Colorado Boulevard - History

History

The most original portion of Colorado Boulevard ran from Orange Grove Boulevard to Broadway, now Arroyo Parkway. This portion of the street always contained many shops, banks, hotels, and major commercial industries. By the late 19th century, this part of the Colorado had become so popular, it was becoming a traffic bottleneck, and as early as May 1900 there were public outcries to City Council to widen the road. It wasn't until 1929 that the City undertook the major and unprecedented task of cutting back the buildings along Colorado 14 feet (4.3 m) on each side. This undertaking created a monumental amount of legal red tape as well as many engineering dilemmas which were handled with amazing results. At the same much of the Victorian facings on the buildings were replaced with Spanish and Art Deco designs.

Colorado Street and Colorado Boulevard carried pre-1964 Legislative Route 161 from its west end to the merge with Huntington Drive (via Colorado Place). This was signed as State Route 134 west of Figueroa Street, U.S. Route 66 Alternate (US 66 before the end of 1940) from Figueroa Street to Arroyo Parkway, and U.S. Route 66 from Arroyo Parkway to Huntington Drive.

In 1954, the Colorado Freeway was opened between Holly Street in Pasadena and Eagle Vista Drive and Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock to help alleviate traffic congestion due to the narrow Colorado Street Bridge over the Arroyo Seco. The new freeway connected the two communities until 1971, when the entire freeway was closed and upgraded, as well as partially rerouted as the new Ventura Freeway. A short segment of the original Colorado Freeway remains as an on-ramp/off-ramp between Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock and the Figueroa Street off-ramp of the present Ventura Freeway.

In the 1964 renumbering, LR 161 remained State Route 134 west of Pasadena, though this was being moved to the new alignment (now the Ventura Freeway); until the freeway was completed through Pasadena in the mid-1970s, Colorado Boulevard was still signed as State Route 134 between Orange Grove Avenue and Arroyo Parkway. Through and east of Pasadena, LR 161 became State Route 248, but was signed as US 66 and continued east on Huntington Drive to the interchange with Interstate 210 (Foothill Freeway) in Monrovia.

The US 66 shields began to come down along the length of Route 248 in 1975, soon after Interstate 210 was completed through Pasadena. SR 248 was never signed as such, though it did appear on some maps in the 1970s and 1980s. The segment within the city of Pasadena was deleted from the state highway system in 1986. The rest was removed in 1992. Along with the moving of SR 134 to the Ventura Freeway, this resulted in Colorado Street and Colorado Boulevard becoming a local road.