Interstate 95

Interstate 95
Route information
Existed	1957–present
Location
Major cities	Jacksonville, Savannah, Richmond, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, New Haven, Providence, Boston, Portland
Interstate Highway system

Interstate 95 (abbreviated I-95) is an interstate highway that runs 1907 miles (3070 kilometers) north-south along the east coast of the United States. The southern terminus is in the city of Miami, Florida (Map); the northern terminus is at the Canadian border at Houlton, Maine (Map), where it becomes New Brunswick Highway 95.

Interstate 95 is one of the most well-known, most important, and heaviest travelled highways in the Interstate system. It serves and connects the major cities along the Northeast corridor, and it is the major north-south highway along the east coast. It is the longest north-south Interstate highway (five east-west routes are longer), and it passes through the most states (15) of any Interstate.

Length

Miles	km	state
382.170	615.04	Florida
112	181	Georgia
199	322	South Carolina
182	295	North Carolina
179	290	Virginia
0.02	0.03	Washington, DC
110	178	Maryland
23	37	Delaware
51	83	Pennsylvania
77.96	125.5	New Jersey (main route) (see note)
8.77	14.1	New Jersey (north of Trenton)
11.03	17.8	New Jersey (NJ Turnpike west alignment)
24	39	New York
112	181	Connecticut
42	68	Rhode Island
92	149	Massachusetts
16	26	New Hampshire
305	491	Maine1
1924	3117	Total

¹: (up from 298 miles [484 km] due to realignment along old Interstate 495 and the remainder of the Maine Turnpike)

Major cities along the route

File:Interstate95 map.png

Location of Interstate 95

From South to North:

• Miami, Florida
• Fort Lauderdale, Florida
• Jacksonville, Florida
• Richmond, Virginia
• Washington, D.C.
• Baltimore, Maryland
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• Newark, New Jersey
• New York City, New York
• New Haven, Connecticut
• Providence, Rhode Island
• Boston, Massachusetts
• Portland, Maine (downtown no longer directly served by I-95 which bypasses in the same manner as it does Boston; Interstate 295 now serves city center)

Intersections with other Interstates

From south to north:

• Interstate 4 in Daytona Beach, Florida (Map)
• Interstate 10 in Jacksonville, Florida (Map)
• Interstate 16 in Savannah, Georgia (Map)
• Interstate 26 near Harleyville, South Carolina (Map)
• Interstate 20 in Florence, South Carolina (Map)
• Interstate 40 in Benson, North Carolina (Map)
• Interstate 85 in Petersburg, Virginia (Map)
• Interstate 64 for 4 miles (6.4 km) in Richmond, Virginia (Map)
• Interstate 76 (east) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Map)
• Interstate 78 in Newark, New Jersey (Map)
• Interstate 80 in Teaneck, New Jersey (Map)
• Interstate 87 in New York City, New York (Map)
• Interstate 91 in New Haven, Connecticut (Map)
• Interstate 93 in Canton, Massachusetts (Map)
• Interstate 90 in Weston, Massachusetts (Map)
• Interstate 93 in Woburn, Massachusetts (Map)

Spur routes

• Miami, Florida - I-195, I-395
• Fort Lauderdale, Florida - I-595
• Jacksonville, Florida - I-295, future I-795
• Fayetteville, North Carolina - future I-295
• Richmond, Virginia - I-195, I-295, defunct I-795, VA 895
• Washington, D.C. area - defunct I-195, I-295, I-395, I-495, unsigned I-595 in Maryland, defunct I-595 in Virginia, I-695
• Baltimore, Maryland - I-195, I-395, defunct I-595, I-695, I-795, I-895
• Wilmington, Delaware - I-495, defunct I-895
• Wilmington, Delaware to Trenton, New Jersey, eventually turning south towards Philadelphia, PA - I-295
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - defunct I-695, defunct I-895
• Spur to New Jersey shore points - I-195
• Northern New Jersey - defunct I-695
• Western spur of New Jersey Turnpike - Route 95W (signed for I-95 through traffic, while the older eastern spur, technically I-95, is signed for the exits along it, and only as I-95 from intersecting roads)
• New York, New York - I-295, I-495, I-695, I-895
• Connecticut Turnpike/Spur to Worcester, Massachusetts - I-395
• Providence, Rhode Island - I-195, I-295, defunct I-895
• Boston, Massachusetts - I-495, defunct I-695
• Saco, Maine - I-195
• Portland, Maine to Gardiner, Maine - I-295
• Falmouth, Maine spur - former I-95/I-295 connector - unsigned I-495
• Bangor, Maine - I-395

Tolls

Portions of the highway have or used to have tolls:

• Fuller Warren Bridge (defunct)
• Trout River Bridge (defunct)
• Richmond-Petersburg Turnpike (defunct)
• Fort McHenry Tunnel (Baltimore)
• John F. Kennedy Memorial Highway (Maryland)
• Delaware Turnpike
• Pennsylvania Turnpike (after interchange completed in 2009[1])
• New Jersey Turnpike
• George Washington Bridge
• New England Thruway
• Connecticut Turnpike (defunct)
• New Hampshire Turnpike
• Maine Turnpike

Notes

• The highway's spurs have set three records. I-95 has the most child highways of any interstate. There are soon to be eight separate I-295s, making this designation used for the most number of highways. Also, six I-695s were planned, but postponed or never built, setting another record.

• I-95 generally parallels US 1 for its entire route, although in some places they are over 100 miles apart. For example, US 1 goes through Raleigh, North Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina and Augusta, Georgia, three cities that are not served by I-95. Also, the southern part of I-95 (Miami, FL to Trenton, NJ) has both ends at US 1; however, this is planned on being changed with the re-routing of I-95 onto the Pennsylvania Turnpike to interchange 6 on the New Jersey Turnpike.

• The Miami hip-hop group 95 South is named after this highway.

• The highway was known as a drug route and was nicknamed Cocaine Alley.

• East-West spur on FL 528 travels between Orlando and Cape Canaveral, Florida; location of Kennedy Space Center

• There are two unsigned spur routes from the Washington area. I-695 is an unsigned route that connects I-395 and I-295; and I-595 to Annapolis is better known as US 50/301. (There is another I-695 not too far to the north, a full beltway around Baltimore.)

• Originally, I-95 was supposed to go through Washington, D.C. instead of around it. The section through the city was re-designated as I-395; it does not connect with I-95 at the northern end, but does at the southern end. The Baltimore-Washington Parkway is not an interstate, but if it were, it would have been I-295; the section not controlled by the National Park Service is designated MD 295, while the portion of the Anacostia Freeway in Washington not designated I-295 is DC 295 – the District's only "state highway". The Capital Beltway article has more about this stretch of highway.

• One portion of the Capital Beltway which is also Interstate 95, there is a very small portion at the Woodrow Wilson Bridge where the road actually crosses through an edge of the District of Columbia in the Potomac River. This small area is within the boundaries surveyed in straight lines when the District was carved out of Virginia and Maryland upon formation in 1790.

• The light towers along I-95 between the I-495 Capital Beltway and the Baltimore city line contain either mercury vapor or metal halide streetlights, both of which cast a soft white light. Once I-95 enters Baltimore, the light towers contain high-pressure sodium lights, which are bright orange. North of Baltimore, there are mercury vapor/metal halide towers at four more interchanges. Light towers are very common on Interstate highways, especially in urban areas, and most of them contain sodium lighting. They usually carry three or four lights, but some light towers can carry as many as 12.

• At eight lanes wide, the Fort McHenry Tunnel is among the widest underwater tunnels in the world. There are four tubes, each of them carrying two lanes.

• In Baltimore, two interstate highways (I-70 and I-83) were planned to intersect with I-95, but they were both cancelled, along with I-170 (which is now part of US 40). I-70 ends unceremoniously at a Park & Ride lot just before the Baltimore city line, and I-83 ends in the downtown district. Ramp stubs remain from both interchanges.

• Originally, a bridge, possibly a suspension bridge, was planned to carry I-95 over Baltimore Harbor, and a tunnel was planned for I-695. Opposition prevented the I-95 bridge from being built (because it would've blocked the view of the Baltimore skyline and Fort McHenry), and it switched positions with the I-695 tunnel, which had also been rejected. The two crossings became the Key Bridge for I-695, and the Fort McHenry Tunnel for I-95.

• The I-895 Harbor Tunnel Thruway in Baltimore intersects with I-95 at three different points. At one of those crossings (where the two Baltimore tunnels are located), there are no ramps between the Thruway and the I-95 freeway.

• I-395, a skyway into downtown Baltimore, was once considered the shortest three-digit Interstate route in the country.

• Also, an I-895 was planned to connect I-95 and I-295 south of Trenton, with the bridge over the Delaware River being a replacement of the Burlington-Bristol Bridge, making a complete loop of Trenton. This was never built, and the Pennsylvania Turnpike Extension would be the interstate in the area if a connection between it and I-295 were ever built.

• I-495 was supposed to link New Jersey and Long Island, but the portion across Manhattan was never built, and the New Jersey section of the freeway was downgraded to NJ 495.

• I-895 around Providence was also planned, but it was never built.

• I-95 in Massachusetts loops around Boston along Massachusetts State Highway 128. I-95 was supposed to go through Boston instead of around it but due to pressure from local residents, all proposed interstate highways within 128 were cancelled in 1972 by Governor Francis Sargent, the exception being the completion of Interstate 93 to Boston. The only section of I-95 completed within the 128 beltway by the Massachusetts Department of Transportation was part of the highway north of Boston to Saugus, called the Northeast Expressway which is now part of US 1. Between 1972 and 1974 plans were to extend I-95 along a northly extension of the Northeast Expressway to Route 128 in Danvers. During this time I-95 was officially routed along Route 128 from Canton to Braintree and along Massachusetts Route 3 from Braintree to intersection with the Northeast Expressway in Boston. When the extension was cancelled in 1974, I-95's route shifted to where it is today, along Route 128 and I-93 was extended to meet I-95 in Canton. Plans for the abandoned roadways can still be seen going from the end of the Northeast Expressway to the Saugus River in Saugus, Massachusetts and on the south end in Canton, there is an abandoned stretch north of the trumpet interchange at I-95 and I-93. From aerial photographs, the planned configuration of the junctions is apparent. [2]

• I-95 was recently rerouted in Maine. Before 2004, the Maine Turnpike between the Falmouth Spur (near Portland, Maine) and Gardiner, Maine was signed as I-495, and I-95 followed a free expressway parallel to the east. Now, the entire Maine Turnpike is signed as I-95, the old I-95 free highway between the Falmouth Spur and Gardiner has been resigned as an extension of I-295 from Portland, and I-495 now only exists as the secret designation for the short Falmouth Spur. The official reason for this change was "to avoid confusion." However, some point out that the new signage might be a ploy to encourage through traffic to use the toll Maine Turnpike instead of the slightly shorter parallel free expressway, and that busy traffic heading for much of the Maine coast must now change from I-95 to I-295 before exiting on US 1.

• Across the Canadian border near Houlton, Maine, I-95 continues in Canada as New Brunswick Highway 95. This is the one of two places where an Interstate and its Canadian extension have the same route number; the other is at the north end of Interstate 29. (However, both of these Canadian extensions are very short, less than ten miles in length, before connecting to another highway.)

Rerouting onto the Pennsylvania Turnpike Project

There is a gap in Interstate 95 in New Jersey, where local opposition groups managed to stop construction of the Somerset Freeway through the area. Heading northbound from Pennsylvania into Ewing Township (by Trenton, New Jersey), Interstate 95 abruptly ends at its intersection with US 1. From there, the highway is then signed as Interstate 295, and turns south. To continue on Interstate 95 northbound, one must travel south on Interstate 295 then east on Interstate 195 (or use a non-freeway section of US 1) in order to reach the northern section of the New Jersey Turnpike, which is signed as Interstate 95.

An interchange is currently being planed [3] with the Pennsylvania Turnpike to install a connection between the two highways. After Philadelphia, I-95 will turn on to the Pennsylvania Turnpike. It will then cross the Delaware River on a expanded bridge to the New Jersey Turnpike extension at exit 6. Users will then continue north on the New Jersey Turnpike, which is already designated Interstate 95. A flat-rate toll will be added before the bridge. This will complete I-95 from Miami, FL to Houlton, ME. Construction is expected to start in late 2006 or early 2007 and will cost approximately 500 million dollars.

Some highway mavens think that this will be an inadequate solution, and want the Somerset Freeway built; others want the entire main trunk of the New Jersey Turnpike designated as I-95, as that is where most of the traffic goes anyway; however, this would bypass Philadelphia.

Disasters

In January 1983, a truck with a brake failure slammed into a line of cars waiting to pay a toll on I-95 in Stratford, Connecticut. Seven people were killed and this accident prompted the state to remove tolls from its portion of I-95.

On the morning of June 28, 1983, a 100 ft (30 meter) section of the Mianus River Bridge in the Cos Cob section of Greenwich, Connecticut collapsed, plunging northbound I-95 traffic into the river below, killing three. The collapse was blamed on the failure of the steel pins to hold the horizontal beams together and inadequate inspection prior to the collapse. Northbound traffic was diverted on this section of I-95 for 25 days. Southbound traffic was unaffected.

On February 1, 2004, a tanker truck fell onto the northbound lanes of I-95 as it was entering the southbound side from the Harbor Tunnel Thruway in Howard County, Maryland, near Baltimore. The truck driver was killed, along with the occupants in additional vehicles traveling north on I-95 (including a pickup truck). The northbound lanes of I-95 were closed to traffic overnight, as cleanup crews cleared the highway of debris from the crash. It is believed that the truck fell onto I-95 while it was crossing the overpass marking the Thruway's southern terminus.

On March 26, 2004 a bridge on I-95 near Bridgeport, Connecticut was partly melted by the explosion of a tanker truck carrying over 45,000 liters (11,900 gallons) of fuel oil. Repairs were estimated to take at least two weeks, but the highway was opened to northbound traffic in only a few days. Southbound traffic resumed about a week later.

On the morning of July 25, 2005, a Philadelphia-bound Greyhound bus crashed and overturned on the rain-soaked lanes of northbound I-95 in Baltimore, Maryland, near the junction with US 40 in the eastern part of the city, before the junction with I-895. Fourteen people were seriously injured, although nobody died. Slick roads caused by an early-morning thunderstorm was blamed for the crash. The highway was closed in the northbound direction for hours.

State by state

Virginia

Interstate 95 approaching U.S. 1 in Alexandria, Virginia from the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

• Exit 177 - U.S. 1, Alexandria, Virginia - Last exit before Woodrow Wilson Bridge into the State of Maryland.

Maryland

The evocatively-named North East Rising Sun exit is a favorite sight of northbound travellers on I-95 in northern Maryland.

New Jersey

Main article: Interstate 95 in New Jersey

New York

• George Washington Bridge over the Hudson River from New Jersey into into New York County (Manhattan)
• Trans-Manhattan Expressway
• Alexander Hamilton Bridge over the Harlem River into the Bronx
• Cross-Bronx Expressway (I-295 after the I-95 portion)
• Bruckner Expressway (I-278 before the I-95 portion)
• New England Thruway through the remainder of the Bronx, all of Westchester, and into Connecticut

Connecticut

• Governor John Davis Lodge Turnpike (Connecticut Turnpike)
• Jewish War Veterans Memorial Highway

Rhode Island

Construction

Interstate 95 in Rhode Island was opened in sections between 1955 and 1969. The sections opened in this order:

Date Opened	Section
December 12, 1955	Connecticut State line to Exit 4
1956	Exit 27 to Exit 29
July, 1958	Exit 6 to Exit 8 For many years, this section was known as the Kent County Freeway.
June, 1963	Exit 29 to Massachusetts State line
September, 1963	Exit 18 to Exit 20
October, 1964	Exit 20 to Exit 23
November, 1965	Exit 23 to Exit 27
December, 1965	Exit 16 to Exit 18
November, 1968	Exit 8 to Exit 16
November 22, 1969	Exit 4 to Exit 6

Exits

Exit 1,
RI 3

Exit 2,
to RI 3

Exit 3,
RI 138

Exit 4, (Northbound only)
to RI 165

Exit 5,
RI 102 (Exeter/West Greenwich)

Exit 6,
RI 3 (Coventry/West Greenwich)

Exit 6a,
Hopkins Hill Road (Coventry/West Greenwich)

Exit 7,
New London Turn Pike (Coventry/ West Greenwich)

Exit 8a,(Northbound)
RI 2 South to RI 401/RI 4
Exit 8b, (Northbound)
RI 2 North
Exit 8, (SouthBound)
RI 2

Exit 9, (southbound Only)
RI 4 to RI 401

Exit 10, (North bound)
RI 117

Exit 10b,(Southbound)
RI 117 West
Exit 10a,(Southbound)
RI 117 East

Exit 11, (Northbound Only)
I-295North (used to access RI Mall, CCRI and Warwick mall)

Exit 12b, (Southbound Only)
I-295 North/ RI 113 West ( used to access RI Mall, CCRI, and Warwick Mall)
Exit 12/12a, (North/South)
RI 113 East to RI 5

Exit 13,
US 1, TF Green Airport

External links

• http://www.usastar.com/i95/homepage.htm

References

• 2005 Rand McNally "The Road Atlas 2005" - newest feature- interstate mileage by state
• FDOT GIS data
• NJDOT Straight Line Diagrams