Route 37 (RI)

Route 37
Lincoln Avenue Freeway
Highways in the Cranston area with Route 37 in red
Route information
Maintained by RIDOT
Length:	3.47 mi (5.58 km)
Existed:	1963 – present
Major junctions
West end:	Natick Avenue in Cranston
	I‑295 in Cranston I‑95 in Warwick
East end:	US 1 in Warwick
Location
Counties:	Providence, Kent
Highway system
Rhode Island Routes ← Route 33 US 44 →

Rhode Island Routes

Route 37, also known as the Lincoln Avenue Freeway, is a state highway running 3.47 miles (5.58 km) in Providence County and Kent County, Rhode Island, United States. A freeway for its entire length, it serves the cities of Cranston and Warwick and is also a major east–west freeway in the Providence metropolitan area, linking T. F. Green Airport with Interstate 295. The western terminus of Route 37 is an at-grade intersection with Natick Avenue in Cranston. The freeway has numbered interchanges with I-295, Rhode Island Route 2, Pontiac Avenue, and I-95 before terminating at a trumpet interchange with U.S. Route 1 in Warwick.

Originally conceived as a freeway linking Scituate with suburban Warwick, the proposed alignment of Route 37 was later shortened to an alignment linking I-295 with I-95. Construction on the freeway began in 1963 and was completed by 1969. An eastward extension across upper Narragansett Bay was proposed in 1966; this proposal would have extended Route 37 north to I-195 and I-295 in Attleboro, Massachusetts, completing a beltway around the city of Providence. This extended route was approved and given the I-895 designation in 1968, but the extension was ultimately canceled by the Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT). In the 1980s, Route 37 was included in proposals for an eastward extension of Interstate 84 from Hartford, Connecticut to Rhode Island, but this alignment was also canceled. RIDOT has long-range plans to extend Route 37 east to Route 117 in Downtown Warwick, but plans for a westward extension have been abandoned.