Detroit's "Mile" Roads

It has always been thought that the mile roads, beginning with 8 Mile as the baseline, came from provisions of the Northwest Territory Act of 1787. According to an article in the Southfield Eccentric (8/22/02), we were wrong.

The system originated in the Land Ordinance Act, passed by the Continental Congress, at Thomas Jefferson's urging, in 1785. Jefferson was an architect, and it appears that he had a predisposition for straight lines and right angles. The law said, in part...

A surveyor of each state shall be appointed by Congress...to divide the said territory into townships of six miles square by lines running due north and south, and others crossing at right angles...

The plats of the townships shall be marked out by subdivisions of one mile square or 640 acres and numbered from 1 to 36...

The surveyors' first task was to establish the points from which the land would be measured and numbered. A line from Michigan's east to west lake shores was labeled the baseline. This is the 8 Mile Road that we know today. It is a county line across the state, and after jumping over Lake Michigan, is the state line between Wisconsin and Illinois.

The north-south line is a meridian drawn from the bottom to the top of the state. It runs east of Lansing and approximately through Jackson and St. Ignace. These two lines, the baseline and the meridian, are the measuring points for the township range numbers which appears as a part of property descriptions on deeds.

The system did not apply in areas where private claims had been established. Thus, the ribbon farms in Detroit (which ran about a quarter-mile wide and three miles long perpendicular to the Detroit River) were not included in the system.

This article was contributed by Susan Dorris, Marketing Coordinator at Oakland County Planning & Economic Development Services in Pontiac, Michigan. Many thanks to Susan!!