The Cleveland Memorial Shoreway (often shortened to simply "The Shoreway") is a limited-access

Limited-access road

A limited-access road known by various terms worldwide, including limited-access highway, dual-carriageway and expressway, is a highway or arterial road for high-speed traffic which has many or most characteristics of a controlled-access highway , including limited or no access to adjacent...

 freeway in Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...

. It closely follows the shore of Lake Erie

Lake Erie

Lake Erie is the fourth largest lake of the five Great Lakes in North America, and the tenth largest globally. It is the southernmost, shallowest, and smallest by volume of the Great Lakes and therefore also has the shortest average water residence time. It is bounded on the north by the...

 and connects the east and west sides of Cleveland via the Main Avenue Bridge

Main Avenue Bridge

The Main Avenue Bridge is a cantilever truss bridge in Cleveland, Ohio carrying Ohio State Route 2/Cleveland Memorial Shoreway over the Cuyahoga River. The bridge, completed in 1939, is in length, the longest elevated structure in Ohio. It was named for Harold H...

. The Shoreway carries State Route 2 along its length, and also carries U.S. 6

U.S. Route 6

U.S. Route 6 , also called the Grand Army of the Republic Highway, a name that honors an American Civil War veterans association, is a main route of the U.S. Highway system, running east-northeast from Bishop, California to Provincetown, Massachusetts. Until 1964, it continued south from Bishop to...

, U.S. 20

U.S. Route 20

U.S. Route 20 is an east–west United States highway. As the "0" in its route number implies, US 20 is a coast-to-coast route. Spanning , it is the longest road in the United States, and the route sparsely parallels Interstate 90...

 and I-90

Interstate 90

Interstate 90 is the longest Interstate Highway in the United States at . It is the northernmost coast-to-coast interstate, and parallels US 20 for the most part. Its western terminus is in Seattle, at Edgar Martinez Drive S. near Safeco Field and CenturyLink Field, and its eastern terminus is in...

 for various stretches. Although it carries I-90, the "East Shoreway" is typically called such (and not "I-90") because it predates the Interstate Highway System

Interstate Highway System

The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, , is a network of limited-access roads including freeways, highways, and expressways forming part of the National Highway System of the United States of America...

. The Cleveland neighborhood of Detroit-Shoreway

Detroit-Shoreway

Detroit-Shoreway is a neighborhood on Cleveland's West Side. Detroit-Shoreway consists of the streets between Lake Erie and Interstate 90, from West 85th to West 45th streets.-Gordon Square:...

 is named after the two roads that form the northern border, the Shoreway and Detroit Avenue.

Because the Shoreway west of the I-90 portion does not connect to another limited access facility, it is underutilized and planned to be converted from a freeway to a surface street beginning in 2014.

History

The Shoreway began as a 4 miles (6.4 km) roadway from East Ninth Street to East 55th Street built in 1930s using Works Progress Administration

Works Progress Administration

The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...

 workers, and it served as access to the Great Lakes Exposition

Great Lakes Exposition

The Great Lakes Exposition was held in Cleveland, Ohio, in the summers of 1936 and 1937, along the Lake Erie shore north of downtown. The fair commemorated of the centennial of Cleveland's incorporation as a city...

 in 1936. It was the largest WPA project in the country. Within two years the roadway was extended to the Illuminating Company

FirstEnergy

FirstEnergy Corp. , is a diversified energy company headquartered in Akron, Ohio. Its subsidiaries and affiliates are involved in the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity, as well as energy management and other energy-related services...

 plant adjacent to Gordon Park, and it was opened for traffic in 1938, although planning delays prevented WPA from laying a second strip of pavement and building grade separations from side streets. After completion of the Main Avenue Bridge was completed in 1940, the highway was extended westward to Edgewater Park. The East Ninth Street interchange was also completed in 1940. The highway was extended to Bratenahl at East 140th Street in 1941. The roadway was envisioned as part of a larger system of high speed highways in the city. A West Shore Drive from Edgewater Park to Rocky River

Rocky River, Ohio

Rocky River is an affluent western suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, United States located in Cuyahoga County approximately nine miles west of Public Square in downtown Cleveland. The city is named for the river that forms its eastern border...

 was planned, but further construction was interrupted by World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. After the War, the previously unnamed highway became the Memorial Shoreway in honor of Cleveland's war veterans.

In 1944, the city and county planning departments and the state highway department developed a master plan for freeways throughout the area. However, the only additional freeway built was the Willow Freeway. The Memorial Shoreway permitted crosstown traffic with some stops but was incomplete between East 55th Street and East 72nd Street. In 1953 a further addition connected the sections of Shoreway and widened the original highway to make it an 8-lane, nonstop freeway. The Interstate Highway Act in 1956 provided the funding to complete much of the freeway system planned in 1944. As part of this effort, the Memorial Shoreway was joined to the new Lakeland Freeway

Lakeland Freeway

The Lakeland Freeway is a limited-access freeway in the northeastern suburbs of Cleveland, Ohio...

, which by 1963 stretched eastward toward Painesville

Painesville, Ohio

As of the 2010 Census, there were 19,563 people. As of the census of 2000, there were 17,503 people, 6,525 households, and 4,032 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,928.6 people per square mile . There were 6,933 housing units at an average density of 1,160.0 per square mile...

.

External links

• "Memorial Shoreway" at The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History