The advent of the automobile brought about a desire to travel farther, and a demand for better roads and highways in Leelanau County. It also created the need for a network of highways to help travelers get to places as easily as possible, and in 1918, Michigan started its own highway system using numbers. Leelanau County received its share of state highway designations, and over time the roads were improved and relocated in some places. These early modern highways, some of them on gravel roads, would be quite foreign to the modern day driver and motor vehicle, but these highways used existing roads and were routed as best as possible on what roads were available. A short history of these highways may give people of today some insight into early 20th Century motoring in Leelanau County.

The state highway numbers located in Leelanau County today are the same except for one, and its designation was changed to extend one of the highways across Michigan. In 1920, M-22 went through Greilickville, but in the early days, it followed Cherry Bend and Center Roads on its way to Suttons Bay, and also followed what is now M-109 until 1922, when it was routed over the Glen Lake Narrows. In 1929 and 1930, M-22 followed the road around the eastern shore of Glen Lake while the bridge over the Narrows was being repaired or replaced.

In 1936, M-22's relocation along the shore of the West Arm of Grand Traverse Bay began when construction proceeded to Crain Hill Road, then routing M-22 onto it to return it to Center Road. The highway's routing remained this way until 1949 when it was realigned along the shoreline to Suttons Bay. Meanwhile, the gravel stretch of M-22 between Leland and Northport was paved in 1945, and today, the Cherry Bend/Center Road stretch of old M-22 is part of County Road 633.

During the 1930's, highway M-76 ran for seven miles from M-22 in Empire to County Road 669. However, in 1940, this road was re-designated M-72, making it disconnected from the rest of the highway by about 45 miles. In 1946, this western segment of M-72 was extended to Traverse City when it was designated along county roads, and in 1948, some sharp curves along this stretch were bypassed by a new alignment.

M-204 starts at M-22 in Suttons Bay and returns to M-22 south of Leland. Originally a gravel road, it was later paved on the gravel alignment. Just east of the village of Lake Leelanau, a new short alignment was built to bypass a curve in that area, and in 1969, M-204 was totally rebuilt from Lake Leelanau to south of Leland, smoothing out a series of curves along the stretch. Phillip Street in Lake Leelanau was widened and used as part of the new stretch, and old M-204, follows Main Street from the St. Joseph/Phillip Street intersection northwesterly to the edge of the village.

M-201, which zig-zags its way through Northport from M-22, takes the traveler to north of the village, where it junctions with county roads, and they point the way to Leelanau State Park, the Grand Traverse Lighthouse, and Peterson Park.

M-209 was a unique highway in Leelanau County. From the 1920's, it was the shortest state highway in Michigan, serving as a spur route from M-109 to a U.S. Coast Guard Station access road in Glen Haven, a total distance of 4/10 of a mile. It remained Michigan's shortest state highway to the mid 1990's, when the designation was retired and the road returned to county control.

Authored by Thomas Baird