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Safety Rest Areas: Eastland County Eastbound

(New facility opened Spring 2016)
Eastland County Westbound is the partner for Eastland County Eastbound
2 sets of Men's and Women's Restrooms Drinking Water Family/Assisted Restroom Handicap Access Interpretive Displays Picnic Tables Storm Shelter

Image Gallery

View inside the lobby area with interpretive displays of local history, culture and geology
An outdoor display interprets local flora and fauna
The new building features full-height windows and slender steel column supports that resemble tree canopies
A welcome sign greets visitors to the new Eastland County Safety Rest Area
spacer Building front entrance features a dramatic butterfly roof that routes rainwater into a collection tank.
Building front entrance features a dramatic butterfly roof that routes rainwater into a collection tank.
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Location

  • IH 20 - Eastbound, just east of Ranger
  • Latitude = 32.4569 Longitude = -98.6483
  • Milepost: 353

Features

  • 2 sets of Men's and Women's Restrooms
  • Handicap Access
  • Air-conditioned lobby and restrooms
  • Interpretive Displays
  • Diaper Changing stations
  • Picnic Tables
  • Drinking Water
  • Playground
  • Family/Assisted Restroom
  • Separate Truck and Passenger Parking
  • Group Picnic Facility

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  • Storm Shelter

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    Miscellaneous

    • New facility opened Spring 2016. The building design with its simple form and earthly material in harmony with their surrounding, is a tribute to park buildings, constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) in the 1930's, whose remnants were found nearby. The building's butterfly roof form is an expressive method of rooftop rainwater harvesting which underlays sustainable building practices found in many CCC's structures
    • This part of Interstate 20 follows the route of the Bankhead Highway constructed in the 1920's and stretched from Washington D.C. to San Diego, California. A section of the old Bankhead Highway is located within the Westbound site, and is marked by a Historical Marker dedicated on April 13, 2016.
    • Eastland County is named for William Mosby Eastland, an officer during the Texas Revolution. Eastland was the first of the 17 captives, and the only officer, to draw a fatal black bean during the Black Bean Episode
    • The eastbound facility is just east Ranger (named after Texas Rangers) where oil well McClesky No. 1 drilled in October 1917 began a mammoth oil boom that led the oil industry to reappraise Texas as an oil producing area and allayed fears of national oil shortage which had been growing since 1900
    • The eastbound facility is 16 miles west of Thurber which was a principble bituminous coal mining town in Texas in 1918
    • Located in the "Panhandle Plains" region of Texas. Visit our Texas Highways Magazine to find out interesting places and events happening in this region.