Originally Posted by
EastsideAl
Pontiac6000 is correct that Houston-Whittier was originally just plain Houston. The family of an uncle-by-marriage of mine owned a music store on Houston, which was a busy business street. He told me that in the early '50s when the city was tweaking streets on the east side to make traffic flow more smoothly, as part of a traffic 'rationalization' plan around the opening of the new Ford Freeway, Whittier was shifted a bit so it joined directly with Houston at Kelly Rd and Hayes. The city wanted to change the name of Houston to Whittier all the way to Gratiot, so it would be apparent that you could drive straight from there to the Ford Fwy, Harper, Outer Dr., and Grosse Pointe.
But the business owners along Houston objected to the name change, and so as a compromise the city agreed to temporarily rename Houston as Houston-Whittier. Over the years the temporary name change seems to have become permanent