Early history Before Michigan became a state, the first land transportation corridors were the
Indian trails. The original
Mackinaw Trail ran roughly parallel to the route of the modern US 131 from east of Kalkaska to Petoskey. In the 19th century, the
Michigan Legislature chartered private companies to build and operate
plank roads or turnpikes in the state. These roads were originally made of oak planks, but later legislation permitted gravel as well. The companies were funded through the collection of tolls. The infrastructure was expensive to maintain, and often the turnpikes fell into disrepair as the wood warped and rotted away.
Mark Twain once commented that "the road could not have been bad if some unconscionable scoundrel had not now and then dropped a plank across it," after a trip on the Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids Plank Road. US 131 debuted along with the rest of the initial US Highway System on November 11, 1926, The northernmost section of the highway between
Fife Lake and Acme was not signposted in the field and the designation ended instead at Fife Lake, At the same time, the
Michigan State Highway Department (MSHD) redesignated the remainder of M-13, between Fife Lake and Petoskey, as
M-131. Public Act 131 of 1931 allowed the MSHD to take control over the city streets that carried state highways through cities in the state. Until this point, the City of Grand Rapids arbitrarily moved the route of state highways through the city on a regular basis. The department took control of a series of streets and fixed the routing of US 131 through the city after the passage of the act. The highway was shifted between Three Rivers and Constantine to the west side of the St. Joseph River in 1936. In late 1938 or early 1939, the MSHD extended US 131 northward over the southern section of M-131. After the changes US 131 turned eastward into Fife Lake and north to
Kalkaska and
Mancelona before ending in
Petoskey. This extension connected US 131 directly to its parent highway,
US 31, for the first time. By the end of the 1930s, the MSHD under the leadership of future governor
Murray Van Wagoner had shifted emphasis to a program of road improvements designed to make the state's roads "safer and smoother for burgeoning traffic volumes." In 1940, a new roadway was opened, completing the third side of a triangle between the junction with
M-113, Walton Corners and Fife Lake. US 131 was shifted to the new highway and the former routing along the other two sides of the triangle became part of M-113 and
M-186. A second realignment opened the following year between Fife Lake and Kalkaska. US 131 no longer turned east along Boardman Road between
South Boardman and
Lodi. Instead the MSHD rerouted the highway directly to the northeast, from the end of the previous new routing north of Fife Lake to Kalaska. By 1945, a
Bypass US 131 (Byp. US 131) was created around the south and east sides of Grand Rapids, following 28th Street and East Beltline Avenue, while the main highway continued to run through downtown unchanged. A decade later, mainline US 131 was rerouted around Grand Rapids over the former bypass route, and
Business US 131 (Bus. US 131) was created for the former route through downtown. A second
business loop was created in
Three Rivers, Michigan, after an expressway bypass of the city's downtown was opened in early 1954. Another expressway section was opened between Mancelona and the
M-32 junction west of
Elmira in late 1956.
Freeway conversion in 2015|alt=Aerial photograph of By the end of 1957, US 131 had been realigned as an expressway from the Three Rivers bypass to
Moorepark. The section of freeway in the Grand Rapids area opened near the southern county line north to 28th Street. This latter freeway segment was extended farther south to
Wayland by the middle of 1958. By the middle of 1960, the freeway was extended to
M-118 in
Martin, where traffic used M-118 to connect back to the old routing. The southern end of US 131 was moved to another location on the state line. Instead of running concurrently with
US 112 between
White Pigeon and
Mottville, US 131 ran directly south of White Pigeon to the state line. In the process, the
M-103 designation was swapped with US 131. The MSHD had proposed that the section of US 131 south of Kalamazoo be built as an
electronic highway under a bid through
General Motors the same year; the testing for such a roadway was ultimately done at
Ohio State University instead. Another project, through the end of 1961, extended the freeway south to
Plainwell and north into downtown Grand Rapids. This extension was designated as part of Bus. US 131 and opened in December 1961. The opening ceremony for the bridge across the
Grand River included the state highway commission and the then-Miss Michigan, pulled by a team of sled dogs, to lead the first traffic over the river. On December 17, 1962, the freeway through downtown Grand Rapids was completed, including the section marked as
I-296. The business loop was removed from the freeway when US 131 took its place. East Beltline Avenue was renumbered as an extension of
M-44, while 28th Street retained the
M-11/
M-21 designations it had in addition to US 131. I-296/US 131 ran alongside the
Grand River between
I-96 downtown and
I-196 north of town. At the end of I-296, US 131 followed I-196 east to the northern portion of the business loop at Plainfield Avenue and followed Plainfield Avenue back to the remainder of its routing north of Grand Rapids. Freeway construction continued through the 1960s. By the end of 1963, the southern section of freeway was extended to
Schoolcraft. The following year, a
business loop in Kalamazoo was created. The new loop used a freeway stub on the north and M-43 on the south to connect the main highway to the former routing of US 131 along Westnedge and Park avenues downtown. A discontinuous segment of freeway, south of
Cadillac into
Osceola County, opened in September 1966. The freeway was extended north from the Grand Rapids area through the
Comstock Park area in 1966. That year, the former Grand Rapids Speedrome, a local race car track was closed. Located on North Park Street between the North Park Bridge and West River Drive, the track was in operation from 1950 until it was closed for the freeway construction in 1966. The freeway was extended further to
M-57 (14 Mile Road) near
Cedar Springs in 1969. In 1968, the section of expressway near Mancelona was downgraded to a two-lane highway. The original roadway had been left in place when a new parallel carriageway was built in 1956. During the winter months, the original lanes built in the 1920s were closed because the grade of the roadway accumulated additional snow and made it difficult to plow. The MSHD had considered reconstructing the older road to retain the expressway setup, but that would have cost $1.5 million while removing it and permanently reconfiguring the 1956 roadway cost only $170,000 (equivalent to $ and $ in ). The 1970s saw the US 131 freeway expand to north of Grand Rapids. The section between the two M-57 junctions near Rockford and in Cedar Springs opened on September 21, 1973, at a dedication ceremony featuring then-Congressman
Gerald R. Ford. By the end of the year, the freeway would be open as far north as
Howard City. At the same time, M-46 was realigned to extend south down the freeway to Cedar Springs and west to replace M-57 west of Rockford. Construction to complete these sections north of Grand Rapids had been delayed in 1967. Before the delays, the MSHD planned to have the gap in the freeway between Grand Rapids and Cadillac completed by 1974. The state even proposed adding the freeway north of Grand Rapids to Petoskey, with a further continuation to
Mackinaw City as part of the
Interstate Highway System in an effort to receive additional funding in 1968. In September 1972, the US 131 Area Development Association lobbied Congress to "expedite funding and priority for the reconstruction of US 131 in Michigan." The section of US 131 freeway south of the
Wexford–Osceola county line was opened on November 9, 1976, at a cost of $7.4 million (equivalent to $ in ). By 1977, the state postponed any plans to complete the freeway north of Cadillac. The department cited rising construction material costs and opposition to the freeway in Petoskey. By the end of the decade, I-296 signs were removed from the section of freeway in Grand Rapids. However, the freeway remains listed as a part of the Interstate Highway System. The next section of freeway opened between Howard City and
Stanwood in 1980. Another segment was opened farther north, bypassing
Big Rapids by 1984. The former route through town and a section of
M-20 were designated as
a business loop simultaneously. US 131 followed 19 Mile Road between the end of the freeway and the former routing north of town. The gap was filled in when the freeway segment between Big Rapids and Osceola County was opened in 1986. The section of highway along 19 Mile Road was transferred to the Big Rapids business loop to connect it back to the new freeway. On December 27, 1999, the state awarded an $85.7 million contract (equivalent to $ in ) for the replacement of the S-Curve on US 131. Deposits of
gypsum under the roadway were dissolving and causing it to settle. A deteriorating bridge also forced the reconstruction of the freeway through the area. Construction began on January 15, 2000, diverting the roughly 115,000 vehicles per day that used the stretch of road to detours through the downtown area. The system is designed to spray a de-icing fluid on the roadway that would be carried by car tires up to along the road surface. This fluid is expected to melt ice at temperatures below the at which salt stops working. Unlike salt, the non-corrosive de-icer does not harm the bridge, but it is more costly. The system is designed to be activated manually, or automatically via sensors along the road. However, plowing would still be required on the roadway. Construction delays were caused by river flooding during spring rains. A design mistake meant that one of the bridges in the structure was built too low, and Grandville Avenue was lowered to compensate for the error. Before the opening, MDOT held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on the freeway to allow local residents to walk along the structure on August 12. The first northbound lanes were opened to traffic in mid-August, three weeks ahead of schedule. Lead contractor
Kiewit Western, a company whose "employees have been known to work 13-hour days and 100-hour weeks", accelerated their work schedule over the course of the project to compensate for the delays and still finish the venture early. The remaining lanes opened to traffic on October 26, also ahead of schedule. Additional work started after the main roadway opened by closing various ramps for reconstruction. This work also focused on restoring parking lots located under or adjacent to the freeway and testing the de-icing system; the final ramps were opened in early December 2000 and early January 2001. The end result of the construction produced a freeway design that increased the rated traffic speed from . Construction started on the Cadillac bypass in 1999, and the first section was opened to traffic in November 2000. This southern segment ran from US 131 south of town to
M-55 east of downtown. US 131 remained routed through downtown, but M-55 was rerouted to the bypass. Local residents were allowed to use the northern section of the bypass for recreational activities until it was opened to traffic. The full bypass around Cadillac was dedicated to Sidney Ouwinga in a ceremony on October 27, 2001, and the road was opened to traffic on October 30, 2001. The former routing through town was redesignated
Bus. US 131 at the same time. Ouwinga was a state lawmaker who died in 1991 while serving in the
Michigan House of Representatives. He was also a member of the US 131 Area Development Association which promoted further northern extensions of the freeway. The freeway expansion The two bypasses cost $146 million (equivalent to $ in ) to complete. with planned completion in 2014. Residents in the community were divided over the proposed highway. Business owners look to the 3,000 cars and trucks that pass through downtown Constantine each day for customers, traffic that would be diverted around the village by the new roadway. On the other hand, residents that work outside of the small community were looking forward to decreased commute times to their workplaces. The bypass opened on October 30, 2013. The City of
Kalamazoo accepted jurisdiction of the trunklines within the city's downtown from MDOT in January 2019; M-43 was rerouted out of the city as a result. After the change, M-43 ran concurrently along US 131 from
Oshtemo Township on the west side of Kalamazoo to Plainwell. Bus. US 131 in Kalamazoo was also truncated, and the BL I-94 overlap removed. ==Future==