Washington State Route 500

State Route 500 marker

State Route 500
Route information
Auxiliary route of I-5
Defined by RCW 47.17.635
Maintained by WSDOT
Length 22.64 mi[1] (36.44 km)
Existed 1964–present
Major junctions
West end I-5 in Vancouver
 
East end SR 14 in Camas
Highway system
← SR 433SR 501 →

State Route 500 (SR 500) is a state highway in Clark County, Washington, United States. The east–west highway runs through Vancouver as an expressway and its eastern suburbs as a country road, connecting Interstate 5 (I-5) to I-205 in eastern Vancouver and SR 14 in Camas. SR 500 runs concurrent to SR 503 within Orchards and also uses a section of the county-built Padden Parkway.

Route description

SR 500 near the St. Johns Boulevard interchange facing east

SR 500 begins northeast of downtown Vancouver as part of an interchange with I-5 and East 39th Street. The westbound lanes of SR 500 connect with an onramp to southbound I-5, while the eastbound lanes of SR 500 are fed by an offramp from northbound I-5; other movements to I-5 are accessed by a half-diamond interchange with Northeast 15th Avenue and East 39th Street.[2][3] SR 500 travels southeast on a four-lane freeway along Burnt Bridge Creek to an interchange with St. Johns Boulevard and turns east to parallel Fourth Plain Boulevard through Vancouver's suburban neighborhoods. The freeway is interrupted by two at-grade intersections at Falk Road (42nd Avenue) and Stapleton Road (54th Avenue),[4][5] which will be upgraded to right-in/right-out access in late 2018.[6]

SR 500 continues northeast and travels through a pair of single-point urban interchanges with Andresen Road and Thurston Way, the latter serving the Vancouver Mall complex on the north side of the highway. The freeway crosses under Fourth Plain Boulevard and reaches a cloverleaf interchange with I-205. After an interchange with Gher Road, the freeway ends and SR 500 turns north onto 117th Avenue, becoming concurrent with SR 503. The two highway enter Orchards and remain concurrent for one mile (1.6 km), splitting at an intersection with Padden Parkway. SR 503 continues north towards Battle Ground, while SR 500 turns east onto Padden Parkway, a limited-access expressway with infrequent intersections. The parkway travels east across several suburban subdivisions and ends after merging with Ward Road, from which SR 500 turns south onto 162nd Avenue.[4][5]

The highway remains on 162nd Avenue until an intersection with Fourth Plain Boulevard, which SR 500 follows east into rural and unincorporated Clark County. At Lacamas Creek in Proebstel, the highway dips south and continues along Northeast 58th Street until reaching Matney Creek, where it makes a series of stairstep turns onto local roads while traveling along the east side of Green Mountain. SR 500 then turns east onto Brunner Road and south onto 267th Avenue, passing Grove Field airport in Fern Prairie and briefly turning west before continuing south into Camas on Everett Street. The highway passes the south end of Lacamas Lake and travels into downtown Camas, where it runs east on 14th Avenue, south on Garfield Street, west on 3rd Avenue, and south on Dallas Street. Near the city's paper mill, SR 500 leaves downtown and crosses over the Washougal River, following a section of the BNSF Railway to Parker's Landing.[7] The highway turns south onto Union Street and intersects SR 14 at a dogbone interchange, where SR 500 terminates.[5]

SR 500 is maintained by the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT), which conducts an annual survey on the state's highways to measure traffic volume in terms of average annual daily traffic. The busiest section of the highway, near the Vancouver Mall and I-205, carried a daily average of 72,000 vehicles in 2016; the least busiest section of the highway, at its eastern terminus in Camas, carried only 2,700 vehicles.[8] The freeway section of SR 500 in Vancouver and the street shared with SR 503 in Orchards are designated as part of the National Highway System, a network of roads identified as important to the national economy, defense, and mobility.[9][10]

History

The SR 500 corridor was added to the state highway system in 1937 as Secondary State Highway 8A (SSH 8), a spur of Primary State Highway 8 (PSH 8) that ran from Vancouver to Camas via Orchards.[11] The highway traveled along Fourth Plain Boulevard in eastern Vancouver, which was built by the Hudson's Bay Company in the 1820s and named for the Fourth Plain region.[12] The roads connecting the east end of Fourth Plain with Camas were built by the 1920s.[13] The SR 500 designation replaced SSH 8A in the 1964 state highway renumbering and initially traveled through Vancouver on Fourth Plain Boulevard.[14]

The expressway section of SR 500 was constructed in the 1970s and 1980s to relieve the congested Fourth Plain Boulevard.[3] Prior to 2005, SR 500 followed 4th Plain Rd. from Orchards to its current junction instead of traveling north to Padden Parkway.

Due to a high accident rate and traffic volumes, Washington State Department of Transportation is converting the expressway section of SR 500 between Interstate 5 and SR 503 to a freeway in phases.[15] Four of the five planned interchanges have been completed, at N.E. St. Johns Rd. (2012), N.E. Andresen Rd. (1995), N.E. Thurston Rd. (2002), and N.E. 112th Ave./N.E. Gher Rd. (2004).

Major intersections

The entire highway is in Clark County. All exits are unnumbered.

Locationmi[1]kmDestinationsNotes
Vancouver0.000.00 I-5 south – PortlandSouthbound entrance and northbound exit from I-5
0.400.64 Northeast 15th Avenue to I-5 northWestbound exit and eastbound entrance
1.141.83St. Johns Boulevard
1.802.90Falk Road / Northeast 42nd AvenueAt-grade intersection
2.383.83Northeast Stapleton Road / Northeast 54th AvenueAt-grade intersection
3.125.02Northeast Andresen Road
3.906.28Northeast Thurston Way – Vancouver Mall
4.737.61 I-205 – Seattle, Salem
5.438.74Northeast Gher Road, Northeast 112th Avenue
5.969.59Eastern end of freeway
SR 503 / Fourth Plain Boulevard – CamasWest end of SR 503 overlap
​6.9811.23 SR 503 north / Padden Parkway – Brush Prairie, Battle GroundEast end of SR 503 overlap
Camas22.6436.44 SR 14 – Kennewick, VancouverInterchange
1.000 mi = 1.609 km; 1.000 km = 0.621 mi

References

  1. 1 2 Multimodal Planning Division (January 3, 2018). State Highway Log Planning Report 2017, SR 2 to SR 971 (PDF) (Report). Washington State Department of Transportation. pp. 1400–1411. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  2. ↑ "SR 5 – Exit 2: Junction SR 500/39th Street/Orchards" (PDF). Washington State Department of Transportation. January 9, 2015. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  3. 1 2 Pesanti, Dameon (December 13, 2017). "Clark Asks: No northbound I-5 ramps from Highway 500?". The Columbian. Retrieved August 21, 2018.
  4. 1 2 "Corridor Sketch Summary – SR 500: I-5 Jct (Vancouver) to 162nd Ave/Fourth Plain Blvd" (PDF). Washington State Department of Transportation. April 2, 2018. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  5. 1 2 3 Google (August 19, 2018). "State Route 500" (Map). Google Maps. Google. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  6. ↑ Hair, Calley (August 14, 2018). "State to remove Highway 500 signals". The Columbian. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  7. ↑ "Corridor Sketch Summary – SR 500: NE 3rd St to SR 14 Jct (Camas)" (PDF). Washington State Department of Transportation. April 2, 2018. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  8. ↑ 2016 Annual Traffic Report (PDF) (Report). Washington State Department of Transportation. 2017. pp. 187–188. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  9. ↑ National Highway System: Portland, OR—WA (PDF) (Map). Federal Highway Administration. March 25, 2015. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  10. ↑ "What is the National Highway System?". Federal Highway Administration. January 31, 2017. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  11. ↑ "Chapter 207: Classification of Public Highways" (PDF). Session Laws of the State of Washington, 1937. Washington State Legislature. March 18, 1937. p. 1005. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  12. ↑ Vogt, Tom (June 10, 2017). "Clark Asks: The Plains explained". The Columbian. Retrieved August 20, 2018.
  13. ↑ https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/img4/ht_icons/Browse/WA/WA_Troutdale_244344_1934_48000.jpg
  14. ↑ Prahl, C. G. (December 1, 1965). "Identification of State Highways" (PDF). Washington State Highway Commission. Retrieved August 19, 2018.
  15. ↑ Herrington, Gregg (September 14, 2002). "List confirms it: Highway 500 is dangerous". The Columbian. p. A1.
KML is from Wikidata
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.