1940: One of Layton’s first highway battles

                                   Layton's Main Street near the Gentile Street intersection.

LAYTON has fought a number of significant highway battles over the decades.

One of the less reported such battles was in 1940, when the State of Utah wanted to run a new highway through Layton.

The preliminary proposal for this road was for it to be located east of the Bamberger railway (where today’s I-15 is found).

George Briggs, Layton Town Councilman, reported to the Ogden Standard-Examiner of April 17, 1940, that if the State used that route, it would miss Layton’s original business district completely.

That path was along a little used railway spur, next to the Bamberger line.

Briggs said a committee of Layton residents had appeared before Utah Governor Henry W. Blood to ask that the new road be rerouted right through the heart of Layton’s business district.

(That Layton lobby was successful and today’s Main Street though Layton is the result. Ironically, all of the former Bamberger railway right-of-way in Layton was later needed for I-125.)

                                                       Layton's Main Street in the 1920s.
                                                                   (Photo from the Heritage Museum of Layton's Collection.)