08/24/2026
Yes the Plank Road! Visit Historical Society of the Town of Chester highway display. Warrensburgh Museum of Local History
The super highway to the North Country was once made of wood!
Before I-87, before Rt. 9 and even before the railroad line to Riverside Station, the fastest way to reach the Town of Chester was over a “plank road.” In the late 1840s and early 50s, “plank road mania” swept New York State. The Legislature awarded franchises to dozens of companies to construct (and collect tolls) over 2,000 miles of plank roads. As their name implies, plank roads were built with wooden planks (generally hemlock) laid perpendicular to the direction of travel. The craze spread to the North Country, and, in 1850, the Warrensburgh & Chester Plank Road was constructed (using planks 7 feet long and 2½ inches thick), part of a series of plank roads that ran north from Glens Falls, roughly in the path of modern Route 9.
A team of horses could travel more rapidly and draw a much greater load over a well-maintained plank road than over a dirt “common road.” The Plank Road thus provided a greatly-improved method of moving freight and passengers into and out of northern Warren County that aided the well-established lumber industry, the important new tannery industry (moving hides in and finished leather out) and the nascent tourist industry. With the plank road, Chestertown was much more connected to the rest of the State.
The state-wide enthusiasm for plank roads faded quickly. Wood planks were found to deteriorate more rapidly than originally projected, making upkeep expensive. An estimated forty percent of the miles constructed in the State were abandoned within ten years. The Warrensburgh & Chester Plank Road Company, on the other hand, survived. An 1860 traveler to the “beautiful and picturesque village” of Chestertown noted that the plank road was “as good as can be desired” and a group of sportsmen heading north in 1869 reported they traveled “at a good pace over the plank-road to Chester.” However, by the 1870s, parts of the road were macadamized (paved with crushed stone), rather than planked, and the word “Turnpike” was inserted into the company’s name to note the change. By the final decades of the century, complaints arose about the condition of the road and burden of the tolls. Nevertheless, the company continued until 1911 when Warren County purchased the company’s franchise, enabling the State to construct the highway that would later become part of Route 9 and help to bring the North Country into the age of the automobile.
Until eclipsed by the opening of railroad transport to Riverside Station in 1872, the Plank Road helped foster a fragile period of expansion in the local economy. Indeed, the population of Chester in 1870 (2,329) was the highest in the 19th Century and higher than the town would see again for the next hundred years.
The Plank Road sign is just one of hundreds of items on exhibit in the Town of Chester Museum of Local History. The museum is open on Wednesdays and Saturday mornings. Come poke around in Chester’s attic!
