The southern tube, designed for eastbound traffic, originates at 12th Street east of Marin Boulevard, and surfaces at the Holland Tunnel Rotary in Manhattan.

[3]: 6 [29][30] The approach to the Holland Tunnel in Jersey City begins where the lower level of NJ Route 139 and the Newark Bay Extension merge.

[34][3]: 6 Soon after construction of the tunnel, and amid rising vehicular traffic in the area, a railroad freight depot, St. John's Park Terminal, was abandoned and later demolished.

[43][45] Hudson Square Connection and the Port Authority collaborated to create a five-year, $27 million master plan for Freeman Plaza.

[48] In 2016, the Hudson Square Connection added solar powered charging stations to both plazas, and introduced a summer lunchtime music series, called live@lunch.

[63] The United States Department of War brought up concerns about the 57th Street bridge plans: the span would need to be at least 200 feet (61 m) above the mean high water to avoid interfering with shipping.

[72] That year, six million dollars in funding for the Hudson River Tunnel was proposed in two bills presented to subcommittees of the United States Senate and House of Representatives.

[79] In July 1919, President Woodrow Wilson ratified a Congressional joint resolution for a trans-Hudson tunnel,[3]: 9  and Clifford Milburn Holland was named the project's chief engineer.

[81] The New York and New Jersey governments signed a contract in September 1919, in which the states agreed to build, operate, and maintain the tunnel in partnership.

[44]: 18  The New York and New Jersey Tunnel Commission subsequently rejected Goethals's plan in favor of a twin-tube proposal that Holland had devised, which was valued at around $28.7 million.

[96] Further delays arose when the New York and New Jersey tunnel commissions could not agree over which agency would award the contract to build the construction and ventilation shafts.

[3]: 10 [95] On the other hand, the traffic in the Holland Tunnel consisted mostly of gasoline-driven vehicles, and ventilation was required to evacuate the carbon monoxide emissions, which would otherwise asphyxiate the drivers.

Volunteer students were supervised as they breathed the exhaust in order to confirm air flows and tolerable carbon monoxide levels by simulating different traffic conditions, including backups.

[101][102] In October 1921, Singstad concluded that a conventional, longitudinal ventilation system would have to be pressurized to an air flow rate of 27 cubic meters per second (953 cu ft/s) along the tunnel.

[3]: 11  Officials started purchasing the properties in the path of the tunnel's approaches, evicting and compensating the tenants "without delay" so that construction could commence promptly.

[109] The workers who were performing the excavations, who were referred to as "sandhogs", were to dig each pair of tubes from either bank of the Hudson River, so that the two sides would eventually connect somewhere underneath the riverbed.

[108] The start of construction for the tubes from the New Jersey side was delayed because the Hudson River Vehicular Tunnel Commission had not yet acquired some of the land for the project.

[112] In mid-June, a state chancellor made permanent an injunction that banned Jersey City officials from trying to preclude construction on the Hudson River Tunnel.

[124] Tunnel construction required the sandhogs to spend large amounts of time in the caisson under high pressure of up to 47.5 pounds per square inch (328 kPa), which was thought to be necessary to prevent river water from entering prior to completion of the tubes.

[8][6] As part of the tunnel project, one block of Watts Street in Manhattan was widened to accommodate traffic heading toward the westbound tube.

Although the Erie had promised to find another site for its railroad yards, it had refused to respond to the plans that the New Jersey State Highway Commission had sent them.

In March 1925, the Highway Commission decided that construction on the approach roads would begin regardless of Erie's response, and so the land would be taken using eminent domain.

In April 1927, the board had conducted their own tests with two lighted candles, and a cloud of smoke had filled the entire tube before the ventilation system was able to perform a full exhaust.

[156][157] A reporter for The New York Times was able to make a test drive through the tunnel, noting that "there is no sudden pressure of wind upon the ear-drums" and that it would reduce the duration of crossing the Hudson River by between 15 and 22 minutes.

The Holland Tunnel officially opened to vehicular traffic at 12:01 a.m. on November 13, the next day; over a thousand vehicles had gathered on the New Jersey side, ready to pay a toll.

[180]: 55  Even after the start of the Great Depression in 1929, when most transit in New York City saw declines, the Holland Tunnel saw an increase in traffic, as did ferry lines.

The two agencies merged that April, and the expanded Port Authority of New York and New Jersey took over operations of the Holland Tunnel,[182] a role that it maintains to this day.

In addition, two first responders, a FDNY battalion chief and a Port Authority patrolman, died as a result of injuries sustained in fighting the fire.

[221] Due to its status as one of the few connections between Manhattan and New Jersey, the Holland Tunnel is considered to be one of the most high-risk terrorist target sites in the United States.

[230] In March 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, all-electronic tolling was temporarily placed in effect for all Port Authority crossings, including the Holland Tunnel.