In the 1830s, general Alexander Bashilov, then employed by the Governor of Moscow, planned the first regular grid of city streets north from Petrovsky Palace; two streets in the area still retain Bashilov's name.
In the 1890s-1900s, the highway was gradually urbanized, with factories and residential quarters, ranging from working-class barracks to luxury country homes of the Morozov family, Nikolay Eichenwald and Fyodor Schechtel.