U.S. Route 80
U.S. Route 80 or U.S. Highway 80 is a major east–west United States Numbered Highway in the Southern United States, much of which was once part of the early auto trail known as the Dixie Overland Highway. As the "0" in the route number indicates, it was originally a cross-country route, from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean. Its original western terminus was at Historic US 101 in San Diego, California. However, the entire segment west of Dallas, Texas, has been decommissioned in favor of various Interstate Highways and state highways starting in 1967, being truncated to its current west end in 1991. Currently, the highway's western terminus is at an interchange with Interstate 30 on the Dallas–Mesquite city line. Its eastern terminus is on Tybee Island, Georgia, near the Atlantic Ocean. Between Longview, Texas, and Cuba, Alabama, US 80 runs parallel to or concurrently with Interstate 20. It also currently runs through Dallas, Texas; Shreveport, Louisiana; Jackson, Mississippi; Montgomery, Alabama; Columbus, Georgia; Macon, Georgia; and Savannah, Georgia.
Route description
Texas
Modern US 80 begins as a significant component of the urban freeway system of Dallas, Texas. With Spur 557, it serves as the shortest freeway route from the central and northern portions of Dallas to I-20, heading east towards Shreveport, Louisiana.From its origin at I-30 in eastern Dallas, through its interchange with the I-635 "LBJ" Loop, to its junction with I-20 southwest of Terrell, US 80/Spur 557 is a full Interstate-grade, limited-access freeway. In western Terrell, US 80 leaves the freeway, which continues southeast as Spur 557 to I-20, while US 80 runs north of I-20 through a number of small towns and cities, including Terrell, Mineola, Longview, and Marshall. It rejoins I-20 for about, before splitting to pass through downtown Waskom before crossing into Louisiana.
Louisiana
US 80 is parallel to the newer I-20, which has supplanted it as a long-distance route, for the entirety of its length in Louisiana.The highway crosses the state line from Texas into Caddo Parish as a two-lane road and crosses over to the south of I-20 without connecting with the freeway. It passes through the town of Greenwood where it meets US 79 coming north from Texas, and these two routes run concurrently eastward from there to Minden. US 79/US 80 crosses over I-20 again, this time at an interchange, and enters the city of Shreveport as Greenwood Road. The highway passes over I-220 without an interchange and continues east to an intersection with Jefferson Paige Road where it expands to four undivided lanes and enters the main part of the urbanized area. US 171 ends at US 79/US 80 at the intersection with Hearne Avenue. At this intersection, the road narrows to two through lanes. US 80 intersects I-20 again just east of here. At Mansfield Road, the highway name changes to Texas Avenue and angles northeast through an industrial area. The road skirts the I-20/I-49 interchange and expands to four lanes for its final approach to downtown. At the west edge of downtown, eastbound jogs one block east on Crockett Street and two blocks north on Common Street north to Texas Street; westbound jogs one block south from Texas Street down Common to Texas Avenue. US 79/US 80 passes through downtown Shreveport on Texas Street before crossing the Red River on the 1930s vintage Long–Allen Bridge and entering Bossier City and Bossier Parish.
Through Bossier Parish, US 79/US 80 comprises a major urban and suburban arterial carrying a minimum of four lanes. In the eastern reaches of the parish, and continuing into Webster Parish, it is a divided highway. The road intersects the east end of I-220 at an interchange. US 79/US 80 stays to the north of I-20, except for a stretch east of Haughton where it strays to the south for a period, skirting the north edge of the Louisiana Army Ammunition Plant. At Dixie Inn, the highway intersects US 371. In Minden, US 79 separates from US 80 and continues its northeasterly trajectory toward Arkansas.
East of Minden, US 80 crosses to the south of I-20 and serves the Bienville Parish towns of Gibsland and Arcadia. Entering Lincoln Parish, the highway serves Simsboro and Grambling before entering Ruston and overlapping US 167 on a north–south couplet of streets through the business district. US 80 resumes its eastward path on the north side of Ruston and exits the city on East Georgia Avenue.
Between Ruston and Monroe the highway serves the small communities of Choudrant and Calhoun. Now on the north side of the interstate, it enters Ouachita Parish and approaches the Monroe area as a two-lane road. US 80 crosses Louisiana Highway 143 and enters West Monroe on Cypress Street, where it continues south into the business district and widens to a four-lane urban arterial. At junction LA 34, US 80 makes a left turn, angling northeast, and crosses the Ouachita River, entering the city of Monroe. As Louisville Avenue it passes north of downtown, but the downtown area can be accessed via Business US 165 which intersects US 80 at North 5th/North 6th Street and becomes concurrent from there to the east. Louisville Avenue rapidly becomes a heavily commercialized urban arterial and remains so as it passes through the city, eventually curving southwestward and meeting the intersection with Desiard Street.
As Desiard Street, US 80 immediately meets mainline US 165, on its expressway bypass alignment, at a diamond interchange. Eastward from there, US 80 passes through suburban areas until it meets LA 139, where it is forced to turn off its four-lane alignment at an intersection which favors LA 139 traffic. Now a two-lane road, US 80 continues east through northeast Louisiana, passing through Richland and Madison parishes and serving the communities and towns of Start, Rayville, Delhi, Tallulah, Mound, and Delta.
Just west of Delta, US 80 turns off its original route and runs a short distance south to an interchange with I-20. The original alignment of US 80 into Delta is now designated as LA 3218. The original US 80 Mississippi River Bridge remains active as a rail bridge but the roadway portion is closed to traffic. Today, US 80 runs concurrent with the interstate around Delta to the state line, bypassing the town and crossing the Mississippi River bridge into Vicksburg, Mississippi.
Mississippi
In Mississippi, US 80 is referred to as "Highway 80" and exists primarily as a two-lane road except in the Jackson area, where it expands to four lanes.US 80 out of Louisiana runs concurrently with I-20 across the Mississippi River through Vicksburg, to Clinton. When US 80 reaches the western edge of Clinton, it separates to pass directly through the cities of Clinton, Jackson, Flowood, Pearl, and Brandon. After Brandon, US 80 runs parallel to I-20 for the next through the towns of Pelahatchie, Morton, Forest, Lake, Newton, Hickory, and Chunky. East of Chunky, US 80 once again merges with I-20 until it separates again in Meridian, where it merges with US 11 as a two-lane highway heading through the town of Toomsuba and finally ending at the Alabama state line.
Alabama
In Alabama, US 80 enters the state near and parallel with I-20 in Cuba. It is co-signed with US 11 until it splits at Cuba and runs east across the center of the state. It is a major highway through Alabama, going through Demopolis and Selma. It continues to Montgomery, where it continues east through Shorter and Tuskegee and leaves the state in Phenix City.The routing from Meridian, Mississippi to Cuba, Alabama originally ran along its current route but for some 30 years it traveled along I-20 and I-59. However, the routing reverted to the original road early in the 2000s. It is internally designated by the Alabama Department of Transportation as State Route 8.
Georgia
US 80 crosses the Chattahoochee River from Alabama into Columbus, where it proceeds along J. R. Allen Parkway through the northern section of the city. Past Columbus, the road meanders through rural Georgia for roughly en route to Macon, where it crosses I-75 and I-16. US 80 passes through downtown Macon via Eisenhower Parkway and parallels the northern boundary of Ocmulgee National Monument just east of the city.Beyond Macon, US 80 turns southeastward, passing through the cities of Dublin, Swainsboro and Statesboro and running roughly parallel to I-16. On the outskirts of Savannah, US 80 crosses I-95 and follows Louisville Road into the city's downtown area. After briefly merging with I-516, US 80 continues eastward along Victory Drive, just south of Savannah's historic district. At the community of Thunderbolt, US 80 crosses the Wilmington River and proceeds across the islands and marshes along the Atlantic Coast east of Savannah. There it crosses the Lazaretto Creek onto Tybee Island. The final stretch of US 80 follows Butler Avenue across Tybee Island. A small monument at the intersection of Butler and Tybrisa Street marks the end of the highway.
History
Established in 1914 by the Automobile Club of Savannah, the Dixie Overland Highway auto trail was the first major route connecting San Diego, California and Savannah, Georgia. The Dixie Overland Highway Association debated on a definitive western end point for the highway in southern California. California politicians Stanley Hufflund and Ed Fletcher convinced the association in an August 1918 meeting to choose San Diego over Los Angeles. Fletcher was responsible for a grassroots campaign years earlier that resulted in the construction of the Plank Road across the Algodones Dunes in 1915. The Plank Road was the final link in the main highway to San Diego. The association agreed to make San Diego the Dixie Overland Highway's western terminus in 1919 and elected Fletcher as the association's president. The highway now followed most of what would become US 80, except between Sweetwater, Texas and El Paso. The section of future US 80 through Odessa, Midland and Abilene was instead part of the Bankhead Highway. Other sections of future US 80 were designated as parts of the Lee Highway and the Old Spanish Trail.In April 1925, the Secretary of Agriculture established the Joint Board on Interstate Highways under the United States Bureau of Public Roads. The board began planning what would become the United States Numbered Highway System. One of the planned highways was US 80 between Savannah and San Diego. The board's highway system proposal was submitted by the Secretary of Agriculture to the newly formed American Association of State Highway Officials, which made changes and revisions to the route before adopting the finalized system. On November 11, 1926, all the proposed highways in the system, including US 80, were officially designated. Ed Fletcher continued his involvement with the route after it became US 80, becoming president of the newly formed US 80 Highway Association. During his time with the association, Fletcher lobbied the federal government to pay for improvements to the highway and actively promoted US 80 to motorists.
US 80 was advertised as the first all-weather coast-to-coast route for auto travelers. Originally, its western terminus was in San Diego at US 101, and its eastern terminus in Savannah at US 17. When first commissioned, the highway was approximately. By 1931, it had been shortened to and the eastern terminus extended to Tybee Island. According to the United States Department of Agriculture Bureau of Public Roads, only were considered "improved" roadway in 1931, being paved with brick, concrete or macadam. The remainder was surfaced of lesser materials such as gravel or dirt. In 1947, the U.S. Highway 80 Association was founded to promote business and tourism along US 80 from Savannah to San Diego. Tourism and travel had sharply declined on the entire route since the 1930s. In 1949, the Association was divided into three divisions: The western division, in Tucson, Arizona; the central, in Colorado City, Texas; and the eastern, in Ruston, Louisiana. The U.S. Highway 80 Association resolved to offer membership to businesses along the route, print promotional booklets and strip maps, and pay for billboard ads to attract tourists to drive US 80 from coast to coast. The Association hoped it would also induce travelers on U.S. Route 66 to consider US 80 instead.
Throughout the 1950s, US 80 grew to become a popular highway that often competed with US 66. At one point, more cars were recorded entering California on US 80 than on US 66. Like US 66, US 80 become a keystone highway in American car culture. This renaissance was short-lived, however, with the creation of the Interstate and Defense Highway System in 1957. Four Interstates were slated to replace US 80 as a major highway: Interstate 8 between San Diego and Yuma, Arizona; Interstate 10 between Tucson and Pecos, Texas; Interstate 20 between Pecos and Meridian, Mississippi; and Interstate 16 between Macon, Georgia and Savannah. Between 1964 and 1991, US 80 was slowly removed in increments between Dallas and San Diego. It was considered obsolete to the western states, which favored the new Interstate highways. As such, US 80 is no longer an active U.S. Highway in California, Arizona, New Mexico and western Texas. Today, I-8, I-10 and I-20 have replaced US 80 between Dallas and San Diego. Notable surviving sections of old US 80 include the entirety of both New Mexico State Road 80 and Arizona State Route 80, and all of County Route S80 in Imperial County, California. Other former sections of US 80, particularly in California and parts of Arizona, carry the title Old Highway 80 or similar variations of that name. Multiple efforts are being made to designate whole sections of US 80 as an historic route. California became the first state to recognize Historic U.S. Route 80 in 2007. As of 2018, California, Arizona and Louisiana recognize former and current sections of US 80 as an historic route.
For a time known as the "Broadway of America", US 80's history is second only to US 66 in American highway folklore, as several significant historical events have occurred on or near US 80. Bonnie and Clyde were ambushed on LA 154, just south of US 80 near Gibsland, Louisiana. Coincidentally, Clyde Barrow was buried with his brother just off former US 80 in Dallas. Lee Harvey Oswald was captured at the Texas Theatre on Jefferson Street in Oak Cliff, which at the time was a business spur of US 80. Much of the former route in Arizona between Yuma and Gila Bend follows the marching routes used by General Stephen Watts Kearny's army as well as Lieutenant Colonel Philip St. George Cooke and the Mormon Battalion to California during the Mexican–American War. Further east on old US 80 near the New Mexico and Arizona state line stands a monument marking the place where the Apache warrior Geronimo surrendered to the United States Army in 1886. In Tombstone, the O.K. Corral, site of the infamous gunfight, is on the south side of Fremont Street, an old alignment of US 80. US 80 was the route taken by the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches in Alabama during the American Civil Rights Movement. Prior to the successful march, the Edmund Pettus Bridge on US 80 in Selma was the site of the infamous Bloody Sunday event, where marchers were beaten and wounded by local law enforcement and armed vigilantes. In downtown Dallas, President John F. Kennedy was shot in Dealey Plaza just blocks from Commerce Street, which was part of US 80 and Business US 80.