M-212 is a state trunkline highway in the US state of

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

. It provides access from M-33 to the community of

Aloha ''Aloha'' ( , Hawaiian: �ˈlohə is the Hawaiian word for love, affection, peace, compassion and mercy, that is commonly used as a greeting. It has a deeper cultural and spiritual significance to native Hawaiians, for whom the term is use ...

Mullett Lake Mullett Lake is a lake in Cheboygan County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The lake is named after John Mullett, who, together with William A. Burt, made a federal survey of the area from 1840 to 1843. A neighboring lake was named after Burt. Hi ...

's eastern shore and

Aloha State Park Aloha State Park is a public recreation area located south of Cheboygan in Cheboygan County, Michigan. The state park covers on the northeast side of Mullett Lake at the center of the Inland Lakes Waterways. History The park was created whe ...

, where the highway ends. It is shorter than all other signed highways in the state, including M-143 at and the

business route A business route (or business loop, business spur, or city route) in the United States is a short special route that branches off a parent numbered highway at its beginning, continues through the central business district of a nearby city or to ...

, Business M-32 in

Hillman Hillman was a British automobile marque created by the Hillman-Coatalen Company, founded in 1907, renamed the Hillman Motor Car Company in 1910. The company was based in Ryton-on-Dunsmore, near Coventry, England. Before 1907 the company had ...

at , which is about longer. M-212 was assigned on December 29, 1937, from the intersection with Second Street to an intersection with US Highway 23 (US 23). In 1940, the state of Michigan rerouted US 23 and replaced it with M-33.

Route

M-212 begins at an intersection with Second Street and the Tromble Trail north of the Aloha State Park entrance gate. The community was originally a stop on the

Detroit and Mackinac Railway The Detroit and Mackinac Railway , informally known as the "Turtle Line", was a railroad in the northeastern part of the Lower Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. The railroad had its main offices and shops in Tawas City, Michigan, Tawas Cit ...

, named after a trip to

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

by the local sawmill owner. The state highway runs northward on Second Street away from the park gate before turning eastward on Center Street. The railroad right-of-way is now the North Eastern State Trail, which M-212 crosses along Center Street in Aloha. Eastward, the highway intersects Third and Fourth streets, both of which are separated by woodlands and residences. This is followed by a large clearing, giving way to a farm to the north and more residences to the south. Beyond this there is a large field where M-212 terminates at an intersection with M-33 in Aloha Township. According to the ''

Lansing State Journal The ''Lansing State Journal'' is a daily newspaper published in Lansing, Michigan, owned by Gannett. It is the sole daily newspaper published in Greater Lansing. History The paper was started as the ''Lansing Republican'' on April 28, 1855, ...

'', "most people could walk the darn thing in about 20 minutes."

History

The

Michigan State Highway Department The Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) is a constitutional government principal department of the US state of Michigan. The primary purpose of MDOT is to maintain the Michigan Highway System, Michigan State Trunkline Highway System wh ...

assigned the M-212 designation to its current alignment from what was then US 23 on December 29, 1937. It has broadly remained the same since. Originally, US 23 ran along the highway at the eastern terminus of M-212, but the highway department realigned this along the shore of

Lake Huron Lake Huron ( ) is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is shared on the north and east by the Canadian province of Ontario and on the south and west by the U.S. state of Michigan. The name of the lake is derived from early French ex ...

in 1940 and later assigned M-33 to the old alignment, which remains the case. M-212 was called a "smidgin" of a highway as part of a group of roadways that lacked the glamor of other highways in a profile of the shortest highways in the state in 1972. In 1996, the highway became the state's shortest when

M-209 In cryptography, the M-209, designated CSP-1500 by the United States Navy (C-38 by the manufacturer) is a portable, mechanical cipher machine used by the US military primarily in World War II, though it remained in active use through the Korean W ...

in the

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is a U.S. national lakeshore in the northwestern Lower Peninsula of Michigan. Located within Benzie and Leelanau counties, the park extends along a stretch of Lake Michigan's eastern coastline, as well ...

was transferred to local control and lost its state highway designation. Since M-212 gained this superlative, in 2018 a radio station in Kalamazoo called it "likely" the state's quietest highway, or the highway with the lowest

annual average daily traffic Annual average daily traffic (AADT) is a measure used primarily in transportation planning, transportation engineering and retail location selection. Traditionally, it is the total volume of vehicle traffic of a highway or road for a year divided ...

Major intersections

References

External links

M-212
at Michigan Highways
Michigan State Trunkline Record Holders
at Michigan Highways
Michigan's Shortest Highway Leads to This Beautiful State Park
at TravelTheMitten.com {{DEFAULTSORT:M212

212 Year 212 ( CCXII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Asper and Camilius (or, less frequently, year 965 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 212 for this ye ...

Transportation in Cheboygan County, Michigan State highways in the United States shorter than one mile

Route

History

Major intersections

See also

References

External links