TOMORROW'S ROADS TODAY - Maryland State Highway ...

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completion of the two interchanges. Mrs. McKeldin cut her ribbon near Wisconsin Avenue and
the Governor cut his at Kenilworth Avenue, which was fifteen miles to the east. 71 The SRC
designed metal girder bridges in both interchanges.
The SRC called the highway the Capital Beltway, and it was opened in August 1964 and
was immediately widened from two lanes to three lanes. Although the SRC had constructed
some of the Beltway’s multi-beam bridges before there was a highway to connect to, one large
bridge across the Potomac River required nonstandard design. The Woodrow Wilson Bridge
between Oxon Hill, Maryland and Alexandria, Virginia was designed as a memorial to the
former President. It was a steel girder and double bascule span bridge with the tender’s house at
the draw span near the Virginia shoreline (Figure 16). 72
Figure 16: Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge, I-495 over the Potomac, looking east toward
Maryland (SHA Photo Archive)
The highway was an important component of Maryland’s interstate system because its
completion provided connections between Washington’s suburbs and Frederick and Baltimore,
and from Baltimore to Philadelphia and New York. The new highway also helped to remove
through traffic from downtown Washington DC. Several more highways needed to be
completed by 1965 in order for the SRC’s interstate program to be finished: the Northeast
Expressway (I-95) between Baltimore and the Delaware State Line, and I-70 between Baltimore
and Frederick, as well as the I-70 portion from Frederick to Hancock, where the road enters
Pennsylvania.
Northeast Expressway/I-95/Kennedy Memorial Highway
The Northeast Expressway (I-95) between Baltimore and either the Pennsylvania or
Delaware State Lines was a highway that the SRC had long planned to complete. MD 7, the
Philadelphia Road, started in the eighteenth century as the post road between Baltimore and
Philadelphia. The SRC took it over in 1908 and upgraded it through the mid-1930s when it
became clear that the development ringing the road would prevent the agency from making it
wider and safer. Between 1936 and 1939, the SRC relocated the road and built a four-lane
highway, divided by medians, with a full width of 80 feet to support the two roads between
Baltimore and the Delaware state lines and called it US 40. During World War II, local and out
71 Op. cit, pp. 126-127
72 The bridge was replaced by the new Woodrow Wilson Bridge between 2006 and 2008.