The Jersey City and Bergen Point Plank Road was a road originally built in the 19th century in

Hudson County, New Jersey Hudson County is the most densely populated county in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It lies west of the lower Hudson River, which was named for Henry Hudson, the sea captain who explored the area in 1609. Part of New Jersey's Gateway Region in t ...

, United States which ran between

Paulus Hook Paulus Hook is a community on the Hudson River waterfront in Jersey City, New Jersey. It is located across the river from Manhattan. The name Hook comes from the Dutch word "hoeck", which translates to "point of land." This "point of land" ...

and

Bergen Point Bergen Point is a point of land that lends its name to the adjacent neighborhood in Bayonne in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States. The point is located on the north side of Kill van Kull at Newark Bay. It is the section of the city c ...

. The company that built the road received a charter on March 6, 1850 to improve one that had been built in the 18th century. It has subsequently become Grand Street and Garfield Avenue in

Jersey City Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.Bayonne Bayonne (; eu, Baiona ; oc, label= Gascon, Baiona ; es, Bayona) is a city in Southwestern France near the Spanish border. It is a commune and one of two subprefectures in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine re ...

Plank road A plank road is a road composed of wooden planks or puncheon logs. Plank roads were commonly found in the Canadian province of Ontario as well as the Northeast and Midwest of the United States in the first half of the 19th century. They were oft ...

s were built during the 19th century, often by private companies as

turnpike road A toll road, also known as a turnpike or tollway, is a public or private road (almost always a controlled-access highway in the present day) for which a fee (or ''toll'') is assessed for passage. It is a form of road pricing typically implemented ...

s, in this case with a tollgate at

Communipaw Junction Communipaw is a neighborhood in Jersey City in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States. It is located west of Liberty State Park and east of Bergen Hill, and the site of one of the earliest European settlements in North America. It gives its na ...

. As the name suggests, wooden boards were laid on a roadbed in order to prevent horse-drawn carriages and wagons from sinking into softer ground on the portions of the road. The road traveled from the waterfront of

North River (Hudson River) North River is an alternative name for the southernmost portion of the Hudson River in the vicinity of New York City and Gateway Region, northeastern New Jersey in the United States. The entire watercourse was known as the North River by the Du ...

, where a toll was collected. It then ran parallel to the

Morris Canal The Morris Canal (1829–1924) was a common carrier anthracite coal canal across northern New Jersey that connected the two industrial canals at Easton, Pennsylvania across the Delaware River from its western terminus at Phillipsburg, New Jers ...

through Greenville to

Curries Woods Curries Woods is a neighborhood in the southern part of Greenville in Jersey City, New Jersey bordering Bayonne. It was named after James Curie, who was on the town Committee for Greenville when it was its own Township in the 19th century. The ar ...

.,Greenville
/ref> passing through Bayview – New York Bay Cemetery. Crossing the canal at Pamrapo, it proceeded south into Saltersville and Centerville ending at

. Transfer to ferries to

Elizabethport Elizabeth is a City (New Jersey), city and the county seat of Union County, New Jersey, Union County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey.Newark Bay Newark Bay is a tidal bay at the confluence of the Passaic and Hackensack Rivers in northeastern New Jersey. It is home to the Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal, the largest container shipping facility in Port of New York and New Jersey, t ...

and to

Staten Island Staten Island ( ) is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Richmond County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located in the city's southwest portion, the borough is separated from New Jersey by the Arthur Kill and the Kill Van Kull an ...

across

Kill van Kull __NOTOC__ The Kill Van Kull is a tidal strait between Staten Island, New York and Bayonne, New Jersey in the United States. It is approximately long and wide and connects Newark Bay with Upper New York Bay. The Robbins Reef Light marks the ...

were possible.

References

{{Coord, 40.717119, -74.061574, format=dms, display=title History of New Jersey Streets in Hudson County, New Jersey Roads in New Jersey Transportation in Hudson County, New Jersey Bayonne, New Jersey Turnpikes in New Jersey Plank road

See also

References