Former CA 194 north from CA 49 to Saddleback Mountain

[Max Rockatansky]

I spent some time sorting out of the alignment history of former CA 194 which ran north from CA 49 west of Downieville north to Saddleback Mountain.  CA 194 was entirely aligned on Saddleback Road and terminated at Eureka Mine Road, prior to the 1964 State Highway Renumbering it was simply known as Legislative Route Number 36.  LRN 36 was adopted in 1907 and appears to have been intended to connect to LRN 30 which never actually occurred.  LRN 30 was ultimately deleted when CA 24/LRN 21 was completed on the Feather River Highway.  For some reason LRN 36 lingered on past the 1964 State Highway Renumbering only to be deleted by 1965 when it was one of the last dirt State Highways. 

https://www.gribblenation.org/2019/07/former-california-state-route-194-from.html

[TheStranger]

Given its one year existing as a numbered route, I presume that this was never signed in the field, correct?  If so, that creates an interesting history of one route number being assigned twice without ever having a single real-life instance of being posted!

[Max Rockatansky]

Given its one year existing as a numbered route, I presume that this was never signed in the field, correct?  If so, that creates an interesting history of one route number being assigned twice without ever having a single real-life instance of being posted!

I believe that's the case, CA 194 appeared to be marked as an un-signed post 1964 LRN.  There would have been absolutely no reason to sign the first CA 194 given it essentially dead-ended at a derelict mine.

Either way I'd have to say that the first CA 194 probably qualifies as the strangest state Highway that ever existed. 

[sparker]

Given its one year existing as a numbered route, I presume that this was never signed in the field, correct?  If so, that creates an interesting history of one route number being assigned twice without ever having a single real-life instance of being posted!

I believe that's the case, CA 194 appeared to be marked as an un-signed post 1964 LRN.  There would have been absolutely no reason to sign the first CA 194 given it essentially dead-ended at a derelict mine.

Either way I'd have to say that the first CA 194 probably qualifies as the strangest state Highway that ever existed. 

It seems that both LRN 30 and LRN 36 were exercises in "how to get to Quincy the hard way!"  Since the corridor the Division of Highways really wanted, LRN 21 through the Feather River Canyon, was a long hard slog in terms of construction; the 1907-09-built WP main line occupied most of the readily available alignment in the canyon, and the state highway had to carve out a path for itself wherever the railroad wasn't.  So in the interim any traffic from the Sacramento Valley to Quincy, then a significant lumber and mining center, had to go "over the hill" on LRN 30, which by all accounts was a treacherous oiled-earth road that crossed some severe topology -- but was still CSAA-signed as SSR 24, a designation that was switched to LRN 21 as soon as that facility was completed.  My guess is that LRN 36 was intended to be a logical extension of the "Gold Center" corridor that characterized SSR 49 (and its various LRN iterations), since if it served Quincy, a major mining center, the route would have maintained its original purpose rather than surmount Yuba Pass and end up on the eastern Sierra slope.  I'd go so far as to say that if LRN 36 had been completed to Quincy, SSR 49 would have been rerouted over it and the remainder of LRN 25 east to LRN 83/SSR 89 at Sattley would have seen a different SSR designation.  But similar topological obstacles to the ones encountered on LRN 30 existed for a potential LRN 36 extension as well, so once the Feather River Canyon route was opened to traffic, and further plans for LRN 36 were dropped along with the decommissioning of LRN 30.   Whoever owned/operated the now-defunct mine north of Downieville probably had enough political clout to ensure that the stub route was state maintained, so it remained on the books until '65.   

[Max Rockatansky]

Given its one year existing as a numbered route, I presume that this was never signed in the field, correct?  If so, that creates an interesting history of one route number being assigned twice without ever having a single real-life instance of being posted!

I believe that's the case, CA 194 appeared to be marked as an un-signed post 1964 LRN.  There would have been absolutely no reason to sign the first CA 194 given it essentially dead-ended at a derelict mine.

Either way I'd have to say that the first CA 194 probably qualifies as the strangest state Highway that ever existed. 

It seems that both LRN 30 and LRN 36 were exercises in "how to get to Quincy the hard way!"  Since the corridor the Division of Highways really wanted, LRN 21 through the Feather River Canyon, was a long hard slog in terms of construction; the 1907-09-built WP main line occupied most of the readily available alignment in the canyon, and the state highway had to carve out a path for itself wherever the railroad wasn't.  So in the interim any traffic from the Sacramento Valley to Quincy, then a significant lumber and mining center, had to go "over the hill" on LRN 30, which by all accounts was a treacherous oiled-earth road that crossed some severe topology -- but was still CSAA-signed as SSR 24, a designation that was switched to LRN 21 as soon as that facility was completed.  My guess is that LRN 36 was intended to be a logical extension of the "Gold Center" corridor that characterized SSR 49 (and its various LRN iterations), since if it served Quincy, a major mining center, the route would have maintained its original purpose rather than surmount Yuba Pass and end up on the eastern Sierra slope.  I'd go so far as to say that if LRN 36 had been completed to Quincy, SSR 49 would have been rerouted over it and the remainder of LRN 25 east to LRN 83/SSR 89 at Sattley would have seen a different SSR designation.  But similar topological obstacles to the ones encountered on LRN 30 existed for a potential LRN 36 extension as well, so once the Feather River Canyon route was opened to traffic, and further plans for LRN 36 were dropped along with the decommissioning of LRN 30.   Whoever owned/operated the now-defunct mine north of Downieville probably had enough political clout to ensure that the stub route was state maintained, so it remained on the books until '65.   

Obviously that momentum to build LRN 36 to LRN 30 had long shuttered even by the time LRN 21 had been finished on the Feather River Highway.  Political pull or not the route to Saddleback Mountain was pretty haggard even by mid-20th century standards.  The only other routes that I can think of that lasted as primitively as they did were early CA 2 (modern CA 173) east of Cajon Pass and CA 25 when it was aligned along Lewis Creek.

[sparker]

^^^^^^^^^
I'll certainly agree that Saddleback Road was and is pretty decrepit; I searched it out and drove it (when I had my old Mazda truck) back around '84 or so.  It looked as if the road was sporadically graded -- although there were plenty of rivulets and other small watercourses crossing the roadway as well as washout areas along its edge (it was early spring, and was raining on and off).  Didn't spend a lot of time (or additional effort) on former 194; just up to the old mine area where the grading ran out, hanging a U-turn, and back to CA 49 and back down the hill to Grass Valley for the evening.     

[Max Rockatansky]

I was bored today so I went back through the CHPW and California Highway Bulletin scans for information pertaining to CA 194.  The CHPWs don't offer a ton of insight but some mining sites I frequent did pertaining to the Eureka Mining District.  CA 194/LRN 36 was located in the Eureka Mining District which was largely worked via placer claims from the 1850s-1880s.  The Eureka Mining District was continuously worked in dwindling capacity via hydraulic mining through the 1930s.  Mount Pleasant Ranch and Eureka are both listed as communities which were part of the Eureka Mining District:

https://www.gribblenation.org/2019/07/former-california-state-route-194-from.html

[NE2]

You say it's a sign route, but the 1964 map shows only an oval, indicating that it was not signed.

[ClassicHasClass]

Yeah, I don't think that was ever formally signed as CA 194. For that matter, I'm pretty sure no incarnation of SSR 194 or CA 194 was ever signed in the field (certainly not I-15E).