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March 09, 2006

Interstate Highway System Celebrates 50 Years

Highways_1 From The National Academies:

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the creation of the U.S. Interstate Highway System, which is considered one of the greatest engineering achievements of the 20th century.

  • The longest Interstate is I-90, which runs from Boston to Seattle, a distance of 3,081 miles. At 75 mph it would take you 41 hours to cover that distance non-stop. The second longest is I-80, which covers the 2,907 miles between New York City and San Francisco.
  • Interstates 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 35, 40, 70, 75, 80, 90, 94 and 95 are all more than 1,000 miles long.
  • The shortest Interstate is I-878 in New York City, which is all of seven-tenths of a mile long. That's 3,696 feet.
  • The highest Interstate route number is I-990 north of Buffalo, NY. The lowest is I-4 across Florida.
  • The only state without any Interstate routes is Alaska.
  • Interstates carry nearly 60,000 people per route-mile per day, 26 times the amount of all other roads, and 22 times the amount of rail passenger services. Over the past 40 years, that's the equivalent of a trip to the moon for every person in California, New York, Texas, and New Jersey combined.

More here.

Posted by Azra Raza at 05:36 AM | Permalink

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Comments

"The only state without any Interstate routes is Alaska."

Where do the interstate routes is Hawaii go?

Posted by: m | Mar 9, 2006 7:47:01 AM

Alaska does have interstates as well, although they aren't signed as such and basically just exist on paper for funding purposes:

http://www.alaskaroads.com/Interstate-ends.htm

Posted by: spinfire | Mar 9, 2006 8:15:35 AM

Hawaii has one freeway (I think on the Big Island). It's several miles long. It took many years to build.

You see, the geology is lava, filled with lava tubes. They kept sinking concrete pillars that sank through the tubes. And sank. And sank. Eventually the pillars got tired of sinking, and they managed to finish the freeway.

Posted by: Craig Shergold | Mar 11, 2006 11:00:04 PM

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