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- The State Trunkline Highway System consists of all the state highways in Michigan, including those designated as Interstate, United States Numbered (US Highways), or State Trunkline highways. In their abbreviated format, these classifications are applied to highway numbers with an I-, US, or M- prefix, respectively. The system is maintained by the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) and comprises 9,669 miles (15,561 km) of trunklines in all 83 counties of the state on both the Upper and Lower peninsulas (UP, LP), which are linked by the Mackinac Bridge. Components of the system range in scale from 10-lane urban freeways with local-express lanes to two-lane rural undivided highways to a non-motorized highway on Mackinac Island where cars are forbidden. The longest highway is nearly 400 miles (640 km) long, while the shortest is about three-quarters of a mile (about 1.2 km). Some roads are unsigned highways, lacking signage to indicate their maintenance by MDOT; these may be remnants of highways that are still under state control whose designations were decommissioned or roadway segments left over from realignment projects. Predecessors to today's modern highways include the foot trails used by Native Americans in the time before European settlement. Shortly after the creation of the Michigan Territory in 1805, the new government established the first road districts. The federal government aided in the construction of roads to connect population centers in the territory. At the time, road construction was under the control of the township and county governments. The state government was briefly involved in roads until prohibited by a new constitution in 1850. Private companies constructed plank roads and charged tolls. Local township roads were financed and constructed through a statute labor system that required landowners to make improvements in lieu of taxes. Countywide coordination of road planning, construction and maintenance was enacted in the late 19th century. In the early 20th century, the constitutional prohibition on state involvement in roads was removed. The Michigan State Highway Department (MSHD) was created in 1905, and the department paid counties and townships to improve roads to state standards. On May 13, 1913, the State Reward Trunk Line Highways Act was passed, creating the State Trunkline Highway System. The MSHD assigned internal highway numbers to roads in the system, and in 1919, the numbers were signposted along the roads and marked on maps. The US Highway System was created in 1926, and highways in Michigan were renumbered to account for the new designations. Legislation in the 1930s consolidated control of the state trunklines in the state highway department. During the 1940s, the first freeways were built in Michigan. With the introduction of the Interstate Highway system in the 1950s, the state aborted an effort to build the Michigan Turnpike, a tolled freeway in the southeast corner of the LP. Construction on Michigan's Interstates started in the latter part of that decade and continued until 1992. During that period, several freeways were canceled in the 1960s and 1970s, while others were delayed or modified over environmental and political concerns. Since 1992, few additional freeways have been built, and in the early years of the 21st century, projects are underway to bypass cities with new highways. (en)
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- The State Trunkline Highway System consists of all the state highways in Michigan, including those designated as Interstate, United States Numbered (US Highways), or State Trunkline highways. In their abbreviated format, these classifications are applied to highway numbers with an I-, US, or M- prefix, respectively. The system is maintained by the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) and comprises 9,669 miles (15,561 km) of trunklines in all 83 counties of the state on both the Upper and Lower peninsulas (UP, LP), which are linked by the Mackinac Bridge. Components of the system range in scale from 10-lane urban freeways with local-express lanes to two-lane rural undivided highways to a non-motorized highway on Mackinac Island where cars are forbidden. The longest highway is nearly (en)
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