North Dakota Highway 15

North Dakota Highway 15 (ND 15) is a 134.137 mi east–west state highway in central North Dakota. The western terminus is at U.S. Route 52 (US 52) in Fessenden and the eastern terminus is at Interstate 29 (I-29) and US 81 near Thompson. ND 15 was designated in 1939.

Route description
North Dakota Highway 15 begins in Fessenden at an intersection with US 52 and travels east for about 5.5 mi before beginning a concurrency with ND 30 for 4.5 mi. After the concurrency ends, ND 15 heads east for 7 mi before leaving Wells County and entering Eddy County. Seven miles east of the county line, ND 15 begins a concurrency with US 281 and heads north for 2 mi to enter the city of New Rockford. Just north of New Rockford, ND 15 turns east and travels about 25 mi across nearly all of Eddy County to begin a concurrency with ND 20. The concurrency heads north for 8 mi before ND 20 forks north and ND 15 forks east. 3 mi farther east, the route enters Nelson County. 9 mi east of the county line, ND 15 reaches the community of Pekin. East of Pekin, the highway intersects ND 1. About 7 mi to the southeast of this intersection, ND 15 passes through McVille and about 9 mi east of McVille, the highway has a junction with ND 32. The Nelson-Grand Forks county line is 5 mi east of this intersection. 12 mi into Grand Forks County, ND 15 begins a concurrency with ND 18. The route heads 8 mi east during this concurrency, passing through Northwood. After the concurrency ends, the highway heads 7 mi east, 2 mi north, and 9 mi east before entering Thompson, a southern suburb of Grand Forks. The highway ends 1 mi east of Thompson at an interchange with Interstate 29 about 6 mi west of the Red River of the North.

The only section of North Dakota Highway 15 that is included in the National Highway System is its concurrency with US 281, which is 3 mi long. ND 15 is one of the less traveled highways in North Dakota, with average traffic in 2011 at about 200-600 vehicles per day with about 1000-2500 vehicles per day during its concurrency with US 281 and in Grand Forks County.

History
ND 15 was designated in 1939. Since then, its routing has largely remained the same, but it has undergone some changes. Southeast of New Rockford, the route originally turned north and then west to enter New Rockford from the west. It has since been straightened to intersect US 281 south of town. Between just east of Pekin and the south side of Northwood, the highway stair-stepped along through Nelson and Grand Forks counties. To reduce the number of turns, the stair-stepping portion of the highway was straightened into a diagonal and a new alignment was built that passed to the north of Northwood. At Thompson, ND 15 originally turned north briefly before turning back to the east to meet US 81. Now the highway keeps going straight to its interchange with I-29 / US 81.