Encyclopedia Of Detroit
Fisher Freeway
The Fisher Freeway is a portion of Interstate 75 (I-75), an interstate highway system that runs north to south from Sault Ste. Marie in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan all the way to Miami, Florida. Named after Detroit Fisher auto body family, the Fisher Freeway portion of the interstate runs from the southern section of Detroit up to its merger with I-375, where it becomes known as the Walter P. Chrysler Freeway through all of Oakland County.
In accordance with an assignment that was made in May 1958 by the tri-party agreement between the Michigan State Highway Department, the Board of Wayne County Road Commissioners, and the City of Detroit, an engineering and planning report for I-75, the Fisher Freeway (from Outer Drive to Gratiot Ave.) within the City of Detroit was submitted on May 5, 1961, after more than two years of study by the Board of Wayne County Road Commissioners. Inside this report, the foundations of the Fisher Freeway were laid out.
Detroit’s Freeway system, first called an expressway, became part of the interstate highway system created by the Eisenhower Administration in the 1950s. A 14-mile roadway connecting the Downriver area to Downtown Detroit, I-75 Southbound opened, in stages, between 1967 and 1970.
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