page_title: Interstate 10 in Texas
section_title: Houston and East Texas
hierarchical_section_title: Interstate 10 in Texas / History / Houston and East Texas
caption_attribution_description: English: Orange County, Texas county line / Texas state line with Louisiana at the Interstate 10 bridge over the Sabine River. View from the westbound lane of Interstate 10, looking southwest. This photograph was taken with an iPhone 6 mobile phone and edited (color balance, saturation, brightness and contrast) using ArcSoft Photostudio 5.5
context_page_description: Interstate 10 is the major east–west Interstate Highway in the Southern United States. In the U.S. state of Texas, it runs east from Anthony, at the border with New Mexico, through El Paso, San Antonio and Houston to the border with Louisiana in Orange, Texas. At just under 880 miles, the Texas segment of I-10, maintained by the Texas Department of Transportation, is the longest continuous untolled freeway in North America that is operated by a single authority. It is also the longest stretch of Interstate Highway with a single designation within a single state. Mile marker 880 and its corresponding exit number in Orange, Texas, are the highest numbered mile marker and exit on any freeway in North America. After widening was completed in 2008, a portion of the highway west of Houston is now also believed to be the widest in the world, at 26 lanes when including feeders.
  More than a third of I-10's entire length is located in Texas alone. El Paso, near the Texas–New Mexico state line, is 785 miles from the western terminus of I-10 in Santa Monica, California, making it closer to Los Angeles than it is to Orange, Texas, 857 miles away at the Texas–Louisiana state line.
context_section_description: When constructed during the 1960s, the I-10 Katy from Houston, known as the Katy Freeway, was built with six to eight lanes wide barring side lanes, being modest by Houston standards because existing traffic demand to the farming area of West Houston was relatively low. As the population and economic activity increased in the area vehicular traffic increased, reaching an annual average daily traffic (AADT) of 238,000 vehicles just west of the West Loop in 2001.
  In 2000, increased traffic levels and congestion led to plans being approved for widening of the freeway to 16 lanes with a capacity for 200,000 cars per day. An old railway running along the north side of the freeway was demolished in 2002 in preparation for construction which began in 2004. The interior two lanes in each direction between SH 6 and west I-610, the Katy Freeway Managed Lanes or Katy Tollway, were built as high-occupancy toll lanes and are managed by the Harris County Toll Road Authority. The section just west of SH 6 to the Fort Bend–Harris county line opened in late June 2006. Two intersections were rebuilt (Beltway 8 and I-610), toll booths were added, together with landscaping as part of Houston's Highway Beautification Project. Most of the section between Beltway 8 and SH 6 had been laid by September 2006 and work was completed in October 2008.
  Tolls on the managed lanes vary by vehicle occupancy, axle count and time of day. High occupancy vehicles may travel for free at certain times.
  Severe flooding of the Sabine River occurred in March 2016. Days of continuous heavy rains, coupled with the controversial opening of the Toledo Bend Dam and the release of 207,000 to 208,000 cubic feet per second (5,900 to 5,900 m³/s) into the river, caused the closing of I-10. The water level in Deweyville rose to 130-year record heights prompting a joint decision by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) and the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (LaDOTD) to close I-10 for four days near Orange.
  Much of Interstate 10 between Houston and Beaumont was shut down in late August 2017 as Hurricane Harvey inundated the Houston and East Texas area with record rainfall.
caption: The Texas–Louisiana state line as seen from I-10
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