For people who may have recently moved to the CSRA, getting from one end of town to another can be more than just a little confusing and early GPS was about as useful as a two-legged table to navigate through the city.
It is possible to traverse the entirety of Richmond County without technically changing roads, but the name of the same road may change multiple times. Starting at the Savannah River and Augusta Canal at Cabela Drive, travel south and the road becomes Alexander Drive, then Berckmans Road.
Somewhere near Surrey Center, the road becomes Highland Avenue, but it only keeps the name for a few miles; once past the Daniel Field Airport as one passes over Gordon Highway, it becomes Wheeless Road, then Ruby Drive, then Richmond Hill Road until finally ending at Windsor Spring Road.
Whew!
And what is the name “Wheeless” Road all about? Supposedly, it was named for the elementary school nearby, not some war hero too poor to afford a proper horse carriage.
Atlanta is known for having a thousand variations of “peachtree” in road names, and before Columbia County made changes to its street naming protocol, one might think that every road in the county either originated or ended in the long gone, tiny hamlet of Belair. There is Belair Road, Old Belair Road, South Belair Road and North Belair Road; and, of course, it is possible to travel north on South Belair and vice versa.
A couple of years ago, a street in Augusta was named one of “America’s Most Charming Streets in America,” according to a poll conducted by the photobook company, Mixbook. They picked Broad Street for its charming name; yeah, the road is broad, but it is really kind of a bland name when it comes to other road names like Lover’s Lane, which is smack dab in the middle of a heavy industrial area and about the least romantic boulevard in the city.
One reason for Augusta’s unique roadway system is due to the way the city grew over the centuries. Rather than being plotted and planned on paper in a grid format, like Washington, D.C. or New York City, most of the CSRA simply added roads as needed, as the city sprawled outward.
Therefore, some roads received their names due to their final destinations, such as Fury’s Ferry and Sand Bar Ferry, which are named for the ferries that once carried people across the Savannah. Others, like Flowing Wells and Windsor Spring are named after the artisanal springs people once used to avoid having to dig their own wells or grab buckets of water straight out of the Savannah River.
There is also the internationally famous “Tobacco Road” that was named for its utilitarian purpose of being the main road used to haul loads of cured tobacco for transport up and down the Savannah to market.
Augusta wouldn’t be called the Garden City without street names that gave a nod to the game of golf and there are plenty of examples, so many that Stan Byrdy could devote a book totally to them. We don’t have a Fore! Avenue near one of the many driving ranges, but we should.
We really ought to have a street named for John Daley, after all, he really is the embodiment of most golf fans in spirit. Everyone needs a Daley living in their garage, but I am sure the fellas with the green jackets would quietly object and then buy up every garage within eyeshot, now that he has been evicted from Hooters.
Some Augusta road names can be a tad misleading. Twentieth century students in Augusta were told that the CSRA’s most vital asphalt byway was named for President George Washington in honor of his 1791 visit to the city; It was said that Washington himself traveled on “Washington Road.”
But, in fact, he didn’t.
It is pretty much established in the historical record that Washington came to Augusta by way of Waynesboro, and nothing indicates he ever went as far west as where modern Washington Road starts.
In a roundabout way, Washington Road is named after the first president as it was named for its destination, which is Washington County. That county is named after the famous general, even though he never set foot within its boundaries.
Most road names downtown honor some well known figure from the city or state’s past and famous Revolutionary war heroes like George Walton, Nathanial Greene and William Few, Jr. are all represented; but, occasionally, some roads get a name that ends up in the local hall of infamy.
No one on the Augusta Commission seems to remember just when the road out in front of the Jamestown Community Center was renamed Sammie Sias Lane, our most recent politician who got knocked down a notch or two by the FBI. The name change likely slid through committee on a wink and landed on the consent agenda with most left unaware.
Thankfully, the commission later rectified their mistake.
Once upon a time, I petitioned the commission to rename a downtown street in honor of Butterfly McQueen, of “Gone with the Wind” fame, but the presentation was bad timing on my part.
During that time, Commissioner Bill Fennoy was attempting to remove names from street signs, and so the proposal, as Carol Burnett would say, went with the wind.
Scott Hudson is the Senior Investigative Reporter, editorialist and weekly columnist for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com
