York governor Thomas E. Dewey. The new highway reduced driving time between Idlewild and Manhattan by 20 percent. Later the same year, the Gull Construction Company was contracted to install "safety plantings" in the median, consisting of shrubs and trees, to separate the different directions of traffic. New York state officials announced in 1960 that they would install a Jersey barrier in the Van Wyck's median, replacing the plantings, which had not been effective in preventing crashes. In April 1949, Dewey signed a contract authorizing a northward extension of the highway to Grand Central Parkway. This segment was to cost $11.6 million. The project included widening a segment of Grand Central Parkway between the Long Island Expressway and the Kew Gardens Interchange. In addition, a ramp was built from Main Street to the Van Wyck Expressway, and an overpass was built to carry Queens Boulevard above both Main Street and the highway. The Gull Construction Company received the contract for the segment of the highway between Hoover Avenue and 88th Avenue in September 1950. A direct ramp from the northbound Van Wyck to Queens Boulevard opened in June 1953; prior to the opening of this segment, the northbound expressway was frequently congested. The extension to Grand Central Parkway opened on November 13, 1953, but the ramps from the Van Wyck Expressway to Main Street were delayed for another year, opening in November 1954. 1964 World's Fair upgrades In December 1957, the state approved a $9.5-million (equivalent to $ in ) project to widen a segment of Whitestone Parkway from Northern Boulevard to the Bronx–Whitestone Bridge, build a new bridge over the Flushing River, and improve the parkway to Interstate Highway standards using funds from the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, in which the federal government would pay 90 percent of the proposed highway's cost. The parkway would be expanded from two to four lanes in each direction, and the interchange with the Cross Island Parkway would also be upgraded. The design process for the upgrade was nearing completion when the state approved the project. The head of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority (TBTA), Robert Moses, stated that the upgrade could start in 1960. At the time of the announcement, the junction with Northern Boulevard was heavily congested because motorists used local streets to connect to the Grand Central Parkway, opposite Flushing Meadows Park from the Whitestone Parkway. In early