The Hudson Valley Rail Trail is a paved 4-mile (6.4 km) east–west
rail trail in Ulster County, New York, stretching from the Hudson River
through the hamlet of Highland. It was originally part of the
Poughkeepsie Bridge Route, a rail corridor that crossed the Hudson via
the Poughkeepsie Bridge. Controlled by a variety of railroads throughout
the 19th and 20th centuries, the bridge was damaged and became
unusable after a 1974 fire. The section of the corridor west of the
Hudson was acquired from a convicted felon by Ulster County in 1991 and
transferred to the town of Lloyd. During the 1990s, a broadband utility
seeking to lay fiber optic cable paid the town to pass through the
former corridor. The town used part of its payment to pave the route and
open it as a public rail trail in 1997. While the trail originally ended
at Route 44–55, it was extended eastward between 2009 and 2010,
intersecting Route 9W and continuing to the Poughkeepsie Bridge. The
bridge, now a pedestrian walkway, connects the trail with the Dutchess
Rail Trail to the east, creating a 30-mile (48 km) rail trail system
that spans the Hudson. The trail is expected to be extended west, where
it will border Route 299.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson_Valley_Rail_Trail>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1759:
The British Museum in London, today containing one of the
largest and most comprehensive collections in the world, opened to the
public in Montagu House, Bloomsbury.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Museum>
1910:
Construction on the Buffalo Bill Dam, then the tallest dam in
the world, on the Shoshone River in the U.S. state of Wyoming was
completed.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Bill_Dam>
1943:
The highest-capacity office building in the world, the
headquarters of the United States Department of Defense known as the
Pentagon (pictured), was dedicated.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pentagon>
1991:
Elizabeth II, as Queen of Australia, signed letters patent
allowing Australia to become the first Commonwealth realm to institute
its own separate Victoria Cross award in its own honours system.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Cross_for_Australia>
1993:
Salvatore "The Beast" Riina, one of the most powerful members
of the Sicilian Mafia, was arrested after three decades as a fugitive.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvatore_Riina>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
floccinaucinihilipilificate:
(colloquial) To describe or regard something as worthless.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/floccinaucinihilipilificate>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge,
aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
--Martin Luther King, Jr.
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King,_Jr.>