“Rav Moshe starts his teshuva dismissing using the Els as a mechitza. There is a long discussion about Manhattan being surrounded by good mechitzos and the only question being the the bridges coming over them. Rav Moshe divides it into three shittos. 1) The Ri that it is not included in the partitions. But it is not a rsh”r at all. 2. Tosofos that it is included. 3. The Rosh the partitions are not including on top of the bridge at all. There are several possibilities. It could be a rsh”r. Or not, but still need a door that closes. Or a door at each end. (As I recall, there is another Rosh involved here.) Possibly even locked doors at each end. Rav Moshe works out some kulos even in this opinion. But he ends of that it would need doors to the bridges and they should be locked. This is about half of the teshuva. Any refutation of Rav Moshe’s shitta would take place on this discussion.
Rav Moshe explains that it would further depend if the bridges are included in the city than they would all be rsh”r because of the city according to all shittos. But Rav Moshe reiterates that perhaps the bridges are outside the city and a tzuras hapesach would be enough even according to the Rosh.”
Correct, but Rav Moshe allows that if the tzuras hapesach is erected in the reshus hayachid it would be sufficient. His issue with the bridges in Manhattan is that they run outside of the mechitzos, and so the integral tzuras hapesach on the bridges is not included in the mechitzos encompassing the island. Hence, tzuras hapesachim which enclose an area, which is encompassed by mechitzos, are sufficient. That is exactly what was done in Brooklyn. As to your comment, “Any refutation of Rav Moshe’s shitta would take place on this discussion,” in fact this is another chiddush of Rav Moshe. Very few poskim would agree with him. On the contrary, most poskim maintain that tzuras hapesachim would suffice for a karmelis.
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