Category: US 6

US highway history of Denver, Colorado

6/29/2017

(Most recently updated 4/28/2018.) Today, Denver is served by seven different US routes: US 6, US 36, US 40, US 85, US 87, US 285, and US 287...

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...but when the US highway system was first commissioned in late 1926, only three routes went through Denver. AASHO officials acknowledged the city's importance by placing it at the junction of a major north-south route (US 85, which ran from a Canadian port of entry almost to Mexico) and a transcontinental east-west route (US 40, which connected Atlantic City NJ to the San Francisco Bay Area):

c. 1927, Rand McNally

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Colorado actually does sign some US routes along interstates, but...

6/2/2017

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(updated June 2019)

Colorado is somewhat infamous for not signposting its US routes where they are concurrent with interstates. This is more than just signage policy: CDoT route logs actually divide US routes into segments, and these segments are discontinuous in cases where the US route shares pavement with an interstate. So in a sense, CDoT considers US routes to be non-existent wherever their implied route is on an interstate. This notion has resulted in at least one very strange sign, shown here:

Sanderson, May 2017

That was taken looking west on I-270 at its interchange with I-25. Straight ahead on the Boulder Turnpike is the east "beginning" of US 36... that is, assuming one disregards the 1300-mile segment of US 36 behind the camera. (Incidentally, heading the opposite direction, there is a "Begin I-270" assembly, but it is not accompanied with an "End US 36" sign.)

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Historically, US 6 went through Leadville, Colorado

2/15/2017

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In 1937, when the US 6 designation was extended west from Greeley (through the rest of Colorado and all the way to Long Beach, California), Vail Pass had not yet been built. Shrine Pass existed, but there was no town of Vail, nor was there any type of road running directly between Minturn and "Wheeler" (today's Copper Mountain):

c. 1937, CDoT

Shrine Pass was not considered to be a good candidate for development into a primary state highway, so US 6 traffic was directed further south from Copper Mountain, along today's SH 91. Drivers had to go over Fremont Pass and all the way down to Leadville. There, traffic was directed north (overlapped with westbound US 24) over Tennessee Pass and up to Minturn.

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US highway history of Denver, Colorado

Colorado actually does sign some US routes along interstates, but...

Historically, US 6 went through Leadville, Colorado

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