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US 96 is a north-south United States highway. Its number is a violation of the standard US highway naming convention on two counts: even numbered highways are generally east-west routes, and it lies entirely to the east of US 59. 9x routes should be in the far western US, like US 95.
One theory about the highway's designation is that it was intended as a mirror-image of nearby US 69, which shares its southern terminus. For reference, another "misnamed" Texas US route is US 57, an east-west route which may have been named for the state route it replaced.
Termini
As of 2004, the highway's northern terminus is in Tenaha, Texas at an intersection with U.S. Highway 59 and U.S. Highway 84. Its southern terminus (as well as those of US 287 and US 69) is in Port Arthur, Texas at an intersection with Texas State Highway 87, five miles up the Sabine River from the Gulf of Mexico.
Historic termini
The US 96 designation was orignally applied in 1926 to an entirely different route, from Rosenberg, Texas near Houston to Pharr in the Rio Grande valley. This diagonal route, south of U.S. Highway 90, did not violate the convention of even numbers for east-west routes. The highway's east-west credentials were boosted in 1934, when US 96 was extended from Pharr to Laredo. In 1939, though, the US 96 designation was moved to the modern route, for reasons that defy understanding by road buffs to this day.
States traversed
The highway passes through the following states:
Related US Routes
Sources and external links
