To NORTHEAST!
It's a fascinating story, but this is not a tourist town. I'm posting these photos to educate.
Who would ever think Kiryas Joel would be America's party capital?
May 14-16 2023
PART 3
As a landlocked Midwesterner, traveling as far as New York state always seems like a major achievement, and the Break The Bank theme has played in my head during my few trips here, as the music is evocative of reaching an elusive goal. Here US 6 joins NY 17, which is mostly a freeway running almost 400 miles across the state. Also, the New York state route shield has been likened to an onion, a book blowing a bubble, and the Children's Television Workshop sign at the end of old Sesame Street episodes, but it's actually a colonial seal.
This billboard warns folks not to violate New York state gun laws.
NY 208 near Monroe.
Schunnemunk Street in Monroe.
Schunnemunk winds east.
We reach this traffic island at Forest Avenue.
Forest Avenue takes us to Kiryas Joel, a town inhabited by adherents of the very conservative Satmar sect of Hasidic Judaism, most of whom speak Yiddish. This is an incorporated municipality, but it's pretty much a theocracy. Though the town itself cannot impose penalties, its leaders expect visitors to follow a strict dress code and gender separation in public. Most residents do not watch TV or listen to radio. Because of a high birth rate, Kiryas Joel's population grew from 500 in 1977 to 36,000 in 2021, making it the biggest municipality in the area. Also, Kiryas Joel voted 98.5% for Donald Trump in 2020.
I think this is Forest Road, and new condos were springing up all over Kiryas Joel to meet its population growth. This photo doesn't show crowds of people, but most of the town was far more active than any other place I've seen in the 2020s. Despite Kiryas Joel's extreme conservatism, it was far livelier than any major American city in this decade - due to the cities' more extreme conservatism! In the 2020s, major cities have looked like the theocracies we always feared.
Another example of the recent condo development in Kiryas Joel.
A random road near Woodbury.
NY 32 at Hazzard Lane (as in Dukes Of).
NY 32 goes under this rail bridge in Woodbury.
NY 32 also goes under I-87.
This is a good find, as NY 32 crosses Moodna Creek near New Windsor.
Looking east out over Newburgh and the Hudson River valley.
I guess it's a brand new day after all, as I-84/NY 52 takes us across the Hudson River on the Hamilton Fish Newburgh-Beacon Bridge. The westbound side of this toll bridge opened in 1963 with one lane in each direction. We're on the eastbound, which opened in 1980. The steel in the 1980 span is designed intentionally to corrode, so it does not need paint.
Looking down the Hudson from the bridge. A pedestrian path parallels this span.
The bridge approaches its end in Beacon.
I-84 near I-684, a 28-mile spur that runs almost to New York City. I-684 grazes Connecticut and was completed in 1974. Somehow, I-684 was once part of I-87. This is near Brewster, N.Y., onetime home of singer Laura Branigan.
The final throes of I-84 in New York state.
I-84 enters Connecticut! With Lockdown Lamont as governor.
I-84 in Danbury. This city of almost 90,000 merged with the surrounding town in 1965, so parts of the city are rural in character. Danbury was also the home of the Danbury Baptist Assocation, recipients of a letter from Thomas Jefferson in which he first used the phrase "separation between church and state."
I-84 picks up US 6 east of Danbury. A bit of trivvo about the Nutmeg State: Connecticut abolished counties. The state's 8 counties have been replaced by 9 councils of government, which govern functions like zoning and policing. In other words, they're...counties.