A subsequent proposal based on a review of the 1960 plan moved I-70 to a new alignment that triggered community opposition, which resulted in a new design process in the late 1960s.

Large stone markers featuring reliefs of the Korean Peninsula were erected in the median of I-70 in Myersville and Mount Airy in 2004.

As the Interstate approaches Hagerstown, it crosses a branch of Conococheague Creek and CSX Transportation's Lurgan Subdivision ahead of its cloverleaf interchange with I-81 (Maryland Veterans Memorial Highway).

I-70 crosses Beaver and Black Rock creeks and gains an eastbound climbing lane as the highway ascends South Mountain and passes through Greenbrier State Park.

[7] The westbound rest area is where the DC snipers, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, were apprehended by police in October 2002.

Westbound I-70 has a climbing lane as the highway descends Braddock Mountain and has partial interchanges with US 40 (National Pike) and US 40 Alt.

Eastbound I-70 receives a ramp from MD 180 and Ballenger Creek Pike and crosses over the state highway before reaching a directional interchange with I-270 and US 40.

I-270 heads south toward Washington, D.C., as the Eisenhower Memorial Highway, taking over the name from I-70, while US 40 (Frederick Freeway) exits to the north and joins I-70 in a concurrency.

I-70 heads east as a six-lane freeway and meets MD 85 (Buckeystown Pike) at a single-point urban interchange (SPUI) south of downtown Frederick.

County-maintained Old National Pike parallels the north side of the Interstate east to Mount Airy via New Market, where I-70 has a diamond interchange with MD 75 (Green Valley Road).

[1][6] I-70 is closely paralleled by MD 144 (Frederick Road) on its eastbound side as the freeway briefly passes through Carroll County.

[1][6] The westbound direction has a mileage sign with approximate values for Columbus, Ohio; St. Louis, Missouri; Denver, Colorado; and the small town of Cove Fort, Utah, at the opposite end of I-70.

Eastbound MD 570 traffic that wishes to access Cooks Lane has to make a U-turn at the terminus and exit from a westbound loop ramp.

[16] The third section of Baltimore National Pike was built from Morgan Station Road into Carroll County just west of the Patapsco River in 1952 and 1953.

[17] The fourth section was constructed to closely parallel the existing alignment of US 40 from Ijamsville Road in Bartonsville to just east of the Monocacy River.

US 40 was reconstructed as a divided highway from Tonoloway Creek at the eastern end of Hancock parallel to the Potomac River to the community of Millstone at what is now the southern terminus of MD 615 in 1961.

In 1984, MDSHA completed the I-70 Corridor Planning Study, which examined the 5.3-mile (8.5 km) segment of I-70 from the Mount Philip Road overpass between Braddock Mountain and Frederick to just east of MD 144 at the western end of the project underway to relocate the Interstate through Bartonsville.

The four-lane freeway was plagued with closely spaced interchanges with substandard acceleration and deceleration lanes and curve radiuses.

For instance, travelers aiming to move from southbound US 15 to westbound I-70 needed to use US 40 through Frederick's heavily commercialized Golden Mile to join I-70 at exit 48.

[56] In response to the new sense of urgency, the head of Baltimore's Department of Planning, Philip Darling, put together a 1960 report titled A Study for an East–West Expressway.

[56] Darling proposed I-70N pass through Gwynns Falls/Leakin Park and the Rosemont neighborhood and head east between Franklin and Mulberry streets.

[59] The route of the East–West Expressway in the 10-D System would require condemning a greater number of properties compared to Darling's plan due to I-70N and I-95 passing through several residential neighborhoods south of the CBD.

Several of the civic groups with which Darling had compromised opposed Expressway Consultants's uncompromising position toward their route through Leakin Park.

[56] Despite the major opposition, the initiation of federal funding allowed the city to start acquiring property in the Franklin–Mulberry corridor in 1966 to clear the way for construction of the stretch of freeway that did get built between Pulaski Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

[9] In 1983, however, I-595 was canceled as well due to escalating costs; saving funds for the original I-595 freeway would detract from more pressing needs like maintenance of city streets and rapid transit.

The Interstate would curve to the northeast and traverse Dead Run and Franklintown Road, then pass through a short tunnel underneath a hill in Leakin Park.

The Interstate would have met the western end of I-170 at a directional T interchange where Baltimore Street and Amtrak's Northeast Corridor cross over Gwynns Falls.

I-70's junction with I-95 would have been a directional T interchange constructed over a rail yard on the Mount Clare Branch of CSX Transportation's Baltimore Terminal Subdivision.

Most of the southern part of the route in Montgomery County passes through suburban areas around Rockville and Gaithersburg that are home to many biotech firms.

North of the Gaithersburg area, the road continues through the northern part of Montgomery County, passing Germantown and Clarksburg as a six- to eight-lane highway with an HOV lane in the northbound direction only.