The GW Bridge in a motor home

Our travels this spring took us from Jekyll Island, Georgia to Friendship, Maine, a distance of about 1500 miles. We stopped for fuel twice, once in South Carolina and again in southern New Jersey, and spent about $625 for diesel. We had about 1/3 tank to start, and ended up with about the same.

The only serious difficulty we had was entering the George Washington Bridge from New Jersey on Interstate 95. The signage was a bit confusing to me, and I'll explain.

Care must be taken when traveling around NY city in a large motorhome. There are a number of old "parkways" which are restricted for cars only. One reason for this is that they have many bridges which have low clearances that would impede our travel. Another is that they want to restrict commercial traffic to roads designed for heavy trucks.

The obvious route for us to take out of NY City would have been the Henry Hudson Parkway, but we could not travel on that. To avoid going way out of our way, we needed to connect to Interstate 87 immediately after crossing the George Washington Bridge. All of the signs in New Jersey stated that traffic bound for I87 needed to cross on the lower level. Other signs indicated that all trucks MUST cross on the upper level. There was no indication that trucks could access I87 via the upper level. Nor was there any indication that RVs must follow the truck routes, and in most cases, private vehicles like us are permitted where trucks are denied. With the information I had, my choice was to make sure I got on I87, so I chose the lower level.

When we pulled up the the toll booth, the very nice lady there told us that we were on the wrong level. She carefully explained that we would have to pull aside just beyond the toll booth and wait for an officer to escort us to the upper level. Oh, and pay your $32 toll here, and show them the receipt at the other toll booth.

We pulled aside and waited about 20 minutes for an officer to arrive. He told us to follow him, and we would go up a ramp that was marked "DO NOT ENTER". Which we did. That took us back onto the streets around the bridge, and we arrive at the upper level tool booths in a few minutes. A mildly confused warily eyed our receipt, and passed us through.

Getting on I87 after the bridge was no big deal, as long as we stayed in the right lane. Traffic was heavy but moving, and we got off without incident. An hour later we were parked iin a campsite north of the city, and the grand-kids arrive an hour after that.

A little knowledge is wonderful.In this case, the restriction that forced us to the lower level was because we were carrying propane, a hazardous material not permitted on the lower level. Signs that reflected that would have helped immeasurably.