The Highway That Cut Poughkeepsie Off From Its River

Poughkeepsie received more federal urban renewal funding per capita than any American city — and used most of it to tear buildings down rather than rebuild. Route 9 became a limited-access highway that cut the city off from its riverfront while demolishing roughly 400 homes, and the East-West Arterial forced massive further demolition on both sides of downtown. In 1973, nearly a mile of Main Street was closed and turned into a pedestrian mall; businesses soon vanished and the historic, largely Black Northside languished. Delays finishing the arterial until 1979, combined with the mall's closure, made access difficult and choked side streets never built for the traffic, while the 1974 opening of a suburban indoor mall five miles south accelerated Main Street's decline. The Main Mall was decommissioned in 2001; its nine surviving buildings were listed on the National Register in 1982 as "Main Mall Row." Under the city's first Black mayor, Northside revitalization funding is now underway.