page_title: New York State Route 5
section_title: Designation
hierarchical_section_title: New York State Route 5 / History / Designation
caption_attribution_description: A westbound New York State Route 5 reassurance shield in Williamsville.
context_page_description: New York State Route 5 is a state highway that extends for 370.80 miles across the state of New York in the United States. It begins at the Pennsylvania state line in the Chautauqua County town of Ripley and passes through Buffalo, Syracuse, Utica, Schenectady, and several other smaller cities and communities on its way to downtown Albany in Albany County, where it terminates at U.S. Route 9, here routed along the service roads for Interstate 787. Prior to the construction of the New York State Thruway, it was one of two main east–west highways traversing upstate New York, the other being US 20. West of New York, NY 5 continues as Pennsylvania Route 5 to Erie.
  NY 5 overlaps with US 20 twice along its routing. The second, a 68-mile overlap through western and central New York, is the second-longest concurrency in the state, stretching from Avon east to the city of Auburn in Cayuga County. The concurrency is known locally as "Routes 5 and 20". As the route proceeds across the state, it also directly or indirectly meets every major north–south highway in upstate New York, including all three north–south Interstate Highways.
context_section_description: The improvement of the road from Buffalo southwest to Pennsylvania in the mid-19th century soon allowed for continuous travel across the entire state of New York. With the advent of the automobile, the state began to take over and pave major thoroughfares at the beginning of the 20th century. In 1908, the state legislature created a statewide system of unsigned legislative routes. One of the routes assigned at this time was Route 6, an Albany–Buffalo highway that followed the path of the Genesee Road and the Seneca Turnpike from Buffalo to Utica, the Mohawk Turnpike between Utica and Schenectady, and the Albany and Schenectady Turnpike from Schenectady to Albany. From Auburn to Chittenango, Route 6 utilized most of the newer, northern branch of the Seneca Turnpike.
  The automobile allowed people to quickly travel long distances and a way to mark routes became needed. One early means of marking routes was the establishment of various auto trail associations in the 1910s. These associations selected good quality roads and marked them with symbols or colors on telephone poles. Most of legislative Route 6 eventually became part of the Yellowstone Trail, a cross-country auto trail established in 1912 that ran from Washington to Massachusetts. In New York, the trail used modern US 20 from Pennsylvania to Silver Creek, most of modern NY 5 from Silver Creek to Albany, and modern US 20 again from Albany to Massachusetts.
  In 1924, following what other states did, New York began to assign route numbers to its main thoroughfares. The Albany to Buffalo portion of the Yellowstone Trail, which ran through the cities of Syracuse and Utica, was assigned the number NY 5A. The portion of the Yellowstone Trail southwest of Buffalo and east of Albany became part of NY 5, which bypassed Syracuse and Utica to the south. The Buffalo to Albany portion of NY 5's original alignment used a new road, Broadway Road, from Buffalo to Avon and the old Cherry Valley Turnpike alignment from Skaneateles to Albany. In between Avon and Skaneateles, NY 5 and NY 5A overlapped.
  By 1926, however, the Buffalo to Albany section of NY 5 was relocated onto the Genesee Road alignment, replacing NY 5A. NY 5's former, more southerly alignment was redesignated as NY 7. In 1927, the establishment of the U.S. Highway System created more numbering changes. US 20, which mainly followed the Yellowstone Trail elsewhere in the country, was designated in New York along NY 5 southwest of Hamburg and east of Albany and along old NY 7 from Skaneateles to Albany. Between the towns of Hamburg and Avon, the new US 20 used an even more southerly alignment, running via East Aurora and Warsaw. This truncated both ends of NY 5 to Athol Springs (south of Buffalo in the town of Hamburg) in the west, and to Albany in the east.
  In the 1930 state highway renumbering, NY 5 was truncated even further to begin in downtown Buffalo. The portion between Buffalo and Athol Springs was assigned as part of NY 62. Southwest of Buffalo, Southwestern Boulevard, an alternate route of US 20 between Irving and Big Tree (east of Athol Springs) became NY 20B. Further southwest, another alternate route of US 20 between the Pennsylvania line and Silver Creek, running along the shore of Lake Erie, was designated as NY 20A. The NY 20A and NY 20B designations proved to be short-lived. US 62 was extended into New York c. 1932, causing NY 62 to be renumbered. Around the same time, US 20 was realigned to follow NY 20B from Irving to Big Tree. NY 5 was extended along part of old NY 62 to Athol Springs, from where it continued to the Pennsylvania state line by way of US 20's old routing to Irving and all of NY 20A.
caption: Reassurance marker on NY 5 in Williamsville
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