Roadgeek

A roadgeek is an individual involved in "roadgeeking" or "road enthusiasm"—an interest in roads, and especially going on road trips, as a hobby. A person with such an interest is also referred to as a road buff, roadfan or Roads Scholar, the latter being a play on the term Rhodes Scholar.^[1]

Contents 1 Interest 2 Activity 3 Roadgeeking online 3.1 SABRE 3.2 Taiwan websites 4 Sites of interest to roadgeeks 4.1 Republic of Ireland 4.2 United Kingdom 4.3 United States 4.3.1 Arkansas 4.3.2 California 4.3.3 Colorado 4.3.4 Maryland 4.3.5 Missouri 4.3.6 Montana 4.3.7 New York 4.3.8 North Carolina 4.3.9 Oklahoma 4.3.10 Oregon 4.3.11 Pennsylvania 4.3.12 Virginia 4.3.13 Washington 5 Examples 6 See also 7 References 8 Further reading 9 External links

Interest

Roadgeeks view their interest as an appreciation of engineering and planning feats:

“

We're interested in all the effort that goes into making roads. The railways in this country get an awful lot of press as great engineering achievements. Roads aren't seen in that way, but it wasn't always so. In the 1950s and 1960s they were part of a brave new era. Back then it was something to get excited about. They actually put people on buses and drove up and down them to have a look... —Steven Jukes[2]

”

However roadgeeks are not necessarily interested in motor vehicles;^[2] there may also be an interest in cartography and map design. Enthusiasts may focus on a single activity related to roads, such as driving the full length of the highway system in a specific area, researching the history, planning and quirks of a particular road or national highway system. They occasionally are quoted in the press on topics related to the history of roads.^[3] Sometimes, road geeks are called "highway historians" for the knowledge and interests.^[4]

Even the numbering system can be a subject of deep interest, as Joe Moran describes in his book "On Roads: A Hidden History":

“

On the online discussion forum of SABRE, the Society for All British Road Enthusiasts" (sic), the 1400-odd Sabristi often debate about where the M25 starts and whether it is correctly numbered, or why the motorway from Carlisle to Glasgow is called both the M74 and the A74(M). In road-numbering lore, the absence of pattern - the discovery that there are so many exceptions to rules that the rules might as well not exists - only seems to revivify the search for inner mysteries. Road buffs talk in reverential tones about "David Craig Numbers" - the elegant theory, named after the man who proposed it, that three digit numbers derive from the roads they connect.[5]

”

Activity

Example activities include:

• Creating fonts and other graphic elements to share with other enthusiasts^[6]
• Taking road trips for the roads rather than for the destination, sometimes referred to as roadgeeking or Roads Scholaring
• Comparing the extent of their travels with other enthusiasts, such as the number of Interstate Highway sections that have been wholly traveled.^[7]
• Photography of road signs, bridges or various highway artefacts
• Collecting old road maps
• Writing about the history of highways^[8], highway terminology and the design of graphics or fonts to facilitate the work of others.

Roadgeeking online

In 2002, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that road enthusiasm was an Internet phenomenon. There is a Usenet newsgroup, misc.transport.road, where participants discuss all facets of roads and road trips from "construction projects to quirks and inconsistencies in signage".^[9] These individuals who anticipated each Rand McNally road atlas release each year found a community of others online who were also interested in roads as a hobby. These communities of people could share photos, swap their thoughts on the highways in their areas and "debate the finer points of interchange design."^[9]

SABRE

Started in 1999, the Society for All British and Irish Road Enthusiasts (SABRE), originally known as "Study and Appreciation of the British Roads Experience",^[10] is one of the larger and most prominent communities of road enthusiasts online.^[11] The organization hosts a large collection of articles and histories of particular roads and terminology, online photo galleries, discussion forums,^[12] and an application to overlay and compare historical roadmaps.^[10] Although SABRE is primarily an online group, members organize group tours to visit sites of interest.^[2]

Taiwan websites

In 2006, a board called "Road" (Chinese: 公路板) in the PTT Bulletin Board System, which is a famous forum in Taiwan, was established.^[13] Nevertheless, there were some people that didn't know how to use a terminal or BBS reader to find and access it, so a web forum named Gonglubang (Chinese: 公路邦; literally Highway State) was started in 2008.^[14] There are some boards in Gonglubang for users to discuss the policies, news about highways or to post the pictures of highways.^[15]

Sites of interest to roadgeeks

Republic of Ireland

• The Mad Cow Roundabout located at junction 9 on the M50 was notoriously congested and locally known as the Mad Cow roundabout instead of its actual name the Red Cow interchange.^[16]

United Kingdom

• The Magic Roundabout in Swindon, England consists of five mini-roundabouts arranged in a circle.^[11]
• Gravelly Hill Interchange, one of many known as Spaghetti Junction, is junction 6 of the M6 motorway where it meets the A38(M) Aston Expressway in Birmingham, United Kingdom.^[11]
• The A64(M) portion of Leeds Inner Ring Road is classified as a "pathetic motorway" by one SABRE member because it is "sadly, only 800 yards long and that's if you go the long way."^[2]
• The expansive but unrealised London Ringways system.

United States

• List of gaps in Interstate Highways
• US Route 66, an iconic highway across the western USA whose remnants attracts enthusiasts from around the globe. There are several Route 66 museums and attractions along the road.

Arkansas

• Arkansas Highway 43/Oklahoma State Highway 20 concurrency, possibly unique instance of two highways from different states overlapping.^[17]

California

• The Ridge Route, the first paved highway directly linking the Los Angeles Basin with the San Joaquin Valley over the Tejon Pass, a portion of which is in the National Register of Historic Places. It was documented by author and roadgeek, Harrison Irving Scott, in 2002. in Ridge Route: The Road That United California.^[18]
• Skyline Boulevard, the road that spans the highest ridge of Santa Cruz Mountains, making it possible to see the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay simultaneously.
• Decommissioned portions of U.S. Route 6, now part of State Route 14, are the subject of significant roadgeek interest.^[19]
• Zzyzx Road, a landmark about halfway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, known for its unusual name. It is the last place on Earth in the English alphabetical order.
• Interstate 238 in the San Francisco Bay Area which defies numbering logic both by location and the absence of its parent, Interstate 38.
• The portion where Interstate 580 and Interstate 80 run concurrently (through Berkeley), which happens to be a wrong-way concurrency. This means that one road goes east and the other goes west at the same time.

Colorado

• Interstate 70's route through Glenwood Canyon, an engineering marvel
• Eisenhower Tunnel, the highest point on the Interstate Highway System

Maryland

• I-70's eastern terminus at a Park & Ride on Security Boulevard in Baltimore, one of the more unusual Interstate termini

Missouri

• Galena Y-Bridge, an unusual bridge with three land connections

Montana

• Going-to-the-Sun Road, a scenic road crossing Glacier National Park, designated both a National Historic Landmark and a Historic Civil Engineering Landmark.^[20]

New York

• Interstate 990, the highest numbered interstate in the system.

North Carolina

• Interstate 73, which lies east of Interstate 77.

Oklahoma

• Arkansas Highway 43/Oklahoma State Highway 20 concurrency, possibly unique instance of two highways from different states overlapping.

Oregon

• Historic Columbia River Highway, the first paved highway in the Pacific Northwest, an engineering and scenic marvel, designated both a National Historic Landmark and a Historic Civil Engineering Landmark.^[21]

Pennsylvania

• Abandoned Pennsylvania Turnpike, an example of 1930's-era highway standards
• Breezewood, Pennsylvania, a gap in Interstate 70 that routes traffic down US 30 through town
• Centralia, Pennsylvania, site of underground coal fires undermining the area highways
• Interstate 99, which lies west of several lower-numbered interstates, such as Interstate 81 and Interstate 95

Virginia

• The wrong-way concurrency of Interstate 81 and Interstate 77, where one goes north on one route and south on the other at the same time. Located near Wytheville, VA

Washington

• Interstate 82, which is not only completely north of Interstate 84, but also runs predominantly north-south, despite its even number.

Examples

• misc.transport.road (Usenet); charter approved November 27, 1995^[22]
• misc.transport.road FAQ
• Glasgows Motorways Fan & Info Site
• Roadgeek Yahoo List; founded April 25, 1999
• Society for All British and Irish Road Enthusiasts (SABRE), founded August 13, 1999
• UK sites CBRD, roadsUK and Pathetic Motorways
• Brad's Australian Highways Page; founded September 19, 1999
• Ozroads; founded July 13, 2003
• Great Lakes Roads Yahoo Forum; founded February 16, 2002
• Roads forum on boards.ie
• Northern Ireland Road Site
• Highways and Autobahns on SkyscraperCity

See also

• Spotting: trainspotting, Plane spotting or Bus spotting
• Metrophile
• Railfan
• Road trip
• Sport touring
• Openstreetmap

References

Further reading

• Beresford, Kevin (2004) (Hardcover). Roundabouts of Great Britain. London: New Holland. ISBN 9781843308546. 

External links

• AARoads Glossary