State Highway 118 (SH 118) is a state highway in the U.S. state of Texas that runs from Big Bend National Park north to Kent and passes through the towns of Study Butte, Alpine, and Fort Davis. SH 118 is maintained by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). The road lies entirely within the Trans-Pecos region of Texas. SH 118 is a two-lane road along its length except for a section in Alpine where the route follows the path of U.S. Route 67 and U.S. Route 90. All of the route except for the section between Big Bend National Park and Farm to Market Road 170 is included in the Texas Historical Commission's Texas Mountain Trail.
The road passes through or along several state and federal parks and other wildlife preservation areas. These include Big Bend National Park and Fort Davis National Historic Site of the National Park Service, Elephant Mountain Wildlife Management Area and Davis Mountains State Park operated by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, and the Davis Mountains Preserve of the Nature Conservancy of Texas. The road is in the Chihuahuan Desert and passes mostly through scrub land except in the higher elevations of the Davis Mountains where the road encounters forested sky islands. The road also provides access to the University of Texas at Austin's McDonald Observatory.
History
In 1927, the Texas Legislature authorized the Texas Highway Department, a precursor agency to TxDOT, to construct Davis Mountains State Park Highway after what was then the State Parks Board had failed to acquire parkland for a state park within the Davis Mountains. The road was to include portions of the present SH 118 and State Highway 166 now known as the Davis Mountains Scenic Loop. On August 17, 1926, SH 118 was designated from Marfa to Presidio. On March 19, 1929, the route was extended north to Fort Davis. On May 1, 1931, SH 118 was replaced by SH 17 and SH 118 was instead assigned on the old route of SH 3 from Alpine to Fort Davis which was completed. By 1932, the parks board finally acquired land for a park ending the need for a park highway. The road, which had then been built from Fort Davis to Fowlkes Ranch, was designated as SH 166. On December 22, 1936, SH 118 extended south to Terlingua.
On September 26, 1939 when the state highway commission approved the General Redesignation of the State Highway System and created the state's Highway Designation Files, SH 118 had been extended north to Kent, replacing SH 233. With this new designation, the route was largely the same as the present with the exception of taking a more westerly path at a point near Adobe Walls Mountain in southern Brewster County in order to terminate at Terlingua rather than Study Butte; although, except for the stretch between Alpine and Fowlkes Ranch, the road was unpaved and even classified as primitive in places. The stretch of the road through Fort Davis to the present intersection with SH 166 at Nunn Hill was concurrent with SH 166. On October 30 of that same year, a spur route of former State Highway 227 was designated as an extension of SH 118 causing the road to terminate at SH 227. This extension followed the easternmost path of present-day FM 170 to its terminus, and then down the southernmost stretch of the present SH 118 and the westernmost portion of the current park road ending at the intersection of what is now the Old Maverick Road within the present Big Bend National Park.
On May 29, 1941, the state canceled the designation of SH 118 from Alpine to SH 227 with the Terlingua Spur between Terlingua and SH 227 receiving the designation of State Spur 121 and the portion between Terlingua and Alpine reverting to county jurisdiction. On November 24 of that same year, SH 166 was given its present termini with its concurrent designation over SH 118 from Fort Davis to Nunn Hill dropped. The cancellation of the route south of Alpine was short lived. On January 8, 1946, SH 118 was extended south from Alpine. On February 20, 1946, Spur 121 was cancelled because the portion in the park was taken over by the National Park service and the remainder was remote from the state highway system, making it uneconomical to maintain. On September 9, 1947, SH 118 was extended south . On July 15, 1949, SH 118 was extended south . On July 25, 1951, SH 118 was extended south . On December 18, 1951, SH 118 was extended south to its current terminus.
Route description
SH 118 is within Brewster, Jeff Davis, and Culberson counties.