L I ti C O L W
H I G H W A. Y
THE widely heralded plan for signing and marking a system of national highways is not all ‘beer and skittles.’ A formidable opposition which has been dormant, but extant, nevertheless, raised its head out of oblivion at the Chicago road show and emitted a powerful and attention-compelling squawk,” says the editor of Western Highways Builder “Highway engineers and public officials from the Atlantic seaboard divested themselves of pungent excoriations of the entire plan in general and its individually repulsive aspects in particular “This was to be expected Of all the idealistic proposals yet advanced for the administration of "highways, none can equal this for pure imbecility The standardization of warning signs is the only feature that has prevented the project from being laughed out of court ere this, but 1 fear even this passably meritorious ramification will not be sufficient to save it from complete dissolution or radical modification,” he continues.
“To ask a motorist to travel from Kensington, Conn , to Keokuk, Iowa, with one eye on a signboard and the other on a key map, is to invite him to a ease of acute myopia and a chronic megrim ”
Recent surveys, conducted by such representative bodies as the National Automobile Chamber of Commerce and the Bureau of Public Roads in conjunction with the State Highway Departments of the various states, indicate that aI>out 15% of motor traffic on the highways is Trucks and busses and about 85% is passenger carrying automobiles Any signing system is naturally of very little value to the drivers of commercial vehicles and common carriers as ordinarily tlicy travel .well-defined, short routes. It is the S5% passenger traffic which is interested in the information that properly designed signboards will convey On country roads, particularly in the western half of the United Staler, a large proportion of this passenger traffic is composed of vacationists and tourists seeking pleasure, health and education While primarily pleasure-bent,they unconsciously al>sorb a vast amount of history anti geography The romance attached to such trips is what leaves the lasting impression and gives to the participant a definite, fixed and permanent element of education, is the verdict of G S Hoag, Secretary of the Lincoln Highway Ass'n There will always be a greater patriotic glow in the thought of having made a trip over a considerable portion of the Lincoln Highway, the Yellowstone Trail, tl Dixie Highway or the Santa Fe Trail tha.. could ever attach to the retrospection of a similar trek over U S Highway Number 11 or Number GO More and more each year Americans are touring their own country and, by so doing, spend at home what" they would otherwise annually spend in search of pleasure in foreign lands This is as it should be, and every effort should be made to encourage it. says Hoag.
The editor of the Portland, Ore, Journal conunents os follows on the historic feature of such tours and the importance of adhering to the old established and historic names “There is no Columbia River highway on the official maps at Washington It’s ' merely ‘No 20 ’
“There is no Lincoln Highway Its J official designation is a number
“ ‘The Old Oregon Trail/ as a designation, is officially dead, and in its place is u couple of meaningless numerals. The Washington bureaucrats have blotted out from the road maps and records the mighty meaning conveyed in those symbolic words, 'The Old Oregon Trail'
“The vast trek in which the caravan of covered wagons wore down the earth until
TYPICAL ol the slCn* placed and mnintainc by the State of Ohio for the purpose c marking it* highway*. Thi* sign well illui trote* the real value of the suggestion made b the American Road Congress.
For purposes of records and accounting on highways built jointly by the Federal Government and the states, the proposed system of numbering U S Highways uniformly is undoubtedly ideal The uniform system of warning and direction signs to be used in all parts of the nation is also a forward step and no word other than of commendation can be said about this part of the marking plan, but it takes more than a number to fix association of any thoroughfare in the minds of travelers.
Probably the most constructive suggestion that has yet been made for marking the interstate highways, so that the designations would be of value to the motorists as well as to the road officials, is contained in a resolution adopted by the American Road Congress in session at Chicago last January It reads. “Be it resolved that the Joint Board, now formulating a uniform marking system for interstate roads in the United Stales, be requested as far as practicable to designate the various routes not only by a numeral but with the local distinctive names” This plan would seem to answer all purposes and has a successful precedent in the system for many years in vogue in Ohio It was the activities of various route associations which fostered and encouraged the idea of motoring and seeing, one’s own country, thus was developed the demand for better highways and that demand brought about the creation of state and Federal units which have built and arc building the highways
Motor touring is still a healthy activity, and always will be It is good for the individual life and • it is good for the national life. It should be fostered and encouraged by all the reputable associations in any way associated with highway construction or the automotive industry It is well to keen alive the popular interest on the part of the nation, lor it will otherwise lag without leadership.
Reprint from Lincoln Highway Forum, March 1926
PRESERVING THE OLD SPANISH TRAIL NAME
The following news iten from tho Santa Barbara, California, News of April 14, 1p?.6 was nailed, to usj-
CHANGE NAME OF ROAD iho none, "Old Spanish Trail,'* w:ull no longer bo used in designating tho fanou3 highway extending fron St. Augustine, Florida, to San Diego, California, according to recent in-fomation received fron trie Touring Dopartnent of the National Autonobile Club. Hereafter it will be designated as"United States Highway Nos. 80 and 50."
The national Joint Board appointed by the U. S. Secretary of Agriculture, head of the Federal Road Bureau, designated the Old Spanish Trail a3 United States Highway No. 50 in the East; No. 80 in the '.Test. It is right this trunkline should be rated one of the national highways and numbered as such'but the none should also be officially fixed and preserved. Sons, not all, of the Joint Board are trying to designate numbers only as a way to establish these national routes and rid tho country of the irresponsible road promoters that have become a nuisance.
The QSt also suffers from these "road runners." V/hile you and we have worked to weave this project together across eight states these promoters have sought advantage without giving service, money or value. Fron JO to 40 names have been placed along this highway and many thousands of fiollars collected. Most of the alleged organisations collected the money and faded away while the Old Spanish Trail Association has spent over $150,000 and e&ven years time helping solve problems and pushing construction gathering, compiling,, printing and distributing travel literature and maps and doing many things to build this highway and popularize it.
These highway officials are very properly trying to stop those confusing and worthless promotions but out of the effort the Old Spanish Trail must, emerge with its name and integrity forever established and protected.
The intelligence with which this trunkline has been developed across the continent is once more evident in its selection in its entirety as tho southern United States Highway, The highway departments of the eight CRT States have performed great service in the construction work; they have solved financial and engineering difficulties that have cost years of effort and the highest order of skill. The ultimate achievement however will come when the narking fron Florida to California shows both tho United States Highway number and tho name that is so firmly rooted in tho hearts of the people.
Highway officials we have consulted are ready to help plan and put in force the most useful system of marking that can be devised. Many problems are evident. Eight state departments must be consulted. The experience and observation of practical highway leaders must be gathered. Methods of financing'muot be considered and, finally, practical plans must be agreed upon which will give the traveler the same sjiyle of marking and signing a-long the Old Spanish Trail in all the eight states.
Ohio Method or Marking Highways Offers the Best Suggestion
Both Number and Name on Sign the Ideal Way
the wheels sgnk to the hubs in two long furrows from the Mississippi to the Willamette valley is officially designated by two numerals
“Only a meaningless number, a hard, cold, metallic number, like the figures in a cash register or on a bank ledger, is used to designate the greatest migration in all history The barren numerals of an arithmetic have officially become the symbol for the great route over which the covered wagons and their heroic company came for the winning of the West.
“One of the glories of a great highway system is the romance reflected in its nomenclature. One of its lures, that will grow stronger and stronger with tune, is its local name, which in a single word tells of an epoch and fires the imagination at thepicturoof a great historic background.”