FILE - Prince performs during the halftime show at the Super Bowl XLI football game in Miami, Feb. 4, 2007. The late pop superstar Prince will have a highway named after him, thanks to Minnesota lawmakers who voted Thursday, May 4, 2023, to dedicate the highway that runs past his Paisley Park museum and studios to the creator of hits including "Little Red Corvette," Let’s Go Crazy" and "When Doves Cry." (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara, File)
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) – The late pop superstar Prince will be honored with a renamed stretch of highway that runs past his Paisley Park museum and studios, under a bill that Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz was preparing to sign Tuesday.
Purple signs will soon go up along a seven-mile stretch of Minnesota Highway 5 in the Minneapolis suburbs of Chanhassen and Eden Prairie designating it the Prince Rogers Nelson Memorial Highway. Prince’s friends and fans are covering the costs.
The Minnesota Senate approved the legislation 55-5 on Thursday and sent it to the governor for his signature. The bill passed the House unanimously last month on the seventh anniversary of Prince’s death.
Paisley Park, where Prince lived and recorded, now draws visitors from around the world to Chanhassen. It’s also where Prince died on April 21, 2016, of an accidental fentanyl overdose at age 57. The 65,000-square-foot complex is now a museum run by his estate as well as an event venue and recoding studio.
The singer, songwriter, arranger and instrumentalist broke through in the late 1970s and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2004. He created hits including “Little Red Corvette,” “³Let’s Go Crazy” and “When Doves Cry,” and sold more than 100 million records worldwide.
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Trisha Ahmed is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Trisha Ahmed on Twitter: @TrishaAhmed15
