Crestwood Boulevard

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Crestwood Boulevard is the section of U.S. Highway 78 (also called the Bankhead Highway) running from 5th Avenue South and 47th Street to somewhere near John Rogers Drive in Irondale. It is so-named because it traverses the Crestwood neighborhood before crossing Red Mountain just south of Red Gap. East of Montevallo Road the Boulevard follows a route more or less parallel to I-20.

It was first identified as "Proposed Avondale-Irondale Super-Highway" on a 1946 road map. At that time, the Bankhead Highway followed Montclair Road between Pawnee Avenue and Irondale. Through the 1950's, this section of US 78 was identified on road maps as the "Atlanta Highway" while the Montclair Road route continued to be called the Bankhead Highway.

Between 53rd Street South and 58th Street South, the Boulevard features a wide median with concrete bollards. For Independence Day and other patriotic holidays in the 1960's through the 1980's, Boy Scout Troop 41 of Woodlawn raised flags on flagpoles spaced at regular intervals along the median. The Alabama National Guard was responsible for installing the flagpoles in the median prior to each holiday and then returning them afterwards to Troop 41's Scout Hut next to Woodlawn United Methodist Church.

The section of Crestwood Boulevard between Irondale and Crestwood Festival Center was landscaped in preparation for the 1996 Olympic Games. Gradco, Inc. was paid $26,000 to install new plantings specified by landscape architect Mike Kirk to continue the style used already in Irondale.

In April 2019 the Birmingham City Council approved 20% matching funds to commission a Crestwood APPLE Study/Crestwood Boulevard Corridor Study through the Regional Planning Commission of Greater Birmingham to determine of the Boulevard could be redesigned according to "complete street" principles, with improved access for pedestrian and bicycle traffic.

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Notable locations (west to east)

Birmingham

Crestwood North (north) / Crestwood South (south)

Eastwood (north) / Crestline (south)

Eastwood

Irondale

References

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