The Hudson River Flyway

The Hudson River VFR Corridor

One of the most spectacular flights anywhere is flying down the Hudson River Flyway taking you between the western side of Manhattan and along the Palisades of New Jersey. The vast majority of air passengers don't even know about this gem of a flight, and it remains for the most part for non-commercial pilots. Its approach is over the Hudson River at Tarrytown New York so that you overfly the Tappenzee Bridge on your way south. You have to descend to 1000feet by the time you reach Alpine Tower a radio tower located in Alpine New Jersey. This is the beginning of the Hudson River Flyway.

Right at the beginning you come in over Tarrytown New York where the village of Sleepy Hollow is located. This village was made famous by Washington Irving who was the author that wrote the world famous story the "Headless Horseman" a tale about Ichabod Crane and a Headless Horseman who threw his head at lonely horseback riders late at night. One of his victims was Ichabod Crane.

To your left as you fly south is Irvingtown the place where Washington Irving was born and grew up. The town is names for his family who were among the early settlers in this region. Proceeding further south along the river on your right where the New York and New Jersey borders meet on a large campus right on the river at the palisades is the Lamont-Dougherty Earth Observatory where there is muck energy devoted to understanding the workings of the Earth. This is a satellite campus of Columbia University of New York City.

Still maintaining your altitude at 1000 feet you are shortly flying past upper Manhattan and are quickly flying over the George Washington Bridge. This is one of the most heavily traveled bridges in the world. It is also where at its western end that I-80 begins ultimately ending in San Francisco, California. Off to your left you can see the great green swatch marking Central Park in Mid-town Manhattan. At the south end of Central Park at 59^th St. is the beginning of the mid-town cluster of skyscrapers begin. They rise up like a mountain range to your left.