"Otay Mesa Road" existed as a dirt road by 1927. A paved road connected San Ysidro to Brown Field and the easternmost ranches in the Otay Mesa area by 1935. Discussions were held between San Diego County and National City over the maintenance of the road in 1950, since it was used by trucks travelling to the landfill. The majority of SR 905, running in parallel with Otay Mesa Road from I-5 to SR 125, was added to the state highway system and the California Freeway and Expressway System in 1959 as Legislative Route 281, and became part of SR 75 in the 1964 renumbering. Planning was underway for the extension of SR 75 east to the then-proposed SR 125 by 1963. The California Highway Commission endorsed the routing for SR 75 in 1965 along Otay Mesa Road, away from future residential developments. There were plans as early as 1970 to have a highway heading southwest to a new border crossing that would bypass the Tijuana area. The next year, James Moe, the state public works director, subsequently asked the California State Legislature to lengthen SR 75 to connect to this new crossing, rather than using I-5 to make the connection. Following this, in 1972, the legislature added a new SR 117, which extended this part of SR 75 southwest to the Mexican border near Border Field State Park, to the state highway system, and a southerly extension of SR 125 to the border at Otay Mesa to the state highway and Freeway and Expressway systems. Two years later, planning began for the construction of the Otay Mesa crossing and the construction of SR 75 to connect it to I-5 and I-805. Later, the Comprehensive Planning Organization (CPO), the local association of municipal governments, recommended using $4 million of federal funding for the construction of SR 75. The CPO later endorsed expediting construction of the freeway before completion of the border crossing, so that the freeway would primarily serve border traffic, thus preventing land speculation in Otay Mesa. While Mexican authorities wanted the crossing constructed in 1975, the CPO indicated that the funding for SR 75 would not be available until at least 1980, or even 1985. Following this, Representative Lionel Van Deerlin attempted to accelerate the construction of the crossing, even though there was no funding for the highway. Construction began on the southern portion of SR 75 in