The Independent Queens Boulevard subway line feeds into the Jamaica maintenance yards via this bridge over the Grand Central Parkway at roughly 78th Avenue. Back during the 1939-1940 Worlds Fair, the subway'a G line was extended from its normal 71st Continental Avenue terminus to the fair grounds via this bridge. Given that much of the land bordering the yards is desolate to this day, I cannot fathom why regular service isn't extended to an appropriate grade level station alongside the Van Wyck Expressway, for the benefit of the heavily populated Kew Gardens Hills neighborhood. How much could a station length slab of concrete and one small station house possibly cost?

The bridge also serves as a walk bridge to connect Forest Hills with the southern end of Flushing Meadow Park that sits wedged between the Grand Central Parkway and the Van Wyck Expressway situated a little ways to the east. The walk bridge is officially closed, or at least was so on this mild February 2001 afternoon. I shot this from the tiny southeastern end area that was outside the fenced off section.
The southeast bound Grand Central Parkway splits apart here, with the outer two lanes heading for the southbound Van Wyck Expressway towards Kennedy Airport, and the inner lanes about to swerve sharply eastward.

Inside the fenced off section is a rare baby Whitestone style pole, like those originally gracing the Van Wyck Expressway, sporting a quite up to date Thomas Betts model 113 light fixture. This fence had enough of a gaping hole that I could have explored further, but considering the equipment I was carrying, I figured it was best not to leave myself trapped inside a no-man's land.
Although this bridge predated the Van Wyck by nearly two decades, by the 1950s, the city must have viewed this bridge as belonging more to the expressway, than the parkway it actually crossed. I cannot figure out any other reason the walkway ended up graced by poles matching the Van Wyck, instead of baby woodie poles matched to what the old Grand Central Parkway used to have, in its woodsier, bucolic days. Knowing nothing more than what I imagine, I imagine these Van Wyck mini me poles replaced either little woodies, or cast iron poles, around the time that the Van Wyck opened, perhaps to celebrate that opening, or because thee newer poles were viewed as being more vandal resistant. I have to imagine little wood poles on a walk bridge might invite a lot of illicit carvings, if not outright malicious vandalism.

The walkbridge is, or was, accessible from this pocket park sitting between the Grand Central Parkway and its erstwhile service road, Peartree. The phallic things embedded in the path leading to the walk bridge are to prevent vehicles larger than cycles to enter.

Here we have a winter shrouded view of typical post-war red brick Forest Hills apartment houses lining Peartree, just outside the park.