OR 217

Oregon Route 217 (OR 217), also known as the Beaverton-Tigard Highway 144, is a north-south controlled-access state highway in Washington County, Oregon. The route travels along the west suburbs of Portland, starting at US Route 26 (US 26) in Beaverton and ending at Interstate 5 (I-5) in Tigard.

OR 217 was initially a route on surface streets which ran from OR 8 in Beaverton and Wilsonville. Construction of the current freeway segment occurred from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s, with the highway re-routed onto it afterwards.

Route description

OR 217 begins at an interchange with US 26 and nearby Barnes Road near the St. Vincent Hospital. It then travels southwest before reaching Walker Road, after which it travels south towards Canyon Road (OR 8) and Beaverton Hillsdale Highway ( OR 10), passing the Beaverton Town Center. Directly after the interchange, the highway turns southeasterly before turning back south right before the Denney Road interchange.

The highway intersects Hall Boulevard near the Hall/Nimbus WES station and Scholls Ferry Road, and then proceeds to turn back southeast. The highway continues southeast for the rest of its route, after which it passes Greenburg Road and nearby Washington Square. The highway then intersects OR 99W and 72nd Avenue. After that, it enters an interchange with I-5, with southbound traffic continuing east towards Lake Oswego as Kruse Way.

For most of its length, OR 217 is a freeway with two travel lanes in each direction, with a third weave lane for exiting and merging, with the exception of its two termini. TriMet's Westside Express Service, a commuter rail line, runs parallel to the highway between Tigard and Beaverton.

History

OR 217 originally ran along surface streets before it was relocated to freeway sections. The highway started at the junction of OR 8 and Hall Boulevard. in Beaverton, continuing along Hall Boulevard through Beaverton, Progress, Metzger, and Tigard for until it reached Durham Road. There, it took a left onto Durham Road, following it for about until the intersection with Boones Ferry Road. It remained on Boones Ferry Road through Durham, Tualatin, and Wilsonville for about , crossing the Willamette River on the Boones Ferry and continuing south for another until finally ending at OR 99E at Aurora, for a grand total of about or so. The southern terminus was scaled back to Wilsonville (current I-5 exit 286) with the completion of I-5 to Portland. This older highway, called the Beaverton-Aurora Highway, was kept in the state highway system as the Beaverton-Tualatin Highway No. 141, and was recently given the route designation OR 141.

The freeway carrying OR 217 was built in the mid-1960s to early 1970s in several stages, generally beginning at the south end. The full length of the freeway was repaved for the first time in the mid-1980s, along with the replacement of metal median barriers with concrete dividers. By 1985, approximately 60,000 to 68,000 vehicles used OR 217 daily. The intersection of OR 217 and US 26 in Beaverton was replaced with an interchange in 1986 after two years of construction.

Future

ODOT started construction on the Auxiliary Lanes Project in December 2021, which aims to add a southbound auxiliary lane from exit 2A to exit 6 and a northbound auxiliary lane from exit 6 to exit 4. The Allen Boulevard southbound on-ramp and Denney Road southbound off-ramp will be removed for a new frontage road being constructed in place of it. The frontage road opened in November 2023.

Exit list

References

External links

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217
Transportation in Portland, Oregon
Transportation in Beaverton, Oregon
Transportation in Clackamas County, Oregon
1970s establishments in Oregon