State Highway 77H was originally created to serve the now-defunct town of Hollywood. This likely explains why the suffix "H" was assigned when letters earlier in the alphabet were available.
Route description
State Highway 77H begins at the intersection of 12th Avenue N.E. and Tecumseh Road in Norman. US-77 follows 12th Avenue south of the intersection and Tecumseh Road west of it, with SH-77H following 12th Avenue north of the intersection. Throughout its length, SH-77H is an undivided four-lane road. It intersects other streets at grade, and has numerous traffic signals.
Former SH-77H (now part of US-77) following 12th Avenue in Norman
SH-77H is also designated as Sooner Road in Moore and Oklahoma City, and as 12th Avenue N.E. in Norman. Locals often refer to the entire length of the road as Sooner Road, ignoring both the highway number and its designation as 12th Avenue in Norman.
Oklahoma Senate Bill 280, passed by the 2003 Legislature, named the highway the Pearl Harbor/USS Oklahoma Memorial Highway. This designation was subsequently applied by the Oklahoma Transportation Commission on 2003-06-02.[3] Signage was installed at each end of the highway displaying the name.
History
State Highway 77H was originally commissioned on 1950-01-11, running from Hollywood in Cleveland County to the Oklahoma County line. This original iteration of SH-77H was decommissioned less than two years later, being removed from the state highway system on 1951-11-05[3]
SH-77H was returned to active service on 1955-02-07.[3] This time, the highway began at the corner of Porter Avenue and Robinson Street in Norman and traveled north to the previous SH-77H's southern terminus in Hollywood.[4] On 1959-02-27, the Department of Highways assumed maintenance of Sunnylane Road south of S.E. 29th Street (at that time part of SH-3), adding it to SH-77H. This made all of the old SH-77H part of the new SH-77H, and extended the highway's northern terminus into the Oklahoma City suburb of Del City.[3] On 1977-06-06, the highway was extended further north into Del City along Sunnylane Road[5] to Reno Avenue, where it turned west, ending at US-77 (which followed Lincoln Boulevard at the time).[6]
On 1988-12-12, SH-77H was removed from Sunnylane Avenue and Porter Avenue and redesignated one section line east onto Sooner Road and 12th Avenue. At the same time, it was truncated to I-240 in Oklahoma City, and its southern terminus became the 12th Avenue–Classen Boulevard intersection in Norman.[3] Before this rerouting, SH-77H served as SH-37's eastern terminus, but when SH-77H was moved, SH-37 was not extended to meet the new alignment. Thus, SH-37 still ends at Sunnylane Road, one block short of SH-77H.
In April 2009, US-77 was realigned through Norman. The portion of 12th Avenue between Classen Boulevard and Tecumseh Road became part of US-77. This change shortened SH-77H by 4.7 miles (7.6 km), and brought its terminus to the present-day location of the 12th Avenue–Tecumseh Road intersection.[7]
^ abOklahoma Department of Transportation (n.d.). Control Section Maps: Cleveland County(PDF) (Map) (2010–2011 ed.). Scale not given. Oklahoma City: Oklahoma Department of Transportation. Retrieved May 3, 2013.
^ abOklahoma Department of Transportation (n.d.). Control Section Maps: Oklahoma County(PDF) (Map) (2010–2011 ed.). Scale not given. Oklahoma City: Oklahoma Department of Transportation. Retrieved May 3, 2013.
US 77 in Norman
I-240 / SH-3 in Oklahoma City
