Summer is just around the corner, which means the long and arduous drives to the beach are also looming ahead. For most people around the Philadelphia area, that means packing up the family and heading to the Jersey Shore. However, since I grew up a little further west in Lancaster County, beach trips meant heading down to Delaware and Maryland.
If you know anything about the drive down to Delaware, you know the majority of the trip from Christiana to Lewes is on Delaware Route 1. This journey includes the Roth Bridge, the tolled sections past Middletown and Dover and the rural portions until you get to Lewes. Once you hit Lewes, it’s a bunch of traffic lights and people that call themselves “locals”. Nowadays, it’s considered a relatively smooth trip. However, that wasn’t always the case.
Just this past week, on April 15th, Route 1 had an unsung milestone. DelDOT opened the northbound bridge/overpass carrying US 1 over Delaware Route 16 east of Milton. Now you may think that’s not a very big deal. They opened a bridge that had been under construction for a few years, so what? Normally, I’d agree, but this opening marks the elimination of all traffic lights on the 79-mile stretch of Route 1 between the Christiana Mall and Nassau Bridge outside of Lewes.
Delaware Route 1 was first designated in the 1970’s, combining various existing roads. In 1987, the Relief Route of US 13 was proposed to, as the name suggests, alleviate congestion on US 13. This major push resulted in the construction of the Roth Bridge and the tolled stretch of highway from the bridge to Dover. The process of converting both signal-controlled and at-grade intersections into interchanges throughout the rest of the route has been ongoing for roughly 15 years. Construction has been slow and steady, to the point that people traveling to the beach only a couple of times a year probably didn’t even notice the change.
In total, 36 signalized intersections along the 79-mile stretch of road have been eliminated. Seemingly, for every traffic light removed, they have added one to the stretch of Route 1 between Lewes and Dewey. I kid, I kid. Even so, if you ever find yourself driving to Delaware, perhaps for the NASCAR races at Dover on May 16th and 17th, take a second to appreciate the journey made possible by some engineer who just wanted to get to the beach faster 40 years ago.
