The LIMP Tour Page:

There are a number of chronological discrepancies on these pages; they will be corrected as time allows.

Approximate Route of the Long Island Motor Parkway -  ^________
Very Preliminary Map
Scale - Flushing (Hillside Avenue#) to Ronkonkoma = 48 road miles
(Long Island Rail Road lines are shown for reference)
[Thumbnail images; click on pictures for large images.]

The above map has been criticized for being TOO approximate; here's a 1927 map
on which all I have done is to add a green highlight between the lines (^________),
add some BLUE to Little Neck and Manhasset Bays and Lakes Success and Ronkonkoma,
and approximate the actual final western terminus which did NOT end at Black Stump Road
(73rd Avenue, as shown) but at Nassau Boulevard (later Horace Harding Boulevard - today's
Long Island Expressway), [which I have extended westward (HHB? - ^{_ _ _ _} ) from what was shown on the old map]
at 193rd Street [WEST (left) and EAST (right)]:

Note also, per my 1994 Hagstrom's Nassau County Atlas, pages 3 and 11, that the boundaries between Manhasset Hills (page 3, H18) and Williston Park and East Williston (page 11, J18), on the south, and Searingtown (H/J17) on the north ARE, in fact, the old RoW of the LIMP!

Roger Cooper reminded me (06 Nov 99) of Senator Camaerer Park, which abuts the LIMP, still preserved under the name of Highway Drive, in Albertson.  I drove around that familiar area (I used to live nearby in Mineola in the mid-'60s) and have since wandered afoot with the trusty digital to document the area between the Queens-Nassau county line and Roslyn Road.

WARNING!  Historians should note that the right-of-way of the Motor Parkway and that of Alexander T. Stewart's Central Railroad of Long Island, now the LIRR's Central Branch, paralleled each other in several areas and should NOT be casually confused.  The LIMP RoW is the one under the LIPA (ex-LILCO) lines in Nassau County and far western Suffolk County
(at least as far east as the Maxess Road area or further).  Even so, there are areas where the LIPA lines and the LIMP RoW do NOT coincide, especially around the old Sperry plant in Lake Success, in Bethpage where the LIPA lines follow the old Central line and in the center of Bethpage State Park, where the LIPA lines veer E and the LIMP RoW goes N, at the LIPA line branching in the 110/Ruland/Maxess area, along Bagatelle Road south of the LIE, etc.

Here's a map of the area where the LIMP and the predecessor road of the LIRR's Central Branch, the Central RR of LI, were coincident or nearly so, courtesy of Vince Fitzgerald, showing the two RoWs (RsoW?):

(Click on the thumbnail to download a 251Kb image.

For a better Nassau-Suffolk map (1928), see the LIMP Maps Page (in work).

(The provenance of this image has been lost; it was
apparently courtesy of the Garden City Toll Lodge Museum)

The Long Island Motor Parkway ca. 1908,
probably well east of the Hempstead Plains;
Notice how incredibly barren the area was
as it was on the frontispiece (above), as well.

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A proposal to Nassau County, filed 15 Apr 2005, for conservation and restoration of the LIMP RoW, may be found on my own domain at http://sbiii.com/limpnass/limpncpk.html.   (28 Feb 06)

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NEWSDAY for 11 Jun 2002 (page B9) had an article on an exhibit at the Museums at Stony Brook (the Carriage House) about sports on LI.  A prized display was the original Vanderbilt Cup, on loan from the Smithsonian Institution (it's normally on display at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan).

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HISTORY OF THE LONG ISLAND MOTOR PARKWAY

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@ - A Note on NOMENCLATURE - The official name of this pioneer highway was the

LONG ISLAND MOTOR PARKWAY

NOT the VANDERBILT MOTOR PARKWAY;

the surviving active easternmost 13-mile right-of-way in Suffolk County,
County Route 67, is now used as public roads named variously
"Motor Parkway", "Vanderbilt Parkway", and "Vanderbilt Motor Parkway".

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# - some accounts say it started in Flushing (at the Hillside Avenue/Rocky Hill Road Toll Lodge) but that was later, in 1928; it started at Lakeville Road in Great Neck as the western terminus in 1910 (43 miles to Ronkonkoma) {at the northwestern corner of the Sperry site - northeastern corner of Marcus and Lakeville Road}, with an extension west to Rocky Hill Road (Springfield Boulevard) in 1911; the section to Kissena Corridor was added later - at Nassau Boulevard (what is now Horace Harding Boulevard - the south service road of the L. I. Expressway) and 195th Street*.  A two-mile feeder road (now Harned Road) north to Jericho Turnpike [Rte.25] in Commack was also added in 1928 (opened 01 Jul) to ease access to the Commack area (and, not incidentally, to WKV's Eagles Nest in Centerport).

* - The RoW ran (runs) N-S between 199th Street and Cross Island (Francis Lewis) Boulevard from Union Turnpike to HHB; the north end bent NW and ended at 195th Street but I believe there was an apron or entry ramp extending as far west as 193rd Street.

Michael Abbey wrote (11 Feb 99) "The part of the LIMP in Great Neck ran through the Phipps Estate, which is now Great Neck South Middle and High School.  In fact, they recently tore down a toll house that was just south of the Great Neck South Middle School property (near Lakeville Road).  This would be almost adjacent to Lake Road and Lakeville Road.  I believe the school still uses part of the roadway as a service path to it's athletic fields.  The old LIMP continues East South East, where it runs into the Northern State Parkway.  There used to be a bridge over the parkway there, but when they expanded to three lanes in each direction many years ago, they tore it down.  At that point it crosses over to New Hyde Park road, and a few hundred feet to the East, the old bridge that crosses over the LIMP can be found."  This is the bridge in NHP that I mention and that Mike has photographed on his website.  In fact, the toll lodge is still there, recognizably buried in the back of a mini-mansion at 351 Lakeville Road and, yes, the RoW is still the school's service path.

Tom Walsh added (13 Feb 99), "A Lake Success history book led me to the conclusion that the road on the southern end of the property is indeed Motor Parkway.  The toll house may not have been demolished, but may have been altered beyond recognition.  My local research shows that the road (heading west from the school property) took an abrupt turn south on the west side of Lakeville Road.  This was so that it could then bend back westerly and pass Deepdale (Willie the builder's mansion) to its south." Tom went on, "Look at the driveways on the property of the temple on Lakeville Road, just across from the school.  I suspect this is a remnant reflecting that southerly turn."

Fred Hadley called all this {#} to a screeching halt (16 Oct 99), effectively demolishing my theory about the route near city line with this definitive description:  "It actually followed the path of today's 74th Avenue which deadends at the employee parking lot of Hillside Medical Center.  It then ran along the east fence of the Glen Oaks Golf Course (today's North Shore Towers course).  The LIMP crossed the Northern State Parkway ¼-mile west of the Lakeville Road overpass."  So it came no closer than ¼-mile from my theoretical route by Lakeville and Union Turnpike.  Fred added, "Of course Willie K. owned the land from Union Turnpike to the LIE and from Little Neck Parkway so it was easy to obtain the right of way from himself!" [Edited slightly.]

Sylvia Adcock*, in NEWSDAY's "Long Island: Our Story" historical sketches, wrote that it was, "the nation's first road designed exclusively for automobiles - - - The reinforced concrete road also was the first highway to use bridges and overpasses to eliminate intersections.  Called 'Long Island's Appian Way' in promotional material, it was a road ahead of its time."

Long Island Studies Institute, Nassau County Museum
A scene from the 1908 Vanderbilt Cup Race on a part of the then-abuilding Long Island Motor Parkway.