New Jersey Roads - US 1 SB

US 1 SB



This isn't just the ramp to I-287, or even all those other routes; it also splits to CR 531 NB (left split up ahead), which really deserves a mainline shield. I-287 becomes NJ 440 shortly, but I-287 South becomes NJ 440 North, and this sign is quite wrong about that. Raritan Center is not a town but a shopping center, adding to the mystique of the overhead.


Speaking of shopping centers, this is in front of Menlo Park Mall. It's nowhere close to standard.


This abutment, seen from the SB US 1 frontage road around College Farm Rd., will hold up US 1 SB from ahead (north) to behind me (south) when completed. See those wooden poles dangling in the air? Earth to contractor - they're not helping hold the abutment up like that.


The frontage road is open enough in March 2011 to carry through traffic, but not much more than that.


Strictly speaking, this almost counts more for the NB side than the SB side; it was at the end of the cut-through between the frontage roads. But the SB page needs its own circle shield.


The NJ 1 error did get replaced, but it came with its own error. I get it. Technically, this is a two-way frontage road, and turning either way will take you to a ramp onto US 1 SB. But doesn't it make much more sense to turn left and head south to head south?


This SB sign gantry is now the ¾ mile advance BGS for US 130 and NJ 171, but when I drove this way in early June 2003, it hadn't gone up yet.


Notice that everything relating to NJ 171 has been taped over. That ramp took awhile to open, as the US 130 NB-NJ 171 NB overpass of US 1 was one of the last pieces to be constructed. Since the SB US 1-SB US 130 ramp opened fairly early though, due to its importance, the BGS's went up anyway.


The only truly old BGS on non-multiplexed US 1 that I know of, this SB signage was replaced with the opening of the new US 1/130 interchange (it replaced a traffic circle, and you can guess how badly this was needed).


More taped-over pieces of BGS, and on the SB ramp you see that only one lane is open for US 130 (and zero are open to NJ 171) in summer 2003.


Two views of the under-construction interchange. Old roadways were taken out before new ones were put in for the less important movements, so almost everything you see is new construction, again as of summer 2003. It's all done as of a year later.


The last two photos are left and right on the same gantry.


Courtesy Lou Corsaro, this is a new jughandle for CR 522 on the SB side of US 1 to the EB side of 522. The current jug has been kept for SB-WB right-turning traffic only. Backups trying to turn left are probably what sparked the new loop.


With the new jughandle, there comes a new sign, and it's WRONG! The layout's not great, but technically, although unsigned, CR 522 continues on town-maintained Promenade Blvd. west to NJ 27.


US 1 is an arrow-straight expressway/Jersey freeway south of New Brunswick. Intersections are gradually being replaced by interchanges over the length, so hopefully one day soon US 1 will be unquestionably the best route for traffic trying to follow the aborted Somerset Freeway (I-95 between Trenton and New Brunswick). For now, though, the little town of Penns Neck interrupts the smooth flow of US 1; plans exist for a bypass (which I'm guessing goes just to the west, since the town lies entirely to the east), but I haven't seen them so I can't comment. Curiously, most of the CR 526 signage at the CR 571 intersection is tacked on as county shields atop 571 LGS's, but these two old signs are paired. CR 526 officially does not follow CR 571 into Princeton based on Straight Line Diagrams, but most signs indicate that it does anyway. Silly NJDOT.


Replacement shields, one missing the county name, and a brief experiment gone awry. NJDOT wanted to improve the crush of traffic on US 1 through Penns Neck, and thought that prohibiting left turns at the intersection would help. Left turns occur through the sides of the circle, so it was easy enough to just close the circle. Then everyone started U-turning as soon as they could, so NJDOT kept extending pylons farther and farther down CR 526/571. It got to the point where there were pylons for a mile and traffic backups for a mile or more on the side road, and the attendant resident complaints, and the experiment was mercifully ended in short order.


The first two photos are left and right sides on the same bridge, while the last two photos are on the SB C-D (collector-distributor) road, except for of course the I-95/I-295 BGS overhanging the main lanes. Click on the penultimate photo for a closeup of all 3 button copy beauties.


As the last picture shows, on the ramp from US 1 SB, I-95 gets the lion's share of lanes at its fourth NJ terminus (the other three being at borders; see the I-95 page for details on the pre-2019 situation), where I-295 also ended. Presumably traffic avoiding the NJ Turnpike is going to avoid the toll to leave NJ as well and take the free Scudders Falls Bridge, although the whole game changes once the new Scudders Falls Bridge is constructed and opened with its own toll; at that point, the completed I-95/I-276 interchange starts to look very attractive on a time vs. dollar basis. Notice how everything goes south from this point; once that interchange was completed, I-295 was extended around Trenton as a signed N-S route to replace I-95's S-N route, even though the road really runs W-E. To make matters worse, the route in PA was then signed W-E instead of S-N, so the new interchange sends a north-signed route (95) east and an east-signed route (295) north, and meanwhile, traffic has to head on a north-signed route (295) to get to a southerly destination (Philadelphia). Great job, guys. *slow clap* This at least avoids the dilemma of two SB I-295's or an NB road suddenly becoming SB... oh wait a minute, that already happened for over 30 years. In late 2007, this exit was reconfigured so that the two lanes heading west (then signed I-95) now leave first, and the I-295 SB exit (to the C-D road, which takes the entrance from I-295 NB) comes further south. I'm not a fan, because now the I-295 exit has a merge just after it leaves US 1, and there is no way to sign that without confusing drivers and creating danger at the merge point.


A lot of warnings for exits ahead - gee, not like there's anything important in Trenton like, say, a state government. Starting with the left and right of a single assembly in two photos, this is the first half of the Trenton Freeway (go to the NB side for more on that). Business US 1 runs toward US 206 and then splits, with the official route going back into US 1 and the signed route running across the old Trenton Makes bridge (largely multiplexed with US 206 through Trenton). The signed route was part of Alternate US 1 (so yes, both Alternate and Business signage existed for quite some time, not to confuse anyone), but PA has completely decommissioned its side of ALT US 1, and has yet to sign the unofficial Business US 1 in its stead. Market St. is also NJ 33, and the state highway should get the billing.


Finishing up the Trenton Freeway. NJ 129 takes you to NJ 29. Warren Street is part of the signed Business US 1 route, but even the older signs on the highway fail to acknowledge either Business or Alternate US 1.

Over to the NB lanes
Back north to US 1-9
General US 1 photos
Back to US 1 main page


Follow US 1 into Pennsylvania
Onto I-287
To NJ 440
Onto the NJ Turnpike (I-95)
Onto US 130
Onto NJ 171
Onto NJ 26
Onto NJ 91
Onto CR 522
Onto CR 526
Onto CR 571
Onto CR 533
Onto I-295
Onto former I-95
Onto NJ 33
Onto NJ 129
To I-195
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