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A timeline of San Antonio road travel history

presented by Texas Transportation Museum, San Antonio

1847 – Texas United Stated Mail Line was running two stagecoaches a week between Houston and San Antonio.

1848 – Bi-monthly stage coach service running between San Antonio and Corpus Christi, later extended to Brownsville.

1848 – Stage coach service from SA to Austin by Tarbox & Brown

1849 – Stage coach service from SA to Port Lavaca

1851 – Henry Skillman begins running a stage coach service between San Antonio and El Paso.

1851 – Stagecoach service from SA to Indianola

1854 – First volunteer fire company is formed.

1857 – George S Giddings takes over the El Paso contract and extends service to San Diego, CA. It initially took seven weeks to travel the 1,476 mile journey but this was cut to fours weeks. Called the Southern Overland Mail, the service lasted until the beginning of the civil war, when the federal contract is revoked.

1880 – Three horse carriage manufacturers operate in San Antonio

1889 – Some downtown streets are paved with mesquite blocks.

1890 – First traffic signal installed, on Commerce Street, near I&GN station

1904 – City ordinance requires automobiles be numbered.

1905 – First motorized vehicles take part in Battle of Flowers parade

1909 - First Ford dealership opened

1910 – SAPD acquires its first automobile, an air cooled Franklin, for patrol work, plus motorcycles

1910 – First motorized fire trucks acquired

1912 – Widening of Commerce Street begins

1913 – Broadway is created out of Avenue C and River Avenue

1915 – Old Spanish Trail connecting St. Augustine, FL, to San Diego, CA, via San Antonio, is begun

1917 – The first bus in San Antonio is built in the shops of the San Antonio Public Service Company

1919 – San Antonio gains first TxDot offices as headquarters of one of its six divisions. TxDot was created in 1917.

1919 - Headquarters of the “Old Spanish Trail” moved to San Antonio.

1919 - Lone Star Motor Company sets up an automobile and truck plant at 515 Roosevelt.

1922 - Lone Star Motor Company goes out of business.

1923 – First factory built bus is acquired

1923 – First electric traffic light is installed

1923 – SAPD creates an automobile theft squad

1923 – The last police horse is retired

1927 – Last use of horse drawn fire equipment

1928 – San Antonio motorist guide still advises not to leave the city if it’s raining, has recently rained or rain is in the forecast

1929 - “Old Spanish Trail” completed, 14 years after it began, running from St. Augustine, FL, to San Diego, CA. Within Texas the route becomes HWY 90 and runs through San Antonio.

1932 – Texas Board of County and District Road Indebtedness is created to pay back local authorities for roads created by bonds and other means which were now part of the state highway system.

1933 – San Antonio becomes the first major US city to abandon its street rail car service

1935 – SAPD patrol cars are fitted with 2 way radios

1936 – First traffic meters are installed

1942 – The privately owned San Antonio Transit Company takes over the previously city owned bus service

1943 – Planning begins in San Antonio for the post war free way system as the city expands rapidly

1949 – San Antonio’s first expressway, HWY 281, is completed

1949 – First ľ mile section of US 87, now IH10, is completed between Woodlawn Avenue to Martin Street

1956 – First section of IH35, from Alamo Street to Broadway is completed

1957 – First section of Loop 410 is completed.

1957 - IH35 now reaches south to Division Avenue

1959 – The city owned SA Transit System takes over from the SA Transit Company

1960 – City first mall, Wonderland, now Crossroads, is opened

1964 – IH10 now reaches De Zavala to the west and exceeds city limits to the east

1964 – First section of Loop 1604 is opened, from Bandera to IH 10

1967 – Loop 410, nearly 52 miles round, is completed.

1967 – A section of Loop 1604, west from HWY 90 is opened

1967 – Breathalyzers are introduced by SAPD

1973 – Use of radar to catch speeders introduced

1978 – VIA Metropolitan Service takes over the city bus system, making it a county wide service

1978 – McAllister free way, the improved HWY 281, is finally opened after a decade long political struggle to prevent its creation

1979 – Loop 1604 is completed

1985 – Mobile digital terminals, MDT’s, installed in SAPD patrol cars

1990 – Downtown bicycle patrols introduced

2006 - November 17, Friday – First production vehicles come off the production line at new Toyota factory in San Antonio. Peak production, when achieved, should be one new Tundra pick up every 73 seconds, of 750 a day, 200,000 year.

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