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On the Road

Henry Petroski

n 1919 Dwight D. Eisenhower, days. The first woman to drive across Ithen a young lieutenant colonel The Interstate the country was Alice Huyler Ramsey, in the U.S. Army, rode in a convoy of who with three other women in her military vehicles that traveled from green Maxwell made it from New York Washington, D.C., to San Francisco. It Highway System to San Francisco in only 41 days in 1909. was the service’s first transcontinental The idea for a transcontinental road, journey by motor vehicle, and the pur- turns 50 this year as opposed to a transcontinental trip, pose of the exercise was to promote was put forward in 1913 by Carl Gra- the army’s Motor Transport Corps ham Fisher, builder of a motor speed- and demonstrate its defense mobility. way on the outskirts of Indianapolis. Almost 300 enlisted men and officers faster than a brisk walk. Although ex- Fisher argued at the time that Amer- rode by motorcycle, car and truck in a cruciatingly slow by today’s standards, ica’s highways were “built chiefly of caravan that stretched for three miles. it was the best that the caravan could politics,” when the “proper material is Vehicles were draped with bunting of do at the time. The journey had to be crushed rock or concrete.” He proposed red, white and blue, and were accom- undertaken in the heat of summer to a “coast-to-coast rock highway” that panied by a band sponsored by the ensure that the western mountains would run from Times Square in New Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, were passable. The season, however, York to Golden Gate Park in San Fran- which no doubt saw an opportunity also meant that what roads there were cisco, and he hoped that it might be to promote land travel and transporta- would be muddy after rain. Vehicles completed in time for the opening of tion in peace time as well as war. would overheat and otherwise break the Panama-Pacific Exposition in 1915. The convoy of 81 vehicles, which down. There were accidents to deal Fisher proposed that the rock high- was seen off from Washington on July 7 with. Roads, where they existed, were way be funded by “automobile bar- with speeches from the Secretary of War often so rough that no significant speed ons” like Henry Ford, but Ford op- and numerous senators, took 62 days to could be achieved. Even the better posed the idea, arguing that if private cover 3,250 miles through Maryland, roads were frequently interrupted by industry began to pay for good roads Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, rivers, which were often crossed by fer- the government would never be ex- Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, Utah, Ne- ry. If there was a bridge, it was often too pected to do so. Henry Joy, president vada and, finally, California. There were light for military vehicles to use with- of the Packard Motor Car Company naturally crowds of well-wishers along out breaking it. Thus, it did not take a and one of the supporters of Fisher’s the way, and there were speeches and great leap of the imagination for Lt. Col. idea, suggested that the road be named festivities befitting the arrival of such Eisenhower to conclude that the United the Lincoln Highway and be dedi- a parade of equipment in the towns States would benefit greatly from an cated to the revered president. In this it passed through. Perhaps not to be improved system of highways. His feel- way, the federal government might be outdone by Goodyear, the tire magnate ings on the matter would intensify dur- persuaded to divert to the highway Harvey Firestone welcomed the traveling World War II, when he witnessed project the $1.7 million intended for ing army to his estate in Akron, where firsthand the great advantages of the a marble memorial to be erected in “a covey of young ladies dressed in gay German Autobahn. All these experienc- Washington. That did not occur, but frocks treated the men with a magnifi- es would inform Eisenhower’s policy with the Federal-Aid Road Act of 1916, cent feast.” making when he became president. funds began to be made available to Gaiety and politicking may have the states—but not directly to private slowed somewhat the progress of the Named Routes roads—on a matching basis. convoy, but it nevertheless did set what Although it may have been encum- According to the Wannamaker Di- was, for the time and circumstances, the bered by heavy equipment and hoopla, ary for 1917, 13 transcontinental high- remarkable pace of 58 miles per day, or the army convoy that so negatively im- way “through routes” were then being about five miles per hour—not much pressed Eisenhower was far from the planned—about evenly divided between first transcontinental driving experi- east-west and north-south routes—but Henry Petroski is Aleksandar S. Vesic Professor ence. In 1903, Horatio Nelson Jackson they were only “in the first stages of per- of Civil Engineering and a professor of history at drove with his personal mechanic from manent improvement.” In addition to Duke University. Address: Box 90287, Durham, San Francisco to New York, paving the the Lincoln Highway, east-west routes NC 27708-0287 way on ways that were not paved, in 63 included the Pike’s Peak Ocean to Ocean

396 American Scientist, Volume Copyright © 2006 by Henry Petroski. Requests for permission to reprint or reproduce this article should be directed to the author at [email protected]. Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library Presidential Eisenhower D. Dwight

Lieutenant Colonel Dwight D. Eisenhower (above, right)—shown here with Major Brett (left) and Harvey Firestone (middle)—partici- pated in a 1919 transcontinental military convoy. The journey took 62 days and entailed considerable hardship (right). The experience—along with seeing the German Auto- bahn during World War II—would inform Eisenhower’s decision, more than 35 years later, to push for the construction of the U.S. Interstate Highway System. Highway (New York to California), the and solutions had been sought. By 1917, jor east-west routes with numbers that National Old Trails (Washington, D.C., the New York State Highway Commis- are multiples of ten, with U.S. 10 being area to Los Angeles), Trail to the Sun- sion introduced a color code for identi- the most northerly route and U.S. 90 set and Santa Fe Trail (New York to San fying main routes throughout the state. the most southerly. Major north-south Diego), and the Old Spanish Trail (St. Bands of color on telegraph and tele- routes, of which there were expected to Augustine to San Diego). North-south phone poles and other stationary ob- be many more than east-west, were to routes included the Atlantic Highway jects, like bridges, distinguished classes have numbers ending in a 1 or a 5. Thus (Calais, Maine, to Miami), Pacific High- of routes: Red indicated a principal it was the location and direction of U.S. way (Vancouver to San Diego), the Di- east-west route, blue a north-south, and 1 that gave it that designation—and xie Highway (Chicago to Miami) and yellow a diagonal route. In so marking not, as is commonly stated, that it was the Jefferson Highway (New Orleans to its roads, New York joined Massachu- the first national highway. By AASHO’s Minneapolis-St. Paul). A “diagonal au- setts, Connecticut, Rhode Island and ordering principle, U.S. 1 ran along the tomobile road across the country” was New Hampshire in the practice, there- east coast between Maine and Florida; also in the planning stages. It was to be by making regional driving and touring U.S. 101 was the west-coast highway the longest on the continent and was to more easily accomplished. At the same between California and Washington. be given the pedestrian name of Savan- time, Wisconsin began replacing named Under this scheme, the Lincoln High- nah to Seattle Highway. At the time such trail and highway signs, which often way lost its identity as a single route, plans were being put forth, there were consisted of little more than a distinc- different sections of it carrying different 3.5 million automobiles and a quarter tive color band painted on a telephone numbered designations, but devotees million trucks waiting to use them, but pole, with numbered route markers of a installed thousands of roadside mark- these numbers were dwarfed by a na- distinctive shape. ers identifying it as the highway dedi- tional population of 21 million horses. cated to Abraham Lincoln. By 1925, there were numerous named Take a Number President Franklin Delano Roosevelt roads throughout the country. Individ- In 1925, the American Association of had a direct and personal interest in the ual states developed segments of these State Highway Officials began to ra- condition of America’s roads. He was routes that maximized travel within tionalize the system of roads and road an ardent automobile driver, and when state boundaries, thereby increasing signs across the nation. Henceforth, U.S. paralysis in his legs restricted his ability the local and regional benefits of tour- highways—a designation that was not to drive, he designed a system of le- ist dollars. Utah, for example, rather meant to suggest that they were federal vers by which he could control the ped- than completing a section of the Lincoln highways (for they were not) but rather als with his hands and thereby enjoy Highway spent its highway money on that they were major routes through driving himself around the countryside the Arrowhead Route to Los Angeles. large stretches of the country—were to near Warm Springs, Georgia, where he Also, it developed the Wendover Road be known primarily by numbers, not had gone for hydrotherapy. Roosevelt’s as an alternative to the Lincoln High- by the colorful names that often had love of the road was exhibited in a 1936 way for travelers on their way to San little intrinsic direction or location in- memorandum in which he reiterated a Francisco. The named-highway system formational content. The scheme in- route of his own design connecting the was becoming increasingly cumber- troduced by AASHO (now known as Shenandoah National Park in Virginia some to master and confusing to use. AASHTO and pronounced “ash-toe” to Worcester, Massachusetts. The fol- Even intrastate routes were difficult because transportation officials are also lowing year, he called the chief of the to master outside one’s familiar area, included in the rubric) designated ma- Bureau of Public Roads to the White www.americanscientist.org Copyright © 2006 by Henry Petroski. Requests for permission to reprint or 2006 September–October 397 reproduce this article should be directed to the author at [email protected]. vention, First Lady Mamie Eisenhower Lake City, was finally opened in 1986, hosted a White House reception for car but still only 97 percent of the system dealers’ wives and “was dazzled by the that would eventually total over 46,000 furs and diamonds the women wore,” miles of roadway was completed at that attesting to the prosperity of the indus- time. Much of it, built to 1972 standards try. There were more than 60 million mo- and traffic expectations, was already tor vehicles registered in America at the obsolete and in need of constant widen- time, and the number was continuing ing and upgrading, as interstate travel- to grow. New roads were sorely needed. ers are all too well aware.

The Interstate System Is Born More Number Games After a couple of years of intense de- Among the less technical but still very bate, the Federal-Aid Highway Act of important challenges to making the In- 1956 was finally passed, thus providing terstate System user-friendly was estab- the basis for calling 2006 the 50th anni- lishing a clear and distinctive system versary of the Interstate System. Among of signage that was readily readable the enticements that finally won over and understandable to a driver going sufficient support for the legislation along at Interstate speeds. The num- was the promised miles of interstate bering system adopted mirrored that Brian Hayes Brian highways around cities, where voters of the U.S. highways. Major east-west Before the development of route numbers, and hence their representatives’ votes in interstate routes were given numbers roads were named and often had markers— here one for the National Highway in Ohio. Congress were concentrated. President that were multiples of 10, but with the Eisenhower signed the bill without cer- lowest numbered (I-10) being the most House to show him a map of the U.S. emony—he was in Walter Reed Army southerly and the highest (I-90) the on which Roosevelt had inscribed three Medical Center at the time, recovering most northerly. This scheme thus mini- north-south and three east-west that he from ileitis surgery. Since he was look- mized the occurrence of nearby U.S. envisioned as a system of transconti- ing forward to being nominated for a and Interstate System routes carrying nental toll routes. The idea did not catch second term, he did not want to appear the same number. Major north-south on at the time, but it would be revised in public in a weakened state. In the bill Interstate routes end in a 1 or 5, but with gusto in the postwar period. that Eisenhower signed, almost 37 years with the lowest number (I-5) running Dwight Eisenhower assumed the to the day since he had set out from along the West Coast and the highest presidency in 1953, bringing to office Washington with the convoy headed (I-95) along the east. Lesser interstates his negative early experience with for San Francisco, $25 billion was au- were to be given even or odd numbers cross-country driving. His appointees thorized over 12 years for constructing according to whether their predomi- soon put forth proposals to develop in a National System of Interstate and De- nant direction was east-west or north- earnest a true interstate highway sys- fense Highways. It increased the federal south, respectively. tem. One proposal from his administra- gas tax to feed a Highway Trust Fund, Triple digits are used to designate tion was to form a National Highway put the federal share of interstate con- interstate spurs or beltways that branch Authority (NHA) that would abolish struction costs at 90 percent, expedited off or connect to the main interstate state highway departments. Among the process of acquiring rights-of-way, routes. Thus, I-495 is the Capital Belt- the obstacles to realizing such a scheme established standards for such physical way around Washington, D.C., which was the fact that the federal govern- features as lane and median width, and allows I-95 thru traffic to avoid the ment had no authority under the Con- set a completion date of 1972. congestion of the central city. There is stitution to build or maintain any roads Massachusetts Route 128 around Bos- also an I-495 beltway around Boston, at all. Ideas for financing any system of ton, with its limited access and remote but there is little chance of confusion interstate roads ranged from all costs location from the congested city center, between identically numbered routes being borne by the states to complete served as a model for much of the In- almost 500 miles apart. Baltimore, how- federal funding. Eisenhower himself, terstate System. When it first opened in ever, is less than 50 miles from Wash- being a fiscal conservative, at one time 1951, Route 128 was referred to as “the ington, so designating its beltway I-495 favored a system of toll roads that road to nowhere,” but by the time seri- could have been confusing. Thus, Bal- would be self-liquidating—that is, the ous planning for the interstates began, timore’s is designated I-695. The spurs tolls would last as long as it took to pay the economic development that Route I-295 and I-395 both lead into the heart off the debt incurred to construct the 128 had attracted, especially around its of Washington from I-95 and its associ- highways. In the end, compromises of exits, was undeniable. The promise of ated beltway. There are also interstate all kinds had to be made. the Interstate System was not fully real- spurs designated I-595 and I-895 in the Meanwhile, automobiles continued to ized by the legislative deadline of 1972, Washington-Baltimore area, the former multiply. In the mid-1950s, a president of however, for there arose opposition to it connecting the Washington beltway the National Automobile Dealers Asso- from groups ranging from environmen- with Annapolis and the latter provid- ciation could declare, “We have not built talists to neighborhood preservation- ing an alternative tunnel route under as many miles of highway since World ists. Indeed, the first fully completed Baltimore Harbor. War II as we have built miles of pas- transcontinental interstate highway was Establishing a rational numbering senger cars.” When the association met I-80, which runs from New York to San system solves only part of the problem in Washington, D.C., for an annual con- Francisco. Its final section, through Salt of designating highway routes. To be

398 American Scientist, Volume Copyright © 2006 by Henry Petroski. Requests for permission to reprint or reproduce this article should be directed to the author at [email protected]. truly useful, the numbers must be ef- a superior choice. The committee repre- fectively displayed on distinctive signs. senting the states was equally insistent It was clearly important to distinguish that green was better. In the end, the the interstates from the U.S. routes, es- issue was resolved by constructing a pecially in the Midwest where the num- roadway section on which were erected bers of nearby roads might be close if differently colored signs directing driv- not identical. The route signs for the ers to “Metropolis” and “Utopia.” Mo- U.S. highways have since 1926 carried torists who drove at 65 miles per hour black numbers on a “U.S. shield” with a past the signs to make-believe destina- The original Gothic typeface used on Inter- state signs (top) is now being superseded by white background. After the interstate tions were polled on background color the new Clearview typeface (bottom), which highway act was signed into law, the preferences. At 58 percent, green was is legible at 50 percent greater distance. state highway departments were invit- the overwhelming choice over blue (27 ed to propose designs for route signs. percent) and black (15 percent). Now, FHA, and examples of the signs were Most of the states submitted concepts of course, the familiar white-on-green erected on sections of I-80 and I-380 in that incorporated the name of the state signs are emblematic of the interstates. Pennsylvania. The improved legibility through which the Interstate would The readability of highway signs has was estimated to reduce reaction time pass, and the now-familiar red, white long been of interest to transportation by as much as two seconds, which can and blue “federal shield” design repre- engineers, and the ubiquitous typeface give a significant advantage to a driver sents a combination of the ideas submit- so familiar to drivers for decades was traveling at interstate speeds. ted by Missouri and Texas—employing dictated in the Federal Highway Ad- American highways and their ac- the top half of one design and the bot- ministration Standard Alphabets for cessories have improved dramatically tom half of the other. Traffic Control Devices. However, as since Lt. Col. Eisenhower traveled in an the population was aging it became in- army convoy across the nation. Where Signs Shape Up creasingly obvious that there was going he found rocky roads, mud and un- Of course, roads and highways also to be a growing percentage of drivers bridged rivers and streams, today’s In- need signs to warn, control and direct over 65 on the roads and that the vision terstate System drivers expect to ride traffic. The value of distinctive sign of these drivers could be expected to on a smooth, hard road surface and shapes for conveying different kinds of decline as they aged. Among the prob- hardly notice the streams and rivers information and instruction dates from lems known to afflict such a population over which they are carried by bridges at least 1922, when a group of Mid- of motorists was difficulty in distin- they may not even realize are beneath western state highway officials sought guishing some letters, especially under them. The uniformly marked lanes and to standardize markings for drivers nighttime driving conditions. An early shoulders give visual and auditory cues traveling among their states. They proposal was to increase the font size to which we react without hardly think- pointed out that the shape of a sign used on highway signs by about 20 per- ing, and the standardized road and exit could convey considerable information cent. A larger type size would naturally signs help us negotiate even the most even in the dark. Their first proposal require a larger sign area, which would unfamiliar highway territory. And for was for black-and-white signs, but this have meant not only more-costly signs those teams of drivers who can tolerate was soon changed to black printing on but also more “visual clutter” on the all the sameness of the Interstate Sys- a light background (“preferably lemon roadscape. tem, especially at night, the drive from yellow”) by an AASHO sign commit- In the late 1980s, Donald Meeker, a Washington to San Francisco might be tee. To further distinguish the octago- sign designer originally hired by Or- accomplished in as few as a couple of nal STOP sign, it was recommended egon for a project, teamed up with days. We and the roads on which we that it have a red background, but James Montalbano, a type designer, drive have come a long way. finding a sufficiently durable red paint to improve the legibility of highway Bibliography proved difficult, so a black-on-yellow signs. They ended up modernizing and American Association of State Highway scheme was adopted at the time. rationalizing the FHA’s alphabets that and Transportation Officials. 2006. Inter- The problem of choosing a color dated from mid-century, and which state 50th Anniversary. http://www. scheme for signage arose again in the they claimed “had never really been interstate50th.org. mid-1950s when distinctive standards tested.” The pair of designers focused Hayes, Brian. 2005. Infrastructure: A Field Guide to for interstate highway exit signs were on such details as redrawing the vowels the Industrial Landscape. New York: Norton. being developed. It was agreed that a, e, and u, which “tend to ‘fill in’ under Lewis, Tom. 1997. Divided Highways: Building they should be readable at 800 feet, bright lights, making them indistin- the Interstate Highways, Transforming Ameri- can Life. New York: Viking. but the color scheme became a subject guishable,” and the vowel i, which can Lin, James. 1998. Lincoln Highway. http:// of some debate. White printing on a sometimes look like an l. The visibility www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~jlin/lincoln/ green background was recommended of signs employing the new typeface history/part4.html by an AASHO committee working in of Meeker and Montalbano was com- Patton, Phil. 2005. Road signs of the times. New conjunction with the Bureau of Public pared with that of signs using the old York Times, January 21, D8. Roads, but the newly selected federal one by erecting examples of each on Reid, Robert L., Laurie A. Shuster and Jay highway administrator, Bertram Talla- a test track, and the redesigned letters Landers. 2006. Special report: The Interstate Highway System at 50. Civil Engineering, my—who was actually color blind—in- remained sharp from distances as much June, 36–39. sisted that a dark-blue background, as as 50 percent farther. The new typeface Weingroff, Richard F. 1997. The origins of the used on the New York State Thruway was christened Clearview; in 2004 it U.S. Numbered Highway System, AASHTO with which he had been affiliated, was was granted interim approval by the Quarterly, Spring, 6–15. www.americanscientist.org Copyright © 2006 by Henry Petroski. Requests for permission to reprint or 2006 September–October 399 reproduce this article should be directed to the author at [email protected].