West Huntington Expressway The West Huntington Expressway is a controlled-access elevated highway that crosses the west end of Huntington WV. It was constructed in 1965 and originally signed as
West Virginia Route 94 (WV 94). The first segment to open was a stub from
I-64 to Jefferson Avenue in
West Huntington in the fall of 1965. This included a bridge over a CSX railroad mainline. In the early 1970s, the expressway was extended northward across what is now the
Nick Joe Rahall II Bridge across the
Ohio River to
US 52 and
State Route 7 in
Ohio. Tolls were collected at the
Ohio River bridge until the mid-1980s. The expressway has four lanes from I-64 to the
US 60 interchange, where it drops to two lanes for the remainder of the highway, which includes the
Ohio River bridge. The expressway was renumbered US 52 in 1979 when that highway was re-routed out of downtown Huntington to a new alignment on I-64 west to the Tolsia Highway south of Kenova.
Tolsia Highway ending at an interchange stub south of
Kenova, West Virginia. bypass. The Tolsia Highway is defined as running from I-64 at
Kenova to
Corridor G (
US 119) north of
Williamson. The name Tolsia takes the names from the first initials of the Tug, Ohio, Levisa, and Sandy Improvement Association. US 52 originally took the path of
WV 152, approximately east of the current alignment. In the mid-1960s, state funding was secured for a construction project along most of County Route 1 (CR 1), which ran along the
Big Sandy River and
Tug Fork River. The rebuilt CR 1 and CR 29 was renumbered as US 52 in 1979. Portions of the highway have been widened to four lanes. In 1998, US 52 south of the I-64 interchange in Kenova was widened to four-lane highway standards to the access road for
Tri-State Airport. In that same year, the
Prichard bypass was opened to traffic with one interchange and one at-grade intersection. This bypass includes very large rock cuts and a long and winding grade down a hill. In 2001, the four-lane highway was extended southward approximately to a stub interchange with
WV 75. Also in that year, the four-lane highway near Prichard was extended northward for , removing some grades and curves along US 52. The extension was completed in 2002 at a cost of $9.6 million. In 2001, the
Crum segment of the Tolsia Highway opened to traffic. The highway, designated CR 152-46, begins just north of Crum at an incomplete diamond interchange and heads eastward towards CR 2. It has at-grade intersections with CR 52-47 and CR 52-31 along with a side road at the eastern terminus that takes traffic to CR 2. There are stubs for future bridges and ramps. Signage along this segment is minimal, with only a handful of arrows to designate the route. While the highway was built to four-lane standards, it is only striped for two. In late 2002, Senator
Robert C. Byrd received $20 million in funds to jump-start construction on the northern half of the Tolsia Highway. The money would be used to speed up construction on the link between
Huntington and Prichard, serving several industrial parks and relieving two-lane US 52 of coal-truck congestion. In 2003, survey and design of of four-lane US 52 from Prichard north to Cyrus were completed. Plans include an interchange and five bridge structures.
Williamson Bypass US 52 enters Kentucky twice along the
Williamson, West Virginia bypass; bridging the Tug Fork River was preferred because it prevented the blasting of several hillsides in West Virginia. It was completed in 1996 as part of the
Corridor G (
US 119) project. The speed limit in West Virginia is but drops to in Kentucky. ==Future==