New York State Route 64 - History

History

In 1908, the New York State Legislature created Route 14, an unsigned legislative route that extended from Corning to Rochester via South Bristol and Pittsford. The majority of Route 14 south of Pittsford was routed on what is now NY 64; however, in the vicinity of Bloomfield, Route 14 broke from modern NY 64 and used what later became NY 20C to access Holcomb. At the same time, the portion of current NY 64 that overlaps with US 20 and NY 5 was included in Route 6, a cross-state highway connecting Albany to Buffalo. On March 1, 1921, Route 14 was altered to bypass Holcomb to the south on what is now NY 64.

When the first set of posted routes in New York were assigned in 1924, the portion of legislative Route 14 between Mendon and Pittsford became part of NY 15, a route that mostly followed the current alignment of NY 96 from Owego to Rochester. Between Victor and Pittsford, however, NY 15 strayed from the modern routing of NY 96 and followed what is now NY 251 to Mendon. At the same time, the segment of legislative Route 6 in East Bloomfield became part of both NY 5 and NY 5A. The NY 5A designation was replaced along this stretch with NY 7 by 1926, which in turn was replaced by US 20 in 1927. In the 1930 renumbering of state highways in New York, NY 15 was realigned to bypass Mendon to the northeast by way of the current alignment of NY 96 between Victor and Pittsford. The former alignment of NY 15 from Pittsford to Mendon became part of NY 64, a new route that extended south to South Bristol over the post-1921 routing of legislative Route 14. The 4-mile (6.4 km) portion of NY 64 between Vincent and South Bloomfield became part of US 20A c. 1939, allowing the route to reconnect to US 20 at South Bloomfield.

NY 64 briefly extended north of the village of Pittsford during the 1950s and 1960s. In the mid-1950s, NY 96 was realigned onto the new Eastern Expressway from Bushnell's Basin to NY 31F near East Rochester. From there, NY 96 followed modern NY 31F west to East Avenue, where it rejoined its original alignment. The portion of NY 96's original surface routing between the village of Pittsford and what is now NY 31F became part of an extended NY 64. A northwest extension of the freeway to what is now the Can of Worms was completed c. 1957 as a realignment of NY 96, resulting in another extension of NY 64 along East Avenue to the eastern edge of Rochester. NY 64 and NY 96 were restored to their pre-1950s alignments c. 1961 when the Eastern Expressway was designated as I-490.