The Paul Bunyan Road as a city street was a long undertaking. The road of course first started out as a railroad to deliver logs to the Springfield Cedar Mill, that evolved into the Paul Bunyan Lumber Company. When the mill closed in 1967, traffic on the road greatly diminished, though with agreement Sierra Pacific Industries utilized it on occasions. However it was a private road. When the Cherry Terrace subdivisions came into existence in the early 1960s, both the city of Susanville and county of Lassen set their sights on the Paul Bunyan Road as a means for better traffic. At the November 6, 1978 meeting of the Susanville City Council it was revealed that some of the first easements for right-of-way for this road was approved. However, it would be still decades away before it became a reality.