State Route 156 (SR 156), also known as Lee Canyon Road, is a

state highway A state highway, state road, or state route (and the equivalent provincial highway, provincial road, or provincial route) is usually a road that is either ''numbered'' or ''maintained'' by a sub-national state or province. A road numbered by a ...

in Clark County,

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...

. The road is one of two highways connecting

U.S. Route 95 US Route 95 (US 95) is a major north–south United States Numbered Highways, US Highway in the western United States. It travels through the states of Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, and Idaho, staying inland from the Pacific Coast ...

(US 95) to the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest and

Spring Mountains The Spring Mountains are a mountain range of Southern Nevada in the United States, running generally northwest–southeast along the west side of Las Vegas and south to the border with California. Most land in the mountains is owned by the Uni ...

area northwest of

Las Vegas Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Vegas ...

and its entire length is designated a

Nevada Scenic Byway The U.S. state of Nevada maintains a system of scenic byways throughout the state. Currently, there are 20 designated state scenic byways. Some of these state scenic byways have also been incorporated into national byway designations. State sce ...

. When first created in the 1930s, the highway followed a slightly different path that formed State Route 52. The SR 52 designation was later realigned and extended west to the

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

state line via Pahrump, but was discontinuous through the national forest. The route was ultimately split into separate highways in the 1970s.

History

The road now known as State Route 156 has origins dating to at least 1933. At that time, it was an unimproved county road that ran from State Route 5 (now US 95) at Indian Springs to the northern border of what was then called the Nevada National Forest. By 1935, this road had been designated as State Route 52, and apparently extended through the national forest (along what may now be State Route 158) ending at State Route 39 (now SR 157) east of

Charleston Peak Mount Charleston, including Charleston Peak (Nuvagantu, literally "where snow sits", in Southern Paiute or Nüpakatütün in Shoshoni) at , is the highest mountain in both the Spring Mountains and Clark County, in Nevada, United States. It is ...

. The routing of SR 52 had been changed by 1937. The highway was moved to the current alignment of Lee Canyon Road, beginning on State Route 5 several miles southeast of Indian Springs and ending in Lee Canyon. Around the same time, the highway designation was extended further west. SR 52 now traveled southwest through the national forest lands, crossing State Route 16 (now SR 160) in Pahrump to end at the California state line (on what is now

California State Route 178 State Route 178 (SR 178) is a state highway in the U.S. state of California that exists in two constructed segments. The gap in between segments is connected by various local roads and State Route 190 through Death Valley National Park. The west ...

) ''en route'' to

Shoshone The Shoshone or Shoshoni ( or ) are a Native American tribe with four large cultural/linguistic divisions: * Eastern Shoshone: Wyoming * Northern Shoshone: southern Idaho * Western Shoshone: Nevada, northern Utah * Goshute: western Utah, easter ...

, resulting in approximately of unimproved highway. By 1940, the eastern end of the route between US 95 and the Nevada National Forest had been fully paved. However, a gap now existed between the paved portion of the highway within the national forest and the unimproved road southwest of the western forest boundary. A trail through the

would connect the two segments of State Route 52 in later years. While improvements were made to the western portion of the route in the 1950s and 1960s, the trail through Clark Canyon was never improved to a full roadway. On July 1, 1976, Nevada began the process of renumbering all of the state's numbered highways. The Lee Canyon Road portion of SR 52 was redesignated as State Route 156, while the portion between Pahrump and the California state line was renumbered to State Route 372. The remainder of the route, from Pahrump to the Toiyabe National Forest, was removed from the state highway system. The changes in route numbering were reflected on official state highway maps beginning in 1978. By 2017, the first of SR 156 at the Lee Canyon ski area had been removed from the routing. The

Nevada Department of Transportation The Nevada Department of Transportation (Nevada DOT or NDOT) is a government agency in the U.S. state of Nevada. NDOT is responsible for maintaining and improving Nevada's highway system, which includes U.S. highways and Interstate highways within ...

designated State Route 156 as a Nevada Scenic Byway in July 1998. The "Mount Charleston/Lee Canyon Road" scenic route encompasses the entire of highway.

Major intersections

References

{{Reflist 156 Spring Mountains 156

History

Major intersections

See also

References