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presents

The Roads and Rails of Mercer County, WV /

Delta Roads

Quick: What's a Delta road?

Delta roads were a peculiar West Virginia phenomenon. It seems that in the 1950s and 1960s, the State Road Commission found itself performing maintenance on privately-owned roads...either by accident due to a lack of detailed documentation, or as a personal favour to the constituents who lived on them. In March 1966, these motley two-tracks and glorified driveways were rounded up to be the basis for the Delta road system...established under the rationale that even though the state didn't own these roads, it could at least save itself some trouble by mapping, quantifying, and accounting for them.

Delta roads were something of an embarrassment to the WVDH, so by the 1980s the agency was taking steps to actively phase out the system. Today, Delta roads are essentially defunct and any signs that might remain are nothing more than obsolete artifacts of the past.

Why were these roads called Delta roads? The story behind the name was probably a prosaic one: The State Road Commission needed a symbol to indicate this road class on maps that was adequately different from the squares and circles already in use, and a triangle was the next obvious choice of geometric shape. A triangle also happens to be the form of the Greek letter delta (Δ), and the name stuck.

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These were the Delta roads in Mercer County known to exist, compiled piecemeal from old maps. The numbering system was strictly sequential, and had no special structure or geographic grouping. All roads are assumed to be insignificant in length (1.5 kilometres or less) and to have a dead end, unless noted otherwise:

Road	Names	Start	Current Designation	Notes
1	Carl Wade Rd.	WV 20, Melrose	CR 20/30
2	Meadow St., Marellan Ave., Carey St.	CR 25, Bluefield	CR 25/12
3	Edgemont Dr.	US 52, Bluefield	CR 52/41
4	Holly Hills Rd.	US 19 south of Kegley	CR 19/38
5	Horton Rd.	CR 29, Bluefield	CR 29/1
6
7	Saunders Rd.	US 52, Bluewell	CR 52/35
8	Ball Dairy Rd.	CR 11, Midway	CR 11/17
9	Cleary Ln.	WV 71 south of Montcalm	CR 71/30
10	Idle Acres Dr.	CR 23/3, Brush Fork	CR 23/4
11
12	Shadetree Cir.	CR 19/33, Maple Acres	CR 19/48
13	Summerfield Rd.	CR 19/29, Glenwood	CR 19/63
14	Larue Rd.	WV 20, New Hope	CR 20/59
15
16
17	Nutmeg Pl.	CR 25/3 near Stony Gap	CR 25/11
18	School St.	CR 11, Midway	CR 11/18
19	Whittaker Hollow Rd.	CR 15, Flipping	CR 15/7
20	McDowell St.	US 19, Princeton	City street	Connects to other streets.
21	Haynes Rd.	US 52 near Simmons	CR 52/24
22	Wallingford Rd.	CR 460/1 east of Princeton	CR 460/20	Connects to CR 460/8.
23	Orange Ln.	CR 19/29 south of Princeton	CR 19/62
24
25	Rolling Hills Dr.	WV 20 west of Princeton	CR 20/32
26	Old Pepsi Plant Rd.	CR 19/29 near Glenwood	CR 19/39	Loops to CR 19/33.
27	Possom Hollow Rd.	US 460 east of Princeton	CR 460/17
28
29	Ford Rd.	CR 44/31, Princeton	CR 44/32
30	Surrat Rd.	WV 20, Bluewell	CR 20/47
31
32
33	Henry Hollow Rd.	WV 71, Lorton Lick	CR 71/22
34	Duck Pond Rd., Sauls Rd.	WV 71, Bluewell	CR 52/39, 52/40
35	Bailey Hollow Rd.	WV 20, Melrose	CR 20/35
36	Redsky Rd.	CR 19/33, Maple Acres	CR 19/45
37	Don Morgan Dr.	WV 20, New Hope	CR 20/31, 20/33
38
39	Shumate Rd.	CR 219/6 south of Oakvale	CR 219/34
40	Howery Rd.	CR 19/15, Kegley	CR 19/59
41	Mannering Rd.	CR 11, McComas	CR 11/15
42
43
44	Shelter Rd.	CR 460/23 south of Princeton	CR 19/32
45	Freedom Rd.	WV 71, Montcalm	CR 71/14	Loop.
46	Clay Ct.	CR 19/15 west of Kegley	CR 19/61
47
48
49
50
51
52	Shrader Hollow Rd.	US 52 near Simmons	CR 15/8
53
54	Murdoch St.	Butler St., Princeton	CR 44/21, 44/22	Connects to multiple streets.
55	Southview Dr.	CR 219/1, Princeton	CR 219/33
56	Whitlow Rd.	US 460 near Kellysville	CR 460/13
57
58	Tabernacle Hill Rd., Rail St.	WV 71, Montcalm	CR 71/25, 71/27
59
60	Glenwood Haven Rd.	CR 19/29, Glenwood	CR 19/35
61	Vest Hollow Rd.	CR 15, Simmons	CR 15/10
62	Kade Hollow Rd.	WV 71 south of Montcalm	CR 71/24
63	Rogers St.	US 52, Simmons	CR 52/28
64	Bell St. (north fork)	US 19, Princeton	City street	Loops to CR 19/30.
65
66	Woodland Ln.	CR 16/6 north of Princeton	CR 16/3 or 16/13
67	Tango Dr.	CR 219/1, Princeton	CR 219/22
68	Kingsview St.	CR 52/19 near Bluewell	CR 52/36
69	Packing Plant Rd.	CR 52/19 near Bluewell	CR 52/37
70	Pinnacle View Rd.	CR 52/19 near Bluewell	CR 52/19 (continuation)

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Gallery

A thicket of Delta roads in Glenwood, 1974. The more, the merrier! (WVDH)

Delta roads appeared on official WVDOT maps as late as 2004...but many of the last examples appear to have been oversights rather than accurate records of fact.

As a case in point, Delta Road 14 appeared on the agency's Mercer County map...even though the correct replacement number (CR 20/59) appears on an inset.

Similarly, a road near Kellysville bore both its old Delta number (56) and its correct replacement number (CR 460/13)...and the Delta number pointed to a portion of the road that had been obliterated by valley fill for Corridor Q in the 1970s, making the error even more ridiculous.

Thankfully, these errors have been corrected on newer WVDOT materials.

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