Missoula’s South Avenue of old
Posted By admin on March 21, 2011
It wasn’t always a straight shot down South from the Missoula County Fairgrounds to Fort Missoula. (Come to think about it, it’s STILL not, what with the rerouting of traffic at Malfunction Junction.)
Local roads sleuth Jim Habeck dug up this from the Missoula-Sentinel archives. It’s dated Oct. 28, 1930, and it begs the question how exactly one did travel from the generally unpopulated area around the fairgrounds to the Fort.
Headlined “Fort Missoula Road Finished by County,” the two-paragraph story noted, “One of the most valuable improvements of the roads in the vicinity of Missoula has been the recent completion of the South avenue project by the county commissioners. This road extends from the fairgrounds west to the Fort Missoula entrance.
“A great deal of work was done on this section of highway, which is about a mile long. Previously the road followed the rolling contour of the country, but now has been graded level. Curves have also been eliminated and the road is now a mile-long straightaway. All the fort traffic follows this highway.”
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