Highway 145 is designation for four state highways in Northeast Arkansas. The highways are maintained by the Arkansas Department of Transportation. Two segments were created as state highways in the 1930s to provide system connectivity; with two others added and extended during the 1960s and 1970s during a period of state highway system expansion.
Route description
The ARDOT maintains Highway 115 like all other parts of the state highway system. As a part of these responsibilities, the Department tracks the volume of traffic using its roads in surveys using a metric called average annual daily traffic. ARDOT estimates the traffic level for a segment of roadway for any average day of the year in these surveys. As of 2018, the peak AADT on the highway was 4,600 vehicles per day near the northern terminus in McCrory. All other segments were below 1,000 VPD, with most counts below 400 VPD. For reference, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials classifies roads with fewer than 400 vehicles per day as a very low volume local road. No segment of Highway 145 has been listed as part of the National Highway System, a network of roads important to the nation's economy, defense, and mobility.
Highway 145 begins in the northeast corner of Woodruff County at Highway 37. The highway runs due east as a section line road through a rural area, passing the unincorporated community of Duffy before turning north and entering Jackson County. Now a north-south section line road, Highway 145 terminates at Highway 42 near McFadden.
Highway 145 begins at Highway 367 in Tuckerman as Estelle Street in a residential area. The highway turns due north, running as a section line road into rural Jackson County. The highway runs north to a dirt road intersection with Jackson County Road 85 near Centerville, where the route terminates near the Black River.
History
The first segment of Highway 145 was created in 1931 between Highway 14 and Highway 37, with the segment between Highway 42 and Highway 37 created in 1935. On February 29, 1956, the Arkansas State Highway Commission designated a third segment of Highway 145 along a newly constructed road between US 64 at Fair Oaks and Penrose parallel to the St. Louis Southwestern Railway tracks. The designation was extended to Highway 39 at Hillemann on October 5, 1960, but this extension was renumbered to Highway 39 on December 2, 1964. A third segment was created from US 64 in McCrory to south on November 23, 1966. It was extended northward to the current northern terminus at Highway 17 when a new US 64 bypass was constructed around Patterson and McCrory on January 24, 1968. The route was extended south to the current southern terminus at Highway 269 on April 25, 1973 pursuant to Act 9 of 1973 by the Arkansas General Assembly. The act directed county judges and legislators to designate up to of county roads as state highways in each county. A fourth segment of Highway 145 beginning in Tuckerman was created on February 27, 1974.