page_title: California State Route 480
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: California State Route 480 / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Interstates in today's terms I-80 I-280 (not connected to I-80) I-480 (only partly built and later demolished) I-580 (south of I-80) I-680 (part became I-780)
context_page_description: State Route 480 was a state highway in San Francisco, California, United States, consisting of the elevated double-decker Embarcadero Freeway, the partly elevated Doyle Drive approach to the Golden Gate Bridge and the proposed and unbuilt section in between. The unbuilt section from Doyle Drive to Van Ness Avenue was to have been called the Golden Gate Freeway and the Embarcadero Freeway as originally planned would have extended from Van Ness along the north side of Bay Street and then along the Embarcadero to the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.
  The Embarcadero Freeway, which had only been constructed from Broadway along the Embarcadero to the Bay Bridge, was demolished after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and Doyle Drive is now part of U.S. Route 101. SR 480 was Interstate 480, an auxiliary route of the Interstate Highway System, from 1955 to 1965. The entire route was removed in 1991, approximately two years after the earthquake.
context_section_description: Legislative Route 224 (LR 224) was defined in 1947 to connect U.S. Route 101 (US 101, pre-1964 Legislative Route 2) at the intersection of Lombard Street and Van Ness Avenue with US 40 and US 50 (pre-1964 Legislative Route 68) at the west end of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge (near the Transbay Terminal). Its alignment was roughly along Lombard Street and the Embarcadero.
  LR 224, as well as Route 2 (US 101) from Route 224 west to the junction with SR 1 near the Golden Gate Bridge, was added to the Interstate Highway System on September 15, 1955. This included the 1936 Doyle Drive, an early freeway built to access the Golden Gate Bridge. After some discussion, the I-480 number was assigned on November 10, 1958. (I-280, as originally planned, ran south from the west end of I-480 along SR 1, through the MacArthur Tunnel and Golden Gate Park, to join its present alignment in Daly City.)
  The original 1955 plan was to extend the Central Freeway as a double decked structure between Van Ness Avenue and Polk Street north to Clay Street, then as a single deck depressed freeway north to Broadway, where it would have tunneled under Russian Hill to connect with I-480.
  The first section of the Embarcadero Freeway, from the Bay Bridge approach (I-80) north to Broadway, opened in 1959 (the Clay Street and Washington Street ramps opened around 1965). The freeway revolt caused the San Francisco Board of Supervisors to pass Resolution 45–59 in January 1959, opposing certain freeways, including the remainder of I-480. The freeway revolt continued after a new freeway plan was proposed in 1964, with a major protest on May 17, 1964—200,000 people rallied in Golden Gate Park against any more new freeways. Poet Kenneth Rexroth spoke at the rally (among others), and folk singer Malvina Reynolds sang (she was most famous for her song "Little Boxes", attacking urban sprawl, which she sang at the anti-freeway rally).
  The proposed section as replanned in 1964 would have extended not from the Lombard Street exit of Doyle Drive along Lombard Street as originally planned in 1955, but from the Marina Boulevard exit off Doyle Drive, through the Marina Green and then along the north side of Fort Mason, then along the north side of Bay Street to the Embarcadero and south along the Embarcadero to connect with the Embarcadero Freeway. The section between the Golden Gate Bridge (including an upgraded Doyle Drive) and Van Ness Ave. would have been named the Golden Gate Freeway; the rest of the freeway east of Van Ness Avenue would have been the extended originally planned full length of the Embarcadero Freeway, originally planned to extend from Van Ness Avenue to the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge—going east first down the north side of Bay Street, then going southeast curving around the base of Telegraph Hill and meeting at Broadway the former end of the actually built section of the Embarcadero Freeway.
  In the 1964 renumbering, Route 480 was designated for the full route of I-480, including the US 101 concurrency. The route was deleted from the Interstate Highway System in January 1968, and I-280 was rerouted north of Daly City at the same time. The short piece of former I-480 from the junction with new I-280 (previously SR 87) south to the Bay Bridge approach became part of I-280 (to allow I-280 to meet I-80), now named the Southern Embarcadero Freeway. These changes were made to the state highway system in 1968; Route 480 was truncated only slightly, with the 5.47 miles (8.80 km) from I-280 to SR 1 remaining, though downgraded to SR 480; this extension of I-280 south (the Junipero Serra Freeway) is considered the southern terminus of Junipero Serra Boulevard.
caption: 1955 map of the planned Interstates in the San Francisco Bay Area. I-480 would have run along the north side of the city, while I-280 would run south along the peninsula. I-80 was to have run past the east end of I-480 to end at I-280.
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