Grizzly Creek Rest Area

The Grizzly Creek Rest Area along Interstate 70 in Colorado, just east of Glenwood Springs.

• Rest Areas

From Vision to Reality

Glenwood Canyon has been a critical link in the nation’s ground transportation network ever since the completion of the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad in 1887 Later, Taylor State Road, a continuous wagon road between Denver and Grand Junction, opened to automobile traffic in 1902. Improvements to the highway occurred when it was renamed U.S. Highway and 24 in 1936. When President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1960 signed the National Highway Bill authorizing the construction of Interstate 70.

Glenwood Canyon was proposed as part of the transcontinental route. Not until 1975, however, did the canyon officially become a link in the 1-70-corridor. Then came the long planning, design.
and construction phases-a process that took nearly twenty years. These panels

A Promise Made

The process of planning and designing the new highway through Glenwood Canyon was lengthy, intense and public. Designers were especially challenged to create model graphics that would realistically depict the finished product. They did this by using artists renderings, sophisticated computer simulations. and actual models. Designers walked every foot of the canyop many times and literally adjusted the location of the road by inches to save a tree or keep from blasting a cliff face. It was this personal commitment excellence and attention to detalk that ulti- mately gave the people-what they wanted- the best that can be accomplished in highway design and construction.