Historic National Road in Maryland
National Scenic Byway · Cumberland, Maryland
The first highway the federal government ever paid to build. Congress authorised it in 1806 under Jefferson, construction began at Cumberland in 1811, and it ran west to open the Ohio country to wagons. The Maryland stretch is about a hundred and seventy miles from Baltimore through Ellicott City, Frederick, Boonsboro and Hagerstown to Cumberland and up over the Alleghenies to the Pennsylvania line — and a surprising amount of it survives: stone arch bridges from the 1810s, a tollhouse, and mile markers still standing in the verge.
U.S. Route 40 and Alternate 40, Cumberland, Maryland, 21502, United States
A public road, drivable at all times, year round, with no tolls. ⚠ THE HISTORIC ALIGNMENT IS MOSTLY ALTERNATE 40 rather than US 40 or Interstate 68 — following the modern highway bypasses most of what is worth seeing. Individual stops keep their own hours; the LaVale Toll Gate House has very limited seasonal opening. WESTERN MOUNTAIN SECTIONS GET SUBSTANTIAL SNOW from December to March.
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