US route endpoint in
Brownsville, TX

This page was originally published in 2000, after several photos from Brownsville were submitted.  At that time, highway signage in the city was quite a mess.  This page pointed out all of the errors, and provided specific details about how each assembly should be changed.  At some point prior to 2008, nearly every erroneous sign in town was replaced to match exactly what was suggested on this page.  

​This animation gives an overview of how the highway configuration in Brownsville has changed over the years:

Concerning the exact routing of US 96 through Brownsville: the original bridge to Matamoros Mexico was built in 1909; it is known today as the B&M Bridge or Puente Viego ("old bridge").  Obviously it was there when US 96 was commissioned, so it is possible that the US 96 designation could have been routed to this bridge.  However, it is also possible that the B&M Bridge never served as a US route, because the second bridge (known as the Gateway Bridge or Puente Nuevo) was built in 1927.  This early Brownsville highway map does show the Gateway Bridge as the southern terminus of US routes serving the city, so presumably highways in Brownsville have always been routed onto Gateway rather than B&M:

As US 83-281 was shown to do on the map above, US 96 probably also used Central Boulevard, Elizabeth Street (which ran both ways then), and a short segment of 14th Street, ending at the Gateway Bridge:

Note the odd-shaped shield on the 281 sign: that probably hailed from a time long ago.  Apparently when the route was truncated, the local DoT left the signs up, and in the intervening years they may have been replaced in-kind.  But as of 2008, it appears all references to Business 83-281 were finally removed; Elizabeth is now signed only as Business 77.  ​Several blocks ahead from there is International Boulevard...

14th has long since been closed to auto traffic, but even today it is plain to see how it formerly aligned with the Gateway Bridge in the background.  That border crossing originally marked the south end of US 96.  And in later years Gateway Bridge was the south end of US 83, US 281, and US 77.  This photo was taken looking the opposite direction:

That assembly has since been removed; Washington is now signed as "Business 77" only.  The building in the distance is on Palm Blvd, which is the city's "zero" street.  Washington is discontinuous at that point, so traffic is routed over to Elizabeth (one block to the left), where that street begins to serve both directions.  

​In 1931, the US 83 designation was extended into Texas, essentially along its modern route.  US 83 came into Pharr from McAllen (as it does today), and at the time it overlapped with US 96 from there to Brownsville:

The two highways continued to follow the same route through town, ending at the Gateway Bridge.  US 96 was already done serving Brownsville by 1934 (it was completely decommissioned by 1939).  The original route of US 96 between Alice and Pharr became part of a newly-commissioned southern segment of US 281.  However -- instead of being overlapped with US 83 west from Pharr to Harlingen and Brownsville, as US 96 had been -- US 281 went south from Pharr (as it does today) to the Rio Grande.  Where the highway began to follow the river eastward, "North/South" signage ended and "East/West" signage began (more info on the US 281 page).  In Brownsville, US 281 was routed down the Military Highway (a different alignment than modern 281), which curved to become Elizabeth.  It met US 83 at Central Blvd, and the two routes were likely co-signed down Elizabeth to a common terminus on 14th at the Gateway Bridge:

It should be noted that the early TXDoT map indicates that the US 83 designation ended at Central and Elizabeth, and that it was only US 281 that continued to Gateway.  However, that seems unlikely, since US 83 had been signed all the way to the border before the US 281 designation was extended into Brownsville.  

​In 1945 the direct highway between Kingsville and Harlingen was built, and the US 77 designation was extended southward onto this road.  As it does today, US 77 met US 83 in Harlingen, and overlapped with it down to Brownsville.  In the city, the routes continued to use Central and Elizabeth:

Here, the white car was heading south on Central Blvd; that was originally US 96, and later US 83 and US 77.  Today it is officially Business US 77.  The cross street is Boca Chica.  In the 1940s or '50s, when US 281 was realigned onto Boca Chica, its "east" terminus was truncated such that it began to the right:

Also shown there is the corrected signage at the east end of US 281.

​Sometime during the 1950s the modern US 77-83 freeway was built between Harlingen and Brownsville.  At the time, the southern terminus of this freeway was at International Blvd.  The US 77-83 designations were routed onto this freeway, and then down International to the same old end at the Gateway Bridge.  A new Business Loop designation began where the freeway veers away from Central Blvd (off the north edge of this map), running from there along the original route (Central/Elizabeth), reconnecting with mainline 77-83 at International:

The notion of "Business 83" worked fine, even if it was not official.  But the "Business 281" signs were a problem.  When US 77-83 was rerouted, the US 281 designation should have either been a.) extended east along Boca Chica to the new US 77-83, or b.) extended down Central and Elizabeth to the Gateway Bridge.  But apparently TXDoT did neither, nor did they check to see that the district office re-signed the routes correctly.

​In about 1999, the US 77-83 freeway was extended through International Blvd, to its modern border crossing: Veterans Memorial Bridge at Los Tomates: