Walkway Over the Hudson Poughkeepsie
— — a railroad bridge that learned to walk.
Not only on a wall.
“The Walkway runs a mile and a quarter across the Hudson, 212 feet above the river, on the deck of what was once the Poughkeepsie–Highland Railroad Bridge. The steel went up in 1889 and carried freight until a fire shut it down in 1974. A volunteer effort spent thirty years getting it walkable; it reopened as a state park in October 2009. The view runs north toward the Catskills and south toward the Hudson Highlands, and on a clear morning the river holds the colour of the sky for as long as anyone watches.
Walkway Over the Hudson Poughkeepsie, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
The Walkway Over the Hudson is a linear state historic park 6,768 feet long, the converted deck of the former Poughkeepsie–Highland Railroad Bridge. Completed in 1889 by the American Bridge Company, the bridge connected Poughkeepsie in Dutchess County with Highland in Ulster County and carried freight traffic until a deck fire in May 1974 closed it permanently. Walkway Over the Hudson, a nonprofit, raised the money to convert the structure to pedestrian use, and the bridge reopened as a New York State park on October 3, 2009. The deck sits 212 feet above mean water.
The Walkway is open to pedestrians and cyclists daily from 7 a.m. to sunset, year-round, with no admission charge. Parking on the Poughkeepsie side is at 61 Parker Avenue; on the Highland side, at 87 Haviland Road. The eastern approach connects to an elevator that descends 212 feet to the Upper Landing Park on the Poughkeepsie waterfront and to the Hudson River Brickyard Trail. The deck links into the longer Empire State Trail, the 750-mile multi-use corridor that runs from New York City to the Canadian border and west to Buffalo, completed in 2020.
Each season changes the bridge: in spring the eastward view holds the bloom along the Mid-Hudson rail trails; in summer the river runs busy with day-sailors out of the Hudson River Maritime Museum at Kingston; in late October the Catskill canopy turns from the north end of the deck and the leaf line moves down the river over about ten days. The Walkway hosts an annual Starry Nights series in summer, when the bridge stays open after dusk for stargazing, and the structure is uplit year-round in colours that mark holidays and civic events.