page_title: Holland Tunnel
section_title: Plans approved
hierarchical_section_title: Holland Tunnel / History / Planning / Plans approved
caption_attribution_description: English: Clifford Milburn Holland, 1919, from Port Authority Website (http://www.panynj.gov/tbt/hthist.HTM).
context_page_description: The Holland Tunnel is a vehicular tunnel under the Hudson River. It connects Lower Manhattan in New York City to the east with Jersey City in New Jersey to the west. An integral conduit within the New York metropolitan area, the Holland Tunnel is operated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The tunnel carries Interstate 78; the New Jersey side is also designated the eastern terminus of Route 139. The Holland Tunnel is one of three vehicular crossings between Manhattan and New Jersey, the others being the Lincoln Tunnel and the George Washington Bridge.
  Plans for a fixed vehicular crossing over the Hudson River were first devised in 1906. However, disagreements prolonged the planning process until 1919, when it was decided to build a tunnel under the river. Construction of the Holland Tunnel started in 1920, and it opened in 1927. At the time of its opening, the Holland Tunnel was the longest continuous underwater vehicular tunnel in the world.
  The Holland Tunnel was originally known as the Hudson River Vehicular Tunnel or the Canal Street Tunnel.
context_section_description: The original plans for the Hudson River tunnel were for twin two-lane tubes, with each tube carrying traffic in a single direction. A request for proposals for the tunnel was announced in 1918, and eleven such requests were considered. One of these proposals, authored by engineer George Goethals, was for a bi-level tube. A modification of Jacobs and Davies' 1913 plan, the Goethals proposal specified that each level would carry three lanes of traffic, and that traffic on each level would run in a different direction. Goethals stated that his plan would cost $12 million and could be completed in three years. Subsequently, John F. O'Rourke offered to build the tunnel for $11.5 million. Goethals cited the area's freight traffic as one of the reasons for constructing the tube. His proposal would use a 42-foot (13 m) diameter shield to dig the tunnel. This large tunnel size was seen as a potential problem, since there were differences in the air pressure at the top and the bottom of each tunnel, and that air pressure difference increased with a larger tunnel diameter. Thus, five engineers were assigned to examine the feasibility of Goethals's design. In July 1919, President Woodrow Wilson ratified a Congressional joint resolution for a trans-Hudson tunnel, and Clifford Milburn Holland was named the Chief Engineer of the project. Holland stated that, based on the construction methods used for both pairs of H&M tubes (and for the downtown pair in particular), it should be relatively easy to dig through the mud on the bottom of the Hudson River, and that construction should be completed within two years.
  The federal government refused to finance the project, even in part, and so it was the states' responsibility to raise the funds. In June 1919, U.S. Senator and former New Jersey governor Edge presented another iteration of the Hudson River Tunnel bill to the U.S. Senate, where it was approved. The New York and New Jersey governments signed a contract in September 1919, in which the states agreed to build, operate, and maintain the tunnel in partnership. The contract was signed by the states' respective tunnel commissions in January 1920.
  Under Holland's plan, each of the two tubes would have an outside diameter of 29 feet (8.8 m) including exterior linings, and the tubes would contain 2-lane roadways with a total width of 20 feet (6.1 m). One lane would be for slower traffic, and the other would be for faster traffic. This contrasted with Goethals's plan, wherein the three roadways would have had a total width of 24.5 feet (7.5 m), only a few feet wider than Holland's 2-lane roadways. Additionally, according to Holland, the 42-foot-wide tube would require the excavation of more dirt than both 29-foot tubes combined: two circles with 29-foot diameters would have a combined area of 5,282.2 square feet (490.73 m²), while a circle with a 42-foot diameter would have an area of 5,541.8 square feet (514.85 m²). The more northerly westbound tube would begin at Broome and Varick Streets on the Manhattan side and end at the now-demolished intersection of 14th and Provost Streets on the New Jersey side. The more southerly eastbound tube would begin at the still-intact intersection of 12th and Provost Streets in Jersey City, and end at the south side of Canal Street near Varick Street. By way of comparison, Goethals's plan would have combined the entrance and exit plazas on each side. The Motor Truck Association of America unsuccessfully advocated for three lanes in each tube.
  Even though Goethals's method of digging had not been tested, he refused to concede to Holland's proposal, and demanded to see evidence that Holland's proposal would work. The New York and New Jersey Tunnel Commission subsequently rejected Goethals's plan in favor of a twin-tube proposal that Holland had devised, which was valued at around $28.7 million. When Goethals asked why, the commission responded that Goethals's proposal had never been tested; that it was too expensive; and that the tunnel plans had many engineering weaknesses that could cause the tube to flood
caption: Clifford Milburn Holland, 1919
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