkway, the part most people think of when they mention "Belt Parkway," skipping across former islands in Jamaica Bay, turning west partly over the former bed of Coney Island Creek then making a large arc to the north to connect to the last original segment, the
• Gowanus Expressway to its end at the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel to Manhattan.

[edit] Picturesque landscapes along the Shore Parkway

All of these original parkways except the Gowanus were built on strips of green and treed rights-of-way in a more pleasant surrounding than most highways of their time. The Gowanus Parkway was built as an elevated structure over Third and Hamilton Avenues in order to avoid the active docks and industrial areas in that part of Brooklyn.

Today, the Cross Island, Laurelton, Southern and Shore Parkways are collectively known as the "Belt System"^[1]. The four components of the Belt System are unsigned New York State Reference Routes 907A, 907B, 907D, and 907C (respectively). Excluding the Cross Island Parkway, the other three segments are now known collectively as the official "Belt Parkway". It is designated an east-west route, and its exit numbering system begins as the Shore Parkway, where it exits off the Gowanus Expressway at the east end of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and continues eastward. At Exit 25A (Southern State Parkway), the Belt Parkway becomes the Cross Island Parkway (which is designated north-south), where the numbering scheme continues until that parkway's northern terminus.

[edit] Conversion and completion

New York parkways are closed to commercial traffic, which means any vehicle with a non-passenger registration, including all commercial trucking of any size. Originally even station wagons, which had "suburban" registrations, were excluded but they are now allowed, along with passenger-registered SUVs and vans.

The system was not completed as a parkway, and some portions of the original system were converted to expressways, which allows commercial traffic to use them, even interstate heavy trucking. These expressway portions are:

• Gowanus Expressway, replacing Gowanus Parkway as a connector between Manhattan and the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge to Staten Island and New Jersey (It is now signed as part of Interstate 278);
• Whitestone Expressway, which converted Whitestone Parkway into a truck route to connect the Van Wyck Expressway to the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge (It is now signed as part of Interstate 678); and
• Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, built as an expressway to connect the Gowanus Parkway/Expressway to the Triborough Bridge and Grand Central Parkway to complete the system (It is now signed as part of Interstate 278).

[edit] Exit list

Number		Municipality	Destinations	Notes
Now	Old
		Brooklyn	Begins at Exit 23 off I-278 Gowanus Expressway
1			65 Street 67 Street
2			4th Avenue Fort Hamilton Parkway
3			I-278 Verrazano-Narrows Bridge Staten Island	Westbound exit only
4			Bay 8 Street 14th Avenue
5			Bay Parkway
6			Cropsey Avenue Coney Island	Eastbound exit only
6N			Cropsey Avenue North Stillwell Avenue	Westbound exit only
6S			Cropsey Avenue South Coney Island	Westbound exit only
7			Ocean Parkway	Eastbound exit only
7A	7S		Shell Road	Eastbound exit only
7B	7N		Ocean Parkway
8			Coney Island Avenue
9			Knapp Street Sheepshead Bay	Westbound exit only
9A			Knapp Street Sheepshead Bay	Eastbound exit only
9B			Knapp Street	Eastbound exit only
11N			Flatbush Avenue North Marine Park
11S			Flatbush Avenue South Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge Rockaways
12			Jamaica Bay Riding Academy	Eastbound exit only. This exit is unofficially given the exit number 12.
13			Rockaway Parkway
14			Pennsylvania Avenue
15			Erskine Street Gateway Center Mall
17		Queens	Cross Bay Boulevard	Eastbound exit only
17N			Cross Bay Boulevard North Cohancy Street Woodhaven	Westbound exit only
17S			Cross Bay Boulevard South Rockaways	Westbound exit only
17W			NY-27/North Conduit Avenue	Westbound exit only
18			Lefferts Boulevard Aqueduct Racetrack
19			NY-878/Nassau Expressway, Interstate 678/Van Wyck Expressway, Lefferts Boulevard, JFK Expressway, JFK International Airport.	Eastbound exit only
20			150th Street Rockaway Boulevard (Eastbound) JFK Expressway to JFK International Airport (Westbound)
21A			Rockaway Boulevard	Westbound exit only
21B			Farmers Boulevard Guy R. Brewer Boulevard
22			Springfield Boulevard
23			NY-27/Sunrise Highway	Eastbound exit only
23A			NY-27/North Conduit Avenue	Westbound exit only
24A			Francis Lewis Boulevard Merrick Boulevard (eastbound)	Eastbound exit only
24B			130th Avenue (Eastbound) Merrick Boulevard (Westbound)
25A			Southern State Parkway Eastern Long Island
			End of Belt Parkway and Start of Cross Island Parkway

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Belt Parkway Historic Overview at Steve Anderson's nycroads.com