You would never look at a map of the Hudson River, point to the spot where the Tappan Zee Bridge is, and say, "Put the bridge here!"
The Tappan Zee crosses one of the widest points on the Hudson — the bridge is more than three miles long. And if you go just a few miles south, the river gets much narrower. As you might expect, it would have been cheaper and easier to build the bridge across the narrower spot on the river.
So I wanted to answer a simple question: Why did they build the Tappan Zee where they did, rather than building it a few miles south?
Original content Bob DeMarco, Look Beyond the Obvious
