A brief history of Highway 89 through Layton

                  Highway 89 at Oak Hills Drive in Layton City.

HIGHWAY 89 (“U.S. 89”) in Layton is one of its main traffic arteries, second only to I-15.

However, what is this important road’s history?

Early settlers and perhaps even Native Americans had a trail along the mountainside, approximately where Highway 89 is today.

There was also a dirt road corridor through the area in the early 20^th Century. Highway 89 was constructed through Layton in the mid to late 1930s. This was part of a plan to have the road span from the Mexican border to the Canadian border – and traverse Yellowstone National Park.

However, the Layton area was part of a State of Utah dispute involving this federal highway. Federal highway officials want to place Highway 89 on or near Highway 91 between Spanish fork and Logan. In the end, the resolution placed U.S. 89 apart from U.S. 91 in only two places – between Farmington and Ogden and between Brigham City and Cache Valley (today’s SR-38).

In the late 1950s, this two-lane road was widened to four lanes and for some three decades was ahead of the curve in traffic capacity for the area. Highway 89 traverses about 4.3 miles through the east side of Layton City today.

                        Highway 89 through Layton City.

However, when plans were being made in the early 1960s for Interstate 15 construction, the Ogden Chamber of Commerce lobbied to make Highway 89 the freeway option from Farmington to Ogden. After all, that offered the most direct access to Ogden City and Weber State College.

However, an independent study found that it would be much more expensive to construct I-15 there along the mountain. And, the western route had better access to the military installations in the area.

Traffic signals were eventually added along Highway 89 through Layton, starting in the 1990s. The “Hill Field” interchange at U-193 and Highway 89 was constructed in the mid 1990s.

SOURCES: Deseret News Archives, Ogden Standard-Examiner Archives.