U.S. Route 30 - History

History

In the original (October 30, 1925) plan for the system, US 30 ran from Salt Lake City, Utah to Atlantic City, New Jersey. West of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, this was designated largely along the Lincoln Highway, as part of a promise to the Lincoln Highway Association to assign a single number to their road as much as possible. West of Salt Lake City, U.S. Route 40 continued to San Francisco, California, although it ran farther north than the Lincoln Highway east of Wadsworth, Nevada and west of Sacramento, California.

Around 1931, a split in Ohio was designated, from Delphos east to Mansfield. The original US 30 was assigned U.S. Route 30S, and a straighter route became U.S. Route 30N. US 30S was eliminated ca 1975, putting US 30 on former US 30N.

US 30 was rerouted ca 1931 to bypass Omaha, Nebraska and Council Bluffs, Iowa to the north. The former route, from Fremont, Nebraska to Missouri Valley, Iowa, was designated U.S. Route 30S. Around 1934 it was truncated to Omaha and c. 1939 it was changed from US 30S to US 30A and was removed from service in 1969 when the historic Douglas Street bridge was demolished.

Metropolitan Portland has a signed US 30 "Bypass", beginning at the St. John's bridge, following (roughly) Lombard Street in North Portland, continuing along Sandy Blvd., and rejoining the I-84/US-30 route in the center of the town of Wood Village. Junctions with I-5, US-30 at the St. John's bridge, and I-205 are all signed with "US-30 BYPASS" markers. Portland also had a U.S. 30 Business route along N.E. Sandy Boulevard, however the route was decommissioned in 2007.

Wyoming had requested ending US 30 in Salt Lake City, but Idaho and Oregon objected. What is now US 30 through those states (west of Burley, Idaho) had been designated as part of U.S. Route 20, another transcontinental route, but it took a detour to the north through Yellowstone National Park, making it inaccessible during the winter season. The states agreed to take US 30 along that route, splitting from the route to Salt Lake City at Granger, Wyoming and running along what had been designated as U.S. Route 530. (That number was then reused for the spur towards Salt Lake City.) The planned US 530 had ended at U.S. Route 91 at McCammon, Idaho, where the new US 30 turned north to Pocatello, meeting the planned US 20. (US 20 was truncated to Yellowstone but later extended along its own route to the Pacific Ocean.) What had been designated as U.S. Route 630, from US 30 at Echo, Utah to Ogden, was to be extended east on former US 30 to US 30 at Granger and northwest on US 91 and what had been designated U.S. Route 191 to US 30 at Burley.

Utah objected to that plan, however, as it removed US 30 from that state, giving them only US 630, a branch. A compromise was reached, in which the US 630 route would become the main line of US 30, once improved to higher standards, but that was still not deemed completely satisfactory. Ultimately, in the final system, a split was approved between Burley, Idaho and Granger, Wyoming, with U.S. Route 30N running along what was to be US 30, and U.S. Route 30S taking the route through Utah (planned as US 630). In the final plan (dated November 11, 1926), the route towards Salt Lake City became U.S. Route 530, ending at U.S. Route 40 at Kimball Junction, Utah.

In 2011, Google Maps mislabeled the entire length of US 30 as being concurrent with Quebec Route 366.

As of 2012, Google Maps has also mislabeled the entire length of US 30 as "U.S. Route 30 in Nebraska" alongside the local names for the road.