Shown in red between New Jersey and Staten Island Arthur Kill connects Raritan Bay on the south with Newark Bay on the north As seen from Staten Island with Cateret in the background and small creek in foreground. Chemical Coast & Howland Hook

The Arthur Kill is a tidal strait separating Staten Island New York from mainland New Jersey USA and a major navigational channel of the Port of New York and New Jersey. Kill is from the Middle Dutch word kille meaning "riverbed" or "water channel". Arthur Kill has also been known as Staten Island Sound. Contents 1 Description 2 Geology 3 Hydronym 4 Tributaries 5 See also 6 References Description

The channel is approximately 10 miles (16 km) long and connects Raritan Bay on its south end with Newark Bay on the north. Along the New Jersey side it is primarily lined with industrial sites part of which is called the Chemical Coast. The Staten Island side it is primarily lined with salt marshes.

A heavily used marine channel it provides access for ocean-going container ships to Port Newark and to industrial facilities along the channel itself. It also provides the primary marine access to the now-closed Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island.

The channel is dredged periodically to a depth of 3537 feet (11 m) and a width of 600 feet (183 m) to maintain its usefulness for commercial ship passage.

Because of the complex nature of the tides in New York-New Jersey Harbor Estuary near the mouth of the Hudson River the hydrology of the Arthur Kill is still an open subject. In particular the net flow of the channel is not well established.

It is spanned by the Goethals Bridge and the Outerbridge Crossing as well as by the Arthur Kill Vertical Lift Bridge a railroad bridge and the largest bridge of its type in the United States.

It contains two small uninhabited islands Prall's Island and the Isle of Meadows both of which belong to the borough of Staten Island. Geology

The Arthur Kill is an abandoned river channel carved by an ancestral phase of the Hudson River resulting from the blockage of the main channel of the Hudson at the Narrows by moraine or an ice dam. The size of the Arthur Kill channel is large suggesting that it was for a time the primary drainage from the region. However it could not have been a primary drainage for long because the river did not have enough time to carve a broad flood plain.1 Hydronym

The name Arthur Kill is an anglicisation of the Dutch language achter kill meaning back channel which would refer to its location "behind" Staten Island and has its roots in the early 17th century during the Dutch colonial era when the region was part of New Netherland. Placenaming by early explorers and settlers during the era often referred to a location in reference to other places its shape its topography and other geographic qualities. Kill comes from the Middle Dutch word kille meaning riverbed water channel or stream. The area around the Newark Bay was called Achter Kol. During the British colonial era the bay was known as Cull bay.2 The bay lies behind Bergen Hill the emerging ridge of the Hudson Palisades which begins on Bergen Neck the peninsula between it and the Upper New York Bay. The sister channel of Arthur Kill Kill van Kull refers to the waterway that flows from the col or ridge or passage to the interior and translates as channel from the pass or ridge. Tributaries Elizabeth River Rahway River Passaic River Hackensack River See also Chemical Coast Achter Col New Netherland and Toponymy of New Netherland List of New Jersey rivers Lower New York Bay Raritan Bay Hudson Canyon Geography of New York-New Jersey Harbor Estuary References U.S. Department of the Interior U.S. Geological Survey Grabas Joseph A.. "Land Speculation and Proprietary Beginnings of New Jersey". The Advocate (New Jersey Land Title Association) XVI (4): 3 20 14. http://www.njlta.org/Dec2004.pdf. Retrieved April 15 2010.  U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Dredging Report Dec. 2003 Coordinates: 403508N 741226W / 40.5855N 74.2073W / 40.5855; -74.2073