New Jersey Route 208

New Jersey Route 208

Route 208 is a state highway in the northern part of New Jersey in the United States. It runs 10.07 mi (16.21 km) from an interchange with Route 4 and County Route 79 (Saddle River Road) in Fair Lawn northwest to an interchange with Interstate 287 in Oakland. The route runs through suburban areas of Bergen and Passaic counties as four- to six-lane divided highway. It is constructed like a freeway, as intersections with cross roads are controlled by interchanges, but is not a controlled access road as several driveways exist. The route runs through the communities of Glen Rock, Hawthorne, Wyckoff, and Franklin Lakes along the way, interchanging with County Route 507 in Fair Lawn and County Route 502 in Franklin Lakes.

What is now Route 208 was initially planned as Route S4B in 1929, a spur of Route 4 that was to run from Fair Lawn northwest to the New York border in Greenwood Lake, where it would eventually connect to New York State Route 208. This route replaced what was planned as a part of Route 3 in 1927 between Paterson and Greenwood Lake. By the time the route was renumbered to Route 208 in 1953 to match NY 208, only a portion of the route in Fair Lawn from Route 4 to Maple Avenue had been built. Route 208 was completed west to U.S. Route 202 in Oakland by 1960 as a two-lane undivided road; it would be built into its present configuration in later years. A Route 208 freeway was planned across the Ramapo Mountains from Oakland to connect to a proposed NY 208 freeway at Greenwood Lake; however, it was never built due to environmental concerns. After Interstate 287 was extended from Montville to the New York border in 1993, it took over the alignment of Route 208 between U.S. Route 202 and the route’s current northern terminus. The last traffic signal along Route 208 at McBride Avenue was removed in 1997 and the interchange with Route 4 and Saddle River Road was reconstructed in 2002.