page_title: Interstate 80 in California
section_title: Historic routing
hierarchical_section_title: Interstate 80 in California / History / Historic routing
caption_attribution_description: Historic U.S. 40 highway route sign — in Sacramento, California. Located at the intersection of Del Paso Blvd and Arden Way.
context_page_description: Interstate 80 is a transcontinental Interstate Highway in the United States, stretching from San Francisco, California, to Teaneck, New Jersey. The segment of I-80 in California runs east from San Francisco across the Bay Bridge to Oakland, where it turns north and crosses the Carquinez Bridge before turning back northeast through the Sacramento Valley. I-80 then traverses the Sierra Nevada, cresting at Donner Summit, before crossing into the state of Nevada within the Truckee River Canyon. The speed limit is at most 65 miles per hour along the entire route instead of the state's maximum of 70 mph and most of the route is in either urban areas or mountainous terrain. I-80 has portions designated as the Eastshore Freeway and Alan S. Hart Freeway.
  Throughout California, I-80 was built along the corridor of U.S. Route 40, eventually replacing this designation entirely. The prior US 40 corridor itself was built along several historic corridors in California, notably the California Trail and Lincoln Highway. The route has changed from the original plans in San Francisco due to freeway revolts canceling segments of the originally planned alignment.
context_section_description: In California I-80 was built along the line of, and eventually replaced, U.S. Route 40. The US 40 designation was eliminated in the state as part of the 1964 state highway renumbering. US 40 was one of the original California routes designed in 1926, although its west end was in Oakland, California with US 101E (then SR 17, then I-5W, now I-580/I-880) prior to the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge opening in 1936. An auto ferry ran from Berkeley to San Francisco, signed at the ferry landings for U.S. 40. After the Bay Bridge's construction, US 40, along with US 50, were extended along the bridge to connect with US 101.  The auto ferry service was then discontinued.
  US 40 and US 50 both followed the Bay Bridge and the routes split on what is the present day MacArthur Maze in Oakland, California. US 50 continued southeast on present-day I-580 to Stockton and US 40 closely followed the route of present-day I-80. When reaching Sacramento, California, US 40 and US 50 rejoined, US 50 running concurrently with former US 99 from Stockton to Sacramento. US 40 then again split with US 50 in Downtown Sacramento and closely followed the route of present-day Business I-80, which was I-80 from 1957 to 1981, when I-80 was realigned along former I-880, routing along what was then the outskirts of Sacramento. US 40 then closely followed I-80 through the Sierra Nevada Range into Nevada.
  A portion of old US 40 near Donner Lake is still intact and is an alternate route of I-80. It begins near Soda Springs and ends at Truckee, California. At one point, it travels right by Donner Lake, unlike I-80, which ascends higher in the Sierra Nevada Range north of historic US 40.
caption: A sign in California recognizing an old alignment of US 40
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