on the west side of Houston]]
('''BW8'''), the '''Sam Houston Parkway''', along with the '''Sam Houston Tollway''', is a
Beltway around the city of
Houston, Texas ,
United States , lying entirely within
Harris County . Beltway 8, a
State Highway , runs mostly along the
Frontage Road s, only using the main lanes where they are free (mostly on the north side of Houston). The main lanes elsewhere are the Sam Houston Tollway, a
Toll Road owned and operated by the
Harris County Toll Road Authority . East of Houston, the Tollway crosses the
Houston Ship Channel on the
Jesse H. Jones Memorial Bridge , a
Toll Bridge ; this forms a gap in Beltway 8 between
Interstate Highway 10 (
Baytown-East Freeway ) and
State Highway 225 (
Pasadena Freeway ).
As Of 2006 , the main lanes are not completed in the northeast quadrant, roughly between
U.S. Highway 59 (
Eastex Freeway ) and
U.S. Highway 90 (
Crosby Freeway ). This piece should be completed between 2007 and 2009.
Beltway 8 is the intermediate beltway in the Houston area. The inner beltway -
Interstate Highway 610 - lies completely within Houston, and the outer beltway -
State Highway 99 (
Grand Parkway ) - is nowhere near complete.
Portions of the West Belt, as sections of the Beltway are called by their compass names, are in various stages of expansion due to high traffic volumes. The remaining portion is a small section of
Tollway between
US 90 and US 59 northeast of Houston, which
The Tollway's construction was piecemealed from the opening of the West Belt in the mid-1970s to the completion of the South Belt in the mid-1990s. The
Jesse H. Jones Memorial Bridge , the Tollway's crossing of the
Houston Ship Channel , was constructed by the
Texas Turnpike Authority (TTA) and was opened in the early 1980s.
The longest free section of main lanes is on the north side of Houston, stretching from Ella Boulevard east to the current end of the (
North Freeway ).
Three shorter free sections also exist:
These all exist in order to allow federal funding to have been used to build the freeway-to-freeway interchanges at the Baytown-East, Gulf and Southwest Freeways.
The
Frontage Road s are general continuous, and allow for slower free travel along the tolled segments. Only one break exists in the frontage roads; there are also several locations where one must turn to stay on them:
Clockwise (CW) reads down and counterclockwise (CCW) reads up.
