The Columbia River Highway, known today as the "Historic Columbia River Highway," was a technical and civic achievement of its time, successfully mixing sensitivity to the Columbia River Gorge's magnificent landscape with ambitious engineering. Constructed from 1913 to 1922, the 74-mile road extended east from the Sandy River, near Troutdale, to The Dalles.

Entrepreneur and Good Roads promoter Samuel Hill teamed up with engineer and landscape architect Samuel C. Lancaster to create an engineering achievement sympathetic to the natural landscape. Their highway made the Columbia River Gorge's idyllic natural setting accessible to tourists without unduly marring its beauty. They patterned it after the roads of western Europe and the British Isles.

The Columbia River Highway is an outstanding example of modern highway development in twentieth-century America for its pioneering advances in road design. These include the adherence to grade and curve standards, comprehensive curb and drainage systems, dry and mortared masonry walls, reinforced-concrete bridges, tunnels, and asphaltic concrete pavement--all on a rural, mountain road during the formative years of modern highway building in the United States.

Construction began after Hill and other enthusiasts convinced the Multnomah County Commission and the state legislature that the route was important as part of a new state highway system. Multnomah County raised revenue through bonds. Later, federal aid and Oregon fuel tax proceeds provided funds to complete the highway in Hood River and Wasco counties. Ultimately, the road through the Gorge became part of a longer Columbia River Highway that stretched from the Oregon Coast to Pendleton, where it connected with the "Old Oregon Trail Highway."

With the Columbia River Highway, Lancaster believed that he was opening up the Columbia Gorge's "hidden waterfalls and mountain crags, dark fern coves, and all else" for all to enjoy. He was so taken by Multnomah Falls, some 30 miles east of Portland, that his words seem to erupt from his heart and soul. "It is pleasing to look upon in every mood," he wrote, "it charms like magic, it woos like an ardent lover; it refreshes the soul; and invites to loftier, purer things." Lancaster believed that "if the road is completed according to plans, it will rival if not surpass anything to be found in the civilized world."

By the 1930s, Lancaster's "King of Roads" had difficulty meeting increasing traffic demands. Engineers designed a new, curvilinear water-level route to bypass much of the old highway. Two lanes were completed to The Dalles by 1953. The designers preserved the Columbia River Highway's western segment, from the Sandy River to Ainsworth, for visitors to its waterfalls, hiking trails, and scenic vistas, and an eastern segment from Mosier to The Dalles through orchard country and plateau. Although they could not save major portions of the old highway from Cascade Locks to Hood River, they were pleased that they could preserve its views. By 1970, two additional lanes and interchanges transformed the new route into a modern freeway, initially designated as Interstate 80N and later renamed Interstate 84.

In 1981, prompted by local, state, and federal agencies and private citizens, the National Park Service brought together a group of professionals to study the Columbia River Highway. They produced two important documents that offered guidance for the road's maintenance, conservation, and reuse. A year later, destruction of the highway's Hood River Bridge sparked a groundswell of support for saving the rest of the route for future generations.

In 1983, the road and associated designed landscapes were listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The state of Oregon, through its Department of Transportation, became proactive in preserving and restoring the highway's historic features. Since then, the major drivable portions have received much-needed repair. Many abandoned segments were reopened for bicycle and pedestrian use as the "Historic Columbia River Highway State Trail." The capstone of this effort was the rehabilitation of the Mosier Twin Tunnels and the 4.5-mile segment between Hood River and Mosier.

In 1984, the American Society of Civil Engineers designated the highway as a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. In 1999, it became a National Scenic Byway-All American Road. In 2000, much of the road and trail segments received its highest acclaim--designation as a National Historic Landmark. This status recognizes the highway as a truly significant national heritage resource, principally because a decade after its initial completion, the National Park Service made Lancaster's design standards the cornerstone of its "Lying Lightly on the Land" philosophy for future national park roads and trails.

Robert W. Hadlow
Robert Hadlow is a historian with the Oregon Department of Transportation and the author of Elegant Arches, Soaring Spans: C.B. McCullough, Oregon’s Master Bridge Builder. His current project is on the history of the Columbia River Highway.

Sources

Fahl, Ronald J., “S. C. Lancaster and the Columbia River Highway: Engineer as Conservationist,� Oregon Historical Quarterly 74, no. 2 (June 1973): 101-44.

Hadlow, Robert W. “Columbia River Highway Historic District, National Historic Landmark Nomination.� Portland: Oregon Department of Transportation, 2000.

Hadlow, Robert W. “The Columbia River Highway: America's First Scenic Road.� Journal of the Society for Commercial Archeology 18, no. 1 (Spring 2000): 14-25.