Quote Originally Posted by Gannon View Post
The Davison doesn't get the respect it should...isn't it the oldest mile of highway in the country?! I know it would change things at street level, but it really should run straight through to I-96. It'd make rush hour a wee bit easier in that crush of I-94 between I-75 and I-96.
Actually, that was planned. Much of the land was acquired, and many houses and commercial buildings were torn down in the '70s along Davison between the Lodge and the Jeffries right-of-way. Davison was widened out west of Livernois and a big spur was built [[that is still in use today) from the Jeffries to connect to the anticipated Davison Freeway extension.

Construction was supposed to start soon after the Jeffries was opened in the late '70s. However, freeway construction was falling out of favor by then and money to build them was drying up, so the project was shelved. For a few years thereafter that section of Davison remained torn up and surrounded by muddy lots and a few holdout homes and businesses, but eventually it became the corridor of strip malls, fast food, and gas stations that you see today.

The Davison Freeway was also supposed to be extended eastward from the Chrysler to an interchange with another freeway coming up the east side that was never built [[which was also supposed to connect to that Gratiot spur of the Fisher Freeway). That's why it runs past the Chrysler and ends abruptly and mysteriously around Conant.