| New Jersey Turnpike | |||
| Get started | Pennsville | ||
| End | Fort Lee | ||
| Length | 122 mi | ||
| Length | 197 km | ||
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According to CITYPOPULATIONREVIEW.COM, the New Jersey Turnpike is a turnpike in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The highway is the primary transportation route in the state, handling through traffic from Washington to New York, bypassing the Philadelphia metropolitan area, but passing through urbanized northern New Jersey. The New Jersey Turnpike is one of the busiest toll roads in the world, with a long parallel structure between the Philadelphia and New York regions. The New Jersey Turnpike runs from Pennsville (I-295) to Fort Lee (I-80). The northern section is also part of Interstate 95. The New Jersey Turnpike is 197 kilometers long.
Travel directions
Southern New Jersey
The start of the New Jersey Turnpike at Penns Grove.
The New Jersey Turnpike begins in Pennsville, a suburb of Philadelphia at the mouth of the Delaware River, just after the Delaware border at the interchange with Interstate 295. I-295 parallels the New Jersey Turnpike through Philadelphia’s many suburbs. The New Jersey Turnpike has fewer exits and is a through route. The toll plaza follows immediately after the start. The highway has 2×2 lanes here. The highway has full services right along the way, such as gas stations. On other highways in the United States, these are usually at exits. The landscape is flat, with rows of trees along the New Jersey Turnpike giving little to no view of the surrounding landscape.
At Swedesboro, US 322 crosses, which runs from Chester in Pennsylvania to Atlantic City in the southeast. You then enter the built-up area, but there are few exits. Interstate 295 parallels a few miles away. At Runnemede, one crosses State Route 42, the North South Freeway, which leads to the Atlantic City Expresswaytowards the town of the same name. However, there are no exchange options for this. One must take the next exit, then turn back north, west, then south on I-295 and I-76. After that, I-295 and New Jersey Turnpike are barely 50 meters apart, but there are no connections with each other. However, the Turnpike just keeps 2×2 lanes. However, after the connection at Ramblewood, the highway has 2×3 lanes.
Both highways will continue to run right next to each other, with I-295 being a commuter highway, and through freight traffic using the New Jersey Turnpike. At the hamlet of Sharp, the Pennsylvania Turnpike inserts extension. This is still Interstate 276, but Interstate 95 will be moved via this route, and so no longer goes along the north side of Trenton, the capital of New Jersey. From this point begins the 110-kilometer parallel structure, with the highway running east of the capital Trenton. One crosses Interstate 195, the highway from Trenton to Neptune City on the Atlantic coast. One then enters the transition area from the Philadelphia metropolitan area to the New York metropolitan area. The area remains highly urbanized.
Northern New Jersey
I-95 / New Jersey Turnpike.
The transition of the two agglomerations is not easy to indicate. This section is now called Interstate 95, and you pass East Brunswick, the beginning of the continuously built-up area of New York, which is still 70 kilometers away. At Metuchen, one crosses Interstate 287, the partial ring road of the New York metropolitan area. Almost immediately afterwards, at Fords, one crosses the Garden State Parkway, a major highway from the suburbs along the coast into the vast New Jersey metropolitan area.
After this interchange, the New Jersey Turnpike widens to 4+3+3+4 lanes, and the corridor is 90 meters wide with 14 lanes and 8 emergency lanes. One then passes through the oil refineries at Linden. Elizabeth crosses Interstate 278, which leads to Staten Island and provides connections to Brooklyn and Queens. Elizabeth is a fairly large suburb with 121,000 inhabitants. The highway then runs past Newark Airport, where State Route 81 exits, the airport’s ring road. You will then pass through the harbor area of Newark, the largest city in New Jersey. One crosses Interstate 78, which runs through the Holland Tunnel to Manhattan. After that, the highway has no less than 6×3 lanes. It also crosses thePulaski Skyway, which runs to Jersey City. At Kearny, Interstate 280 ends at the New Jersey Turnpike.
Both directions then split, with 2×3 lanes each. Both carriageways are 3 kilometers apart, with swamps, the Hackensack River and the town of Secaucus in the median strip. One then crosses State Route 3, which runs to the town of Clifton. At Ridgefield, both directions come together again. Near Teaneck, Interstate 80 ends at NJ Turnpike/I-95, which comes all the way from San Francisco. The New Jersey Turnpike then ends and Interstate 95 continues through the George Washington Bridge to Manhattan, and to Boston.
History
As early as the 1930s, there were plans for a 12-lane superhighway between Boston and Washington. However, the depression threw a spanner in the works, and then the Second World War followed. Despite this, the construction of the New Jersey Turnpike was seen as a top priority.
Construction of the highway began in January 1950. This one was fairly simple in southern New Jersey, which was still largely undeveloped forest. In the north, however, it was a different story, this part was already highly urbanized. In Elizabeth, an older industrial city of 110,000 inhabitants, about 450 buildings had to be demolished. Another problem was the Pulaski Skyway, which is located 30 meters higher on site. If one went over it an expensive and high viaduct had to be built, if one went under it one came out too low over the Passaic River further north. The latter went ahead anyway. Farther north were the swamps known as the New Jersey Meadowlands. In some places the swamp was 75 meters deep. In shallow places rubble was poured for the foundation, in the deep places the engineers lowered concrete caissons on which the highway was built.
The 120-mile New Jersey Turnpike took 25 months to construct at a cost of $255 million. The 71-kilometer southern section between exit 1 and exit 5 opened on November 5, 1951. The 79-kilometer middle section between exit 5 and exit 11 in Woodbridge opened on November 30, 1951, and a 16-mile section between exit 11 and exit 15E in Newark on December 20, 1951. The last 15-mile stretch between exit 15E and exit 18 in Ridgefield opened on January 15, 1952.
In 1971, the New Jersey Turnpike connected directly to I-80/I-95 north of Ridgefield. Before that, traffic went from the turnpike to the George Washington Bridge via US 46 and US 9, a narrow 2×2 expressway. This route had no traffic lights.
Opening history
| From | Unpleasant | Length | Opening |
| 1 | 5 Westhampton | 71 km | 05-11-1951 |
| 5 Westhampton | 11 Garden State Parkway | 79 km | 30-11-1951 |
| 11 Garden State Parkway | 15E Pulaski Skyway | 26 km | 20-12-1951 |
| 15E Pulaski Skyway | 18 Ridgefield | 14 km | 15-01-1952 |
Widenings
The interchange between the New Jersey Turnpike and I-278.
According to ASK4BEAUTY, the New Jersey Turnpike was originally constructed with 2×2 lanes, and traffic models at the time indicated that widening to 2×3 lanes was not necessary until the mid-1970s. However, New Jersey suburbanization proceeded much faster than expected, and the New Jersey Turnpike was congested after just a few years. Already in 1955 a considerable part of the turnpike was widened. Between Exit 4 (Mount Laurel) and Exit 10 (Edison), the highway was widened to 2×3 lanes. A parallel 4×2 lane structure was constructed between Exit 10 (Edison) and Exit 14 (Newark).
Traffic in the region was still growing explosively and 10 years later a second widening was already necessary. In 1966 the 4×2 section was widened to 4×3 lanes, with a parallel structure in which trucks were only allowed to drive on the parallel lanes, and passenger cars on all lanes. In 1973 the turnpike was widened further south, between Exit 9 (East Brunswick) and Exit 10 (Edison) from 2×3 to 4×3 lanes. In 1990 a further section southwards was widened from 2×3 to 2×5 lanes to Exit 8A (Monroe).
However, the portion north of Newark still had 2×3 lanes, and a simple widening was not possible here. That is why a new route has been constructed for the western carriageways. Both sets of lanes are 2 miles apart here, with the western lanes opening in 1970 to include 4×3 lanes north of Newark. This connected with the link opened in 1971 from the New Jersey Turnpike to I-80.
In 1996, the highway between Exit 11 (Garden State Parkway) and Exit 14 (I-78) was widened from 12 to 14 lanes, by adding an extra lane in both directions on the parallel lanes of the turnpike. Between 1992 and 1997, the huge braid between I-78 and the Pulaski Skyway was constructed in Newark.
Between 2009 and 2014, an additional 55 miles of the New Jersey Turnpike was widened to 4×3 lanes, 12 in all. It concerned the section between Exit 6 (I-276) just outside Trenton and Exit 9 in East Brunswick. 40 kilometers has been doubled from 6 to 12 lanes and another 15 kilometers has been widened from 10 to 12 lanes. The project cost $2.5 billion and was carried out by the New Jersey Turnpike Authority. It was one of the largest construction projects on the East Coast of the United States during this period and was completed ahead of schedule and $200 million under budget. The additional lanes were opened to traffic in phases from October 24, 2014 to November 3, 2014.
Longest parallel structure
The original parallel structure was 27 kilometers long in 1955. This was one of the first large-scale parallel structures in the world, with 4×2 lanes. In the period 1970-1973, the parallel structure grew to 72 kilometers in length.
The main competitor for the title of ‘world’s longest parallel structure’ was Ontario Highway 401, which passes through Torontohas a long parallel structure. Highway 401 is the busiest highway in the world, a title that the New Jersey Turnpike cannot claim. In 1972, Highway 401 had a parallel structure of 45 kilometers, shorter than that of the New Jersey Turnpike. But in the following years, the parallel structure was further extended, reaching a maximum length of 58 kilometers in 2014. Thus, the parallel structure of Highway 401 has never been longer than that of the New Jersey Turnpike. Longest parallel structure status for the New Jersey Turnpike was set in concrete in 2014 when the southern extension was completed, and today is 70 miles long, nearly twice as long as Highway 401. It seems unlikely that the Highway’s parallel structure 401 will ever exceed that of the New Jersey Turnpike.
Toll
The Turnpike has a closed ticket toll system. Fares increased by 53% effective January 1, 2012, with a 36% increase effective September 13, 2020. Originally relatively inexpensive, the New Jersey Turnpike is now one of the more expensive long-haul toll roads in the United States.
Traffic intensities
The fork with I-95 near Trenton.
| Exit | Location | 2008 |
| 2 | Pennsville | 47,000 |
| 3 | Woolwich | 50,000 |
| 4 | Camden | 59,000 |
| 5 | Willingboro | 74,000 |
| 6 | 81,000 | |
| 7 | Bordentown | 122,000 |
| 8 | Hightstown | 138,000 |
| 9 | New Brunswick | 161,000 |
| 10 | 203,000 | |
| 11 | Garden State Turnpike | 190,000 |
| 12 | Woodbridge | 225,000 |
| 13 | 240,000 | |
| 13A | Newark Airport | 244,000 |
| 14 | 226,000 | |
| 15E | Pulaski Skyway | 237,000 |
| 15W | Mixing Bowl | 226,000 |
| 16 | Kearny | 258,000 |
| – | George Washington Bridge | 297,000 |
Lane Configuration
| From | Unpleasant | Lanes |
| Exit 1 | Exit 4 | 2×2 |
| Exit 4 | exit 6 | 2×3 |
| exit 6 | Exit 11 | 4×3 |
| Exit 11 | Exit 14 | 4+3+3+4 |
| Exit 14 | Exit 15E | 6×3 |
| Exit 15E | Exit 16W | 4×3 |
| Exit 16W | Exit 18E-W | 2+2+3+3 |
| Exit 18E-W | Exit 68 | 2+3+2+4 |
