The Cross Island Parkway runs 10.6 miles (17.1 km) from the Whitestone Expressway (Interstate 678 or I-678) in Whitestone past the Throgs Neck Bridge, along and across the border of Queens and Nassau County to meet up with the Southern State Parkway, acting as a sort of separation point which designates the limits of New York City.

[3] Exit 26D is the final entrance ramp to Belmont Park and also provides access to UBS Arena and the Elmont Long Island Rail Road station.

Past the junction, the highway continues on a northwestward track as it passes under the Port Washington Branch of the Long Island Rail Road and begins to run along the western edge of Little Neck Bay.

[4] The Cross Island Parkway soon leaves the side of Little Neck Bay and passes south of Fort Totten Military Reservation.

A short distance later, the parkway enters another diamond interchange, exit 33, this time for the Clearview Expressway (I-295) and the Throgs Neck Bridge.

After crossing under 147th Street, the parkway enters exit 36, a partial diamond interchange with the Whitestone Expressway (I-678), which proceeds north to the Bronx–Whitestone Bridge and southbound towards John F. Kennedy International Airport.

The proposal was held at the Hotel Commodore in Manhattan during the Park Association of New York City annual dinner, which had an attendance of 500 civic leaders.

[5] The project for the Cross Island soon became the northernmost part of the 33-mile (53 km) "Circumferential Parkway", a new roadway that would start at Owl's Head Park and run along the southern shores of Brooklyn and Queens.

[6] In June 1938, the Regional Plan Association proposed 27 new parks throughout the city, including three that would serve the purpose of helping construct the Cross Island Parkway.

The first, an approach to the Whitestone Bridge, the city had recently gotten control of, the second; a park along Little Bay, a section of the Long Island Sound that would also connect to the Clearview golf course.

The Regional Plan Association, in coordination with Moses, requested these new park ideas as urgent, and would help improve the parkway system through New York City.

[17] In January 1939, the state government received bids for the construction of the interchange between the Whitestone and Cross Island parkways.

[19][20] By February 1939, the project was already 26% along, with parts of the $6.1 million (1939 USD) section of the Belt Parkway system being completed, and eleven contracts had been awarded.

LaGuardia and Moses both praised the construction of the Cross Island Parkway as the important part of the Whitestone side of the new bridge.

Ross Galvanizing Works in Brooklyn won the contract for fencing between North Conduit Avenue and the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge along the Southern, Laurelton and Cross Island.

[33] On May 22, 1940, a contract was let to Frank Mascali and Sons, which paved, drained, filled and graded sections of the Cross Island Parkway between the Grand Central and the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge.

[37] In 1952, the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority awarded a $920,000 contract to widen about 11 miles (18 km) of the Cross Island Parkway from four to six lanes.

[41] In 2000, Pataki and New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani announced that the segment of I-495 near Alley Pond Park and the Cross Island Parkway, would be rebuilt at a cost of $112 million.

[45] The project included the restoration of 12 acres (4.9 ha) within the park, as well as the construction of new ramps between I-495 and the Cross Island Parkway at exit 30.