State Highway 90 (SH 90) is a long state highway at the western edge of

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...

. SH 90's western terminus is a continuation as Utah State Route 46 (SR-46) at the

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

state border, and the eastern terminus is at U.S. Route 550 (US 550) in Montrose.

Route description

SH 90 begins in the west at the border with Utah where it becomes Utah State Route 46 which continues westward to meet US 191 about twenty miles (32 km) south of Moab, UT. From the Utah border the road passes eastward for about through a very remote area, first along a section of La Sal Creek, then over a pass and though

Paradox Valley Paradox Valley is a basin located in Montrose County in the U.S. state of Colorado. The dry, sparsely populated valley is named after the apparently paradoxical course of the Dolores River—instead of flowing down the length of the valley, t ...

, where it crosses the Dolores River Bridge near the town of Bedrock. After leaving the valley, it joins up with SH 141 at Vancorum where this portion of the road ends. The road then reappears approximately eight miles west of Montrose and travels into downtown Montrose where its western end occurs at its intersection with

US 550 U.S. Route 550 (US 550) is a spur of U.S. Highway 50 that runs from Bernalillo, New Mexico to Montrose, Colorado in the western United States. The section from Silverton to Ouray is frequently called the Million Dollar Highway.

. The two sections of the road are joined by a section composed mostly of unpaved road and a brief stretch of SH 141, neither of which are officially part of SH 90. Thus the official length of the road is , but driving from one end to the other will require traveling at least . If only paved routes are used, that distance increases considerably.

History

The route was established in the 1920s without the current gap. In 1954, all was cut out except the current eastern section, and the current western section was added back in 1963. The route was also entirely paved by 1963.

Major intersections

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Colorado State Highway 090 090 Montrose, Colorado Transportation in Montrose County, Colorado