From my understanding is that originally providence was supposed to be bypassed. 95 would have gone from Groton and then the existing rt 395 to Boston… RI made an argument that the existing military facilities at the now non military quonset Point needed to be connected to the network. I am pretty sure that the current 295 was supposed to be the original 95 through RI, and then another argument was made that the jewelry district needed access to the highway so then it was going to be current rt 10, but then an argument was made that the port of providence needed to be connected, so we got the Thurber’s ave s curve….I could be wrong but that is the story that I had heard…imagine if to get to 95 you had to take rt 6 or rt 44 to get out of RI?