U.S. Route 59 in Texas

Infobox TX State Highway
type=US
route=59
length_mi=612.169
length_round=3
length_ref=cite web | author=Texas Department of Transportation | title=Highway Designation File - U.S. Highway 59 | url=http://www.txdot.state.tx.us/tpp/hwy/us/us0059.htm | accessdate=2007-09-08 ]


formed=1935
dir1=South
dir2=North
from=
junction=
|to=
previous_type=TX
previous_route=58
next_type=TX
next_route=59

In the U.S. state of Texas, U.S. Highway 59 is named the Lloyd Bentsen Highway, after Lloyd Bentsen, former U.S. Senator from Texas. In northern Houston, US 59 is the Eastex Freeway. To the south, it is the Southwest Freeway, which is one of the busiest sections of freeway in the United States with a vehicle count, as of 2006, over 330,000 vehicles per day just outside the Loop. [Texas Department of Transportation, [http://www.dot.state.tx.us/apps/statewide_mapping/StatewidePlanningMap.html Traffic Counts] Last accessed 2007-12-12.]

US 59 (overlapped by US 71) actually straddles the border between Texas and Arkansas north of Interstate 30 near Texarkana, with the east side of the highway in Arkansas and the west side of the highway on the Texas side. In the past, both highways remained on the border past I-30 as State Line Avenue to downtown Texarkana; today, only US 71 does so.

History

The US 96 designation was originally applied in 1926 from Rosenberg, Texas, near Houston to Pharr in the Rio Grande valley. This diagonal route, south of U.S. Highway 90, did not violate the convention of even numbers for east-west routes. The highway's east-west nature was boosted in 1934 when US 96 was rerouted from Alice to Laredo.

Junction list

References