Interstate 695 (District of Columbia) - History

History

Plans from 1955 (numbered in 1958) took Interstate 95 through Washington on what is now Interstate 395, turning east at U.S. Route 50 (US 50) and leaving along the Baltimore-Washington Parkway. Interstate 295 was to run along its current route to south of the 11th Street Bridges, but then would have continued northeast along D.C. Route 295, ending at I-95 just outside the District. Interstate 695 was to run from I-295 over the 11th Street Bridges, turning west on what is now I-695 to end at I-95 (now I-395).

Soon—possibly by 1958, when numbers were assigned—I-95 between Baltimore and Washington was shifted to its present alignment, splitting from the U.S. 50 corridor northeast of Union Station. I-295 was shifted to cross the 11th Street Bridges, and then turn east in the median of present I-695 (where the ramps to RFK Stadium now lie), continuing north and northwest to end at I-95 and US 50 at their split. I-695 would be the short section of freeway between I-95 and I-295, and ramps on both sides of the East Capitol Street Bridge would provide a freeway-to-freeway connection between I-695 and DC 295 (via I-295).

By 1971, an extension was added to the planned I-695. It would run concurrent with I-95 west to Maine Avenue, where it would split (the existing interchange provides for freeway-to-freeway ramps) and run northwest along Independence Avenue past the Lincoln Memorial to end at Interstate 66, at the east end of the Theodore Roosevelt Bridge (that interchange also has the appropriate ramps).

The Southeast Freeway, including the section planned as I-295 to Pennsylvania Avenue, was built in the late 1960s. Plans for the remaining Interstates in Washington were canceled in 1977 after much opposition, and I-295 was later truncated to I-695, with the former I-295 stub to Pennsylvania Avenue renumbered as part of I-695.

In 1990s, the Barney Circle Freeway was planned to run from the east end of I-695 across the Anacostia River to D.C. Route 295. This would have filled a hole in Washington's freeway system, which currently has no connection between I-395 and DC 295. (This would have been provided by I-295 and the Whitney Young Memorial Bridge.) After the Barney Circle Freeway plan was canceled in 1996, a left-turn movement was added at the interchange between Pennsylvania Avenue and DC 295, allowing traffic coming from I-695 to cross the Anacostia on Pennsylvania Avenue and join DC 295 directly, albeit passing through two traffic signals. However, no ramp was provided from DC 295 south to Pennsylvania Avenue west, and so traffic from DC 295 south to I-395 south must cross the Anacostia on South Capitol Street.

In December 2009, construction began on replacement of the 11th Street Bridges and their interchange with I-295/DC 295, including ramps which will allow for highway-only travel between DC 295, I-295, and I-395 in all directions. The renderings for that project also show a deletion of the connections between the bridge and I-695 east, indicating that the stretch of the Southeast Freeway between 11th St SE and Pennsylvania Avenue may soon be decommissioned. In 2011, as a part of the project, I-695 was signed along the Southeast Freeway.

That decommissioning was foretold in April 2003, when the DC Office of Planning stated that "the elevated Southeast Freeway and industrial landscape create formidable psychological barriers" between the surrounding neighborhoods. In October 2008, the freeway was named one of ten U.S. "Freeways Without Futures" by Congress for the New Urbanism.

Prior to the 11th Street Bridge Project, the unsigned Interstate 695 did not cross the bridges and terminated north of the Anacostia River. As of January 2012, the new signage installed by the District Department of Transportation marks the first time I-695 has appeared on directional signs in the District of Columbia. The new signs designate I-695 as extending from the point where I-395 branches off from the Southeast Freeway, with I-695 continuing along the Southeast Freeway and over the new 11th Street Bridge to the interchange with I-295. The portion of the Southeast Freeway between 11th Street SE and Pennsylvania Avenue SE is no longer considered part of the Interstate Highway System, another step towards eventual decommissioning.