The Roads and Rails of Mercer County, WV /

WV 12 and WV 112

Highway	Start	Terminus	Length (km)
WV 112	US 19 east of Bluefield	US 460 near Oakvale	23
WV 12 (historical)	US 19 (now CR 19/33) east of Bluefield	Giles County, Virginia state line, Glen Lyn	30

Overview

WV 112 is one of the less heavily trafficked state highways in Mercer County. It runs through the East River Valley connecting Bluefield to Oakvale, bypassing Princeton.

(WV State Road Commission, 1935)

As with most highways in the state, WV 112 hasn't always been what it is today. The State Road Commission's 1922 highway plan didn't include a provision for a direct Bluefield-Oakvale connection at all. But a road existed...and when the state's county highway system was inaugurated in 1933, it became designated as CR 38. CR 38 was originally a dirt road, and it featured a lot of back-and-forth railroad track criss-crossing between Ada and Ingleside.

(WV State Road Commission, 1945)

By 1945, most of CR 38 had been upgraded to the status of a state highway: WV 12. Route 12 initially had a rather strange course, running northeast from Bluefield to Oakvale, joining US 219 (later 460) for a 17-kilometre concurrency through Peterstown, then bearing due north through Monroe and Summers counties. As part of the upgrade, WV 12 was placed on a newly-built routing between Ada and Ingleside (pink arrows), relegating the old railroad-straddling route to fractional county status as CR 38/5. The west approach and Ada section were also rebuilt.

(WVDH, ca. 1971)

WV 12's routing remained unchanged through the first half of the 1970s. But there was a lot about the highway that didn't make sense:

WV 12 was effectively split into two discontinuous segments (yellow arrows), bearing in two different cardinal directions.
WV 12's utility as a direct link from Bluefield to Monroe County was useful only to drivers in Mercer County's southwestern extremity. Most motorists had to go out of their way in order to follow WV 12's course.
US 460 ran parallel to WV 12 in Mercer County and was the better-improved and higher-speed road of the two, particularly after four-lane segments began to open as part of the Appalachian Development Corridor Q program.
Adding to the absurdity, WV 12's discontinuous segments were linked by a redundant, 17-kilometre concurrency with US 460 (teal arrows)...which meant that all motorists had to use US 460, even when WV 12 was their starting point!
And the most ridiculous element of all: Like WV 24 in the 1920s, WV 12 actually exited and re-entered the state between Glen Lyn and Peterstown, resulting in an implied 8 km out-of-state concurrency that the Virginia Department of Highways was under no obligation to sign or mark.

In the 1970s, the West Virginia Department of Highways tried to wring order out of the highway map by eliminating auxiliary "alt" and "spur" routings and discontinuous segments, renumbering many of them as discrete highways with 3-digit designations. This route was no exception. In 1975, WV 12 was truncated west of Peterstown. The redundant concurrency with US 460 was eliminated, and the remaining east-west stub between Bluefield and Oakvale was renumbered as WV 112.

Shortly after being renumbered, the west end of the highway was lengthened by approximately 1 kilometre to incorporate a portion of former US 19 and 460 that had been bypassed by Corridor Q in 1977. This was the final adjustment for the road.

Prehistory

As discussed above, WV 12 in Mercer County was originally numbered as CR 38 from its western terminus to Ada and from Ingleside to Oakvale. The course of this road was in place by the 1890s. The segment between Ada and Ingleside was built anew in the 1940s, expressly for WV 12.

Etymology

"112" was obviously chosen to emphasize that the highway had previously been numbered as part of WV 12.

Photos by the author, 2000:

The Norfolk & Western line crosses the East River and WV 112 west of Hardy.

Just east of Oakvale, WV 112 intersects with the former course of US 219 and 460 at a well-built three-way intersection. Few automobiles pass this way now, but there are still ample reminders of past transportation methods at the site to go around...such as this vintage Norfolk and Western Railway caboose and the elevated trestle of the Virginian, which soars over the road and passes by in the background. At this point, WV 112 "commandeers" a stub of old US 460 in order to connect itself to 460's current Corridor Q course, where the highway formally terminates.

Fractional spur roads

Confused by WV 12 and WV 112 yet? You will be when you take one look at the confounding map above. What could explain this? Let's begin...

There are two defunct Route 12s in Mercer County. The first, CR 12, was commissioned as part of the initial numbering of county "trunk" highways in 1933. CR 12/1 through 12/4 and 12/6 through 12/9 are spur routes that intersect with the route of this CR 12, and they never touched WV 12.
When WV 12 was added in the 1940s, CR 12 was renumbered as CR 71/12 (discussed here) in order to avoid number duplication. Nevertheless, CR 12's spur routes kept their 12-prefix fractional numbers, confusing numerically-oriented transportation geeks for the next seven decades!
The future course of WV 12 and WV 112 was still part of CR 38 when the fractional road numbering system was established in the 1930s. So most of the spur roads that actually touched WV 12 bear a "38" prefix, not "12."

CR 12 wasn't the only road that had to be renumbered to avoid duplicating a new state highway. CR 20 changed to CR 9/8 due to WV 44 becoming WV 20...and it also left a fraction hanging!

Road	Names	Start	Terminus	Length (km)	Notes
12/1	Little Rich Creek Rd.	CR 71/12 (former CR 12)	CR 6 near Lashmeet	6	Original 1930s road with numbers assigned from north to south. Intersected CR 12, not WV 12.
12/2	Bullhead Rd.	CR 71/12 (former CR 12)	CR 12/3	insignificant	Original 1930s road with numbers assigned from north to south. Impassable. Intersected CR 12, not WV 12. Former alignment of CR 12's predecessor road.
12/3	Reese Harmon Ridge Rd.	CR 71/12 (former CR 12) near Lashmeet	CR 19/33	2	Original 1930s road with numbers assigned from north to south. Intersected CR 12, not WV 12. Former alignment of CR 12's predecessor road.
12/4	Mt. Olive Rd.	CR 71/12 (former CR 12), Lashmeet	CR 10/7	4	Original 1930s road with numbers assigned from north to south. Intersected CR 12, not WV 12.
12/5	Old CR 27	WV 112 (former WV 12), Ingleside	dead end	insignificant	Former stub of CR 27, bisected by I-77
12/6	Bicknal Flats Rd.	CR 71/12 (former CR 12)	CR 12/1	3	Intersected CR 12, not WV 12
12/7	Lusk Hollow Rd.	CR 71/12 (former CR 12) near Spanishburg	dead end	2	Intersected CR 12, not WV 12
12/8	Basham Rd.	CR 12/4 near Lashmeet	dead end	insignificant	Intersected CR 12, not WV 12
12/9	Dillon Ln.	CR 12/8	dead end	insignificant	Intersected CR 12, not WV 12
12/10	Church Hill Rd.	CR 12/5, Ingleside	dead end	insignificant

In the years since Mercer County's segment of WV 12 was renumbered as WV 112 in the 1970s, only four new fractional spur roads have been added. Two are Oakvale streets (ceded from municipal control to state maintenance), and two are merely bridges for shared driveways.

Road	Names	Start	Terminus	Length (km)
112/1	(shared driveway bridge)	WV 112	dead end	insignificant
112/2	(shared driveway bridge)	WV 112	dead end	insignificant
112/3	Cumberland Rd.	WV 112, Oakvale	dead end	insignificant
112/4	Railroad Ave.	WV 112, Oakvale	dead end	insignificant

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