page_title: West Side Highway
section_title: Westway
hierarchical_section_title: West Side Highway / Westway
caption_attribution_description: English: People demonstrating against the Westway highway project, New York City, July 6, 1977. Photograph by Robert Swirsky.
context_page_description: The West Side Highway is a 5.42-mile-long mostly surface section of New York State Route 9A that runs from West 72nd Street along the Hudson River to the southern tip of Manhattan in New York City. It replaced the West Side Elevated Highway, built between 1929 and 1951, which was shut down in 1973 due to neglect and lack of maintenance, and was dismantled by 1989. The term "West Side Highway" is often mistakenly used to include the roadway north of 72nd Street, which is properly known as the Henry Hudson Parkway.
  The current highway was complete by 2001, but required reconstruction after the September 11 attacks that year, when the collapse of the World Trade Center caused debris to fall onto the surrounding areas, damaging the highway. It uses the surface streets that existed before the elevated highway was built: West Street, Eleventh Avenue and Twelfth Avenue. A short section of 12th Avenue still runs between 125th and 138th Streets, under the Riverside Drive Viaduct. Eleventh Avenue is a separate street north of 22nd Street. The portion between West 42nd Street and Canal Street is part of the Lincoln Highway.
context_section_description: In 1971, the Urban Development Corporation (UDC) proposed rebuilding the highway as Interstate 478. UDC's "Water Edge Study" called for the highway to be routed above the water at the ends of the then mostly abandoned piers on the Hudson River and the addition of hundreds of acres of concrete platforms between the bulkhead and the pierhead lines for parks and apartments. The final plan, championed by New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller and Mayor John Lindsay, called for burying the six-lane highway in 220 acres (89 ha) of new landfill south of 40th Street, placing the accompanying development on land instead of on platforms. It was renamed "Westway" in 1974.
  Hugh Carey, who was to become governor, and Ed Koch, who was to become mayor, both campaigned against the plan saying that it would be a waste of government funds and would be a windfall for private developers. After the two were elected, they both reversed their position and supported the plan.
  In 1981, President Ronald Reagan's Department of Transportation and the United States Army Corps of Engineers were on board for the construction with a 1981 price tag of $2.1 billion.
  But in 1982, Judge Thomas Griesa of the U.S. District Court blocked the Corps permit, saying the road would harm striped bass.  His order was affirmed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. In August 1985, Judge Griesa ruled that state and federal agencies provided tainted testimony regarding the striped bass. At the same time, Congress moved to deny necessary funding for the landfill.
  
  On September 30, 1985, New York City officially gave up on the project, allocating 60 percent of its interstate highway funds to mass transit and setting aside $811 million for the "West Side Highway Replacement Project".
caption: Protesters demonstrating against the Westway project in New York City
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