Maryland Route 404

Maryland Route 404
Route information
Maintained by MDSHA
Length	24.61 mi[1] (39.61 km)
Existed	1933–present
Tourist routes	Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway
Major junctions
West end	MD 662 in Wye Mills
Major intersections	US 50 in Wye Mills MD 309 in Queen Anne MD 303 in Queen Anne MD 480 in Hillsboro MD 312 near Ridgely MD 328 in West Denton MD 313 / MD 619 in Denton MD 16 near Denton MD 313 in Andersontown MD 16 near Andersontown
East end	DE 404 at Delaware border near Andersontown
Location
Country	United States
State	Maryland
Counties	Talbot, Queen Anne's, Caroline
Highway system
Maryland highway system Interstate US State Scenic Byways
← MD 402 → MD 405

Maryland Route 404 (MD 404) is a major highway on Maryland's Eastern Shore in the United States. Signed east-west, it runs 24.61 miles (39.61 km) from MD 662 in Wye Mills on the border of Queen Anne's and Talbot counties, southeast to the Delaware state line in Caroline County, where the road continues as Delaware Route 404 (DE 404) to the Five Points intersection near Rehoboth Beach. The Maryland and Delaware state highways together cross the width of the Delmarva Peninsula and serve to connect the Baltimore–Washington Metropolitan Area by way of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and U.S. Route 50 (US 50) with the Delaware Beaches. Along the way, MD 404 passes through mostly farmland and woodland as well as the towns of Queen Anne, Hillsboro, and Denton. The route is a four-lane divided highway between US 50 and east of Denton, with the remainder of the route a two-lane undivided road.

MD 404 was designated by 1933 to run from Matapeake (where the Annapolis–Matapeake ferry across the Chesapeake Bay connected the route to Annapolis), east along present-day MD 8, US 50, and MD 662 to Wye Mills, where it followed its current routing to the Delaware border. By 1946, the route's western terminus was moved to MD 2 north of Annapolis, where it headed east across the Chesapeake Bay on the Sandy Point-Matapeake ferry. The western terminus was cut back to Wye Mills in 1949, having been replaced by US 50 west of there. The route was realigned to bypass Queen Anne and Hillsboro in 1960 and Denton in 1987.

Since MD 404 is the main route for travelers between the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and the Delaware Beaches, the road experienced a high accident rate. To improve on this situation, the Maryland State Highway Administration planned to widen the two-lane portions of the route into a four-lane divided highway. A portion of the road east of Tuckahoe Creek in Caroline County received $7.7 million for widening as a part of the stimulus bill signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2009; this section was widened in 2012. Widening on the remainder of MD 404 between US 50 and Denton was completed in November 2017.