A Patchwork of Progress: US Highway 101

By Luke Carothers

Stretching almost the entirety of the United States’ West Coast from California to Washington, US Highway 101 (or US 101) traverses many of the most beautiful landscapes the country has to offer.  In its southern stretches, this scenic highway clings to the coast along the sunny Pacific ocean before turning inward to traverse hills and mountains forested with ancient towering redwoods.  Still further northward, US 101 picks its way from coastal settlement to coastal settlement in places like Oregon where the only practical means of linking these once-isolated towns and cities is to cut a winding path as close to the sea as possible.

The plan for US 101 was developed in the early 1920s with plans to link San Diego in the south with Port Angeles on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington.  With an increasing reliance on cars for transportation and trucks for the movement of goods, the development of a coastal highway linking major cities along the West Coast became necessary.  Around the start of the 20th century several smaller state and inter-state roads had been established up and down the West Coast.  One of the primary focuses for a new plan was connecting these disparate highways through a cohesive network.  The first stage of this massive inter-state highway project began in January of 1928 when plans were approved for its first section from San Diego to Los Angeles.  Plans for the rest of the route were approved shortly after that year, and construction soon began.  

Perhaps the most notable of the historic roads and trails incorporated into US 101 is El Camino Real (also known as The Royal Road or The King’s Highway).  Running a roughly 600-mile route from San Diego to San Francisco, this historic trail dates back to the 17th century when Spanish missionaries used it to travel between missions and pueblos.  It was established when the Spanish Portola expedition landed in what is now San Diego in 1769.  They were the first Europeans to travel overland through the region, and made their way north to the San Francisco Bay, establishing 21 missions along the way.  The route traveled by these Spanish missionaries over three centuries ago still traces the route of US 101 through much of California to this day.  A section of El Camino Real became the first paved highway in California as it was incorporated into the Pacific Highway.  Two decades later, several sections of the El Camino Real were further incorporated into the expanding stretch of US 101.

As the 1920s turned into the 1930s, the completed vision for US 101 was coming to fruition, and in less than a decade from its start the patchwork project of new and existing roads was taking shape.  Over the course of the next several decades, numerous improvements were made–bypassing sections of dangerous roadway with tunnels, widening sections, straightening curves—and the result was a new era of growth and mobility for a growing population on the West Coast.  Coastal and mountain towns up and down the West Coast were connected in a way that allowed for the growth of industries like tourism, which hit its peak around the middle of the 20th century and waned as new interstates began to bypass the old route taken by the now-old highway.

While it’s easy to view projects like the US 101 and others as modern feats of engineering, its important to also note the impact that historical trends can have on even the most modern of projects.  Within a context of historical trends, networks like coastal highways and the patterns through which they develop can be viewed as an almost natural progression of human movement—giving us an invaluable perspective for past, present, and future.