Long Island's Great Horseless Way

On September 26, 1972, the Huntington Town Board designated the "Vanderbilt Parkway," from Half Hollow Road to the Huntington-Smithtown border, as a landmarked historic roadway, ensuring that the road would be protected from destruction. 

But why go to such great lengths to protect a road?  What makes this road so significant? And just why is that road named the Vanderbilt Parkway anyway—didn't the Vanderbilts live in Centerport--not Dix Hills? 

The six-mile stretch called the Vanderbilt Parkway in Dix Hills was originally part of the Long Island Motor Parkway.  This parkway was the Long Island Expressway of the early 20th century, connecting Queens to Lake Ronkonkoma.  It was not, however, built only for this purpose.  Though it did provide Manhattan's wealthy elite with a pathway to entertainment on Long Island, and solidified Long Island's Gilded Age future as an amusement park for the rich, it was also part of the entertainment itself.

 In 1906 "Willie K.--as William Kissam Vanderbilt, II was known--formed a company with plans for constructing a new and private road for the exclusive use of racing cars and pleasure automobiles.  Construction began in 1908.  This idea was a groundbreaking one on two levels.  This road would become the first reinforced concrete, high-speed limited- access highway in the United States, as well as the first road to use bridges and overpasses to avoid intersections.  Secondly, it would be the first road built solely for automobiles, signaling a new era in transportation and opening up rural Long Island to the beginning of suburban sprawl.  The road featured tollbooths designed by architect John Russell Pope.  The daily toll was $2 but drivers could purchase an early version of the EZ Pass by buying a special license plate that served as a season or annual pass. 

In light of this, it is no surprise that the May 3, 1907 issue of The Long-Islander, in its discussion of the new parkway, announced that, "Long Island seems destined to become an Arcadia for automobilists."  Referring to the parkway as the "Vanderbilt Speedway," The Long-Islander goes on to say that, "Following in the wake of the Speedway, nearly a score of modern hotel and wayside inns, catering almost exclusively to the automobiling public, are planned or proposed… In many cases they will have fine garages in connection, while… several automobile supply and storage houses are projected along or near the parkway." 

Considering all the firsts that the Long Island Motor Parkway achieved and the changes to the Long Island landscape that it caused, it is clear to see why the six-mile stretch of it in Dix Hills was designated a historic landmark.  This piece is part of a larger section of the parkway that stretches into Lake Ronkonkoma, and this whole 13- mile section is the only part of the original 45-mile parkway open to traffic today. 

But William K. Vanderbilt was mostly interested in one thing when he decided to invest over $2 million in the construction of this road—racing.  Willie K., a racer himself, had broken the world's speed record, clocking his Mercedes at over 92 mph in Florida.  But he was not satisfied and in 1904, he organized the first "Vanderbilt Cup Race," the world's first international automobile race.  Winners' names were inscribed on a 10- gallon silver chalice made by Tiffany's and now part of the Smithsonian's collection.  Vanderbilt did not compete in the race, but officiated over it and hoped that the race would serve as a way to spur American companies to develop automobiles to match those produced by their European competitors. 

The first three Cup Races were held on Long Island public roads.  Unfortunately, a spectator was killed at the 1906 races, and this was the last race held on local, public roads. In fact, this is the very reason that Willie K., (who was in his late 20s and had inherited a fortune of over $1 billion by today's money), decided to build the Long Island Motor Parkway—to build a racetrack for the Cup Races that was safer and better for driving at high speeds. The parkway was therefore designed with racers in mind—for example, it had banked turns that allowed drivers to take them at speeds over 60mph.  In addition, the road had guard rails (to protect spectators), and a nonskid pavement. From 1908 to 1910 the races were held on the Long Island Motor Parkway.  

 After 1910, and a few more fatalities, the Vanderbilt Cup Race was moved off Long Island to Savannah.  The parkway kept operating as a toll road, and at its peak, in 1929, over 175,000 cars traveled over it.  In 1933, when the free Northern State Parkway opened, the cost of the toll dropped to $.40.  Unable to compete with the modern-day parkway system developed by Robert Moses, Vanderbilt's road lost money and by 1938 he owed over $80,000 in back taxes.  On Easter Sunday 1938, he officially closed the road and donated the land to the counties that it ran across in exchange for the back taxes he owed.   

 So the next time you drive down Vanderbilt Parkway, remember that you and your automobile are participating in the history of the world, the country, and Long Island.