Old Redwood Highway Historic District: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Redwood National and State Parks

McCardle, Kevin; others

The Old Redwood Highway Historic District consists of formerly designated highway segments totaling 25.6 miles, in two non-contiguous locations within Redwood National and State Parks. Two segments of approximately 5 ½ miles are listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The segments of former highway have mixed conditions including paved roads and hiking trails in good condition to roads buried and undermined by landslide. The road is significant at the state level under Criterion A for its association to transportation and early highway construction in the state of California and Criterion C for its construction and design techniques, with a period of significance of 1919 to 1930. The original Redwood Highway was first designated Route 1 and conceived of in the late 19th century as a state road that would connect Sausalito to the remote redwood forests along the coast of California and on to Oregon. Construction began in 1909 at Sausalito and was California’s first state-funded route. It took until 1920 to make a “passable” route to Eureka and until 1926 to overcome the final major barrier at the Klamath River when a bridge was built. South of Del Norte County in what became Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, the county road was still the “passable” route until 1928 when the final segment of the Old Redwood Highway was constructed and later paved in 1930. The highway was initially embraced by both commercial interests as a route for timber and commerce; and by conservationists who saw the highway as a means to expose more people to the beauty of the tall trees, and a means to preserve corridors of forests found along the new scenic highway. These duel interests became increasingly at odds as automobile technology rapidly developed in the 1920s, uniform highway standards were adopted, and roads increasingly needed to accommodate faster traffic and larger vehicles. California passed a highway transportation bill in 1952 intended to modernize the Redwood Highway to contemporary standards.

Old Redwood Highway Historic District: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Redwood National and State Parks

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