My Way or the Highway

Although I don’t think I’ve actually ever said, “My Way or the Highway,” my family will tell you that I’ve often implied it. Ironically, as a budding nomad, my way has now become the highway. So I currently do a lot of thinking about real highways. As they’ve become a bigger part of my life, I’ve become convinced that highways provide critical insight into the culture of a place.

Let’s start by considering the Midwest. Two-lane highways in the Midwest are amazing. They can go for parsecs without a curve. In fact, curves in the Midwest are statistically more dangerous because drivers can be distracted gawking at their rare occurrence. While people from other parts of the country drive down a midwestern highway developing cramps from never turning the wheel, midwestern drivers go blithely along until they encounter one of these rare roadway events. Then, only a quick recitation of the mantra, “righty tighty, lefty loosey” helps them to negotiate the endangered species of midwestern curves.

Another feature of midwestern highways is their elevation. During construction belly scrapers from the four corners of the earth gather to raise the height of a road to a level that would tempt Joshua to march around them with his trumpets blaring. The highway department thinks the reason for this elevation is to enable the wind to clear snow from the road during blizzards. But all midwesterners know that road height is what makes it possible for travelers to identify the crop in the field at any stage of development. One simply must know whether it is corn or soybeans that are sprouting in April or enjoy the ecstasy of looking down on a field of sunflowers in August.

But even though midwestern highways form the low end of the testbed for self-driving cars, steps have been taken to increase their level of interest for drivers. One important initiative was to place another road perpendicular to the highway every mile along its entire route. Each side road serves as a ramp for launching vehicular cross-traffic onto the highway. The surprising capability of these unexpected arrivals is greatly enhanced in the fall by tall fields of corn and in the winter by equally tall snowdrifts.

Midwesterners also stimulate travel interest by contracting with farmers to periodically drive up and down the highway on behemoth equipment dwarfing most ocean-going vessels. Even though midwestern highways feature landing-strip-size shoulders, farming equipment being driven roadside can extend well beyond the centerline, completely blocking the view of on-coming traffic. This situation enables a rural midwestern form of rush hour traffic with vehicles lined four or five cars deep. I’m quite sure that some drivers are guilty of staying back just to see how many cars they can pile up. After all, think of the efficiency it generates for the midwestern custom of waving a greeting to all oncoming traffic. One wave can do it for an entire line of cars behind a piece of farm equipment.

However, the cultural niceties of the two-lane highway end when traveling a midwestern freeway. The interstate system is pretty much the same no matter where you are in the country. True, in the Midwest they have not found any more effective way to get curves on the Interstate than on the two-lane highways. In point of fact, once you merge onto westbound I-90 in Sioux Falls, you don’t have to actually turn again until you exit in Rapid City. Many people think that it is the clever road signs that get people into Wall Drug. But that famous drugstore’s marketing benefits more from involuntary twitches generated by the subliminal need to turn the steering wheel.

Even with its geographically ubiquitous nature, interstate travel does bring its own form of entertainment. For instance, there is an ongoing competition for the most flagrant swearing about the rough surfaces created by heavy truck traffic supporting our country’s supply chain. Additionally, there is ample opportunity for competitive cursing during interminable sections of road construction where they are fixing the rough surfaces caused by the heavy truck traffic supporting our country’s supply chain. And when not engaging in unprintable expletives about the road condition, one can invent pungent laments about the heavy truck traffic itself which is much more entertaining than standing in a store complaining about the state of the supply chain.

The familiar culture of midwestern highways is left behind as one traverses Kentucky and Tennessee on the way to the alien road scape of Georgia. From a midwestern perspective, Georgia highways can best be described as . . . interesting.  Even though much of Georgia is relatively flat with gently rolling hills much akin to parts of Iowa, the roads themselves go every which way with no regard for points of the compass. Obviously, they were designed by engineers from the Roman Republic long before the invention of the surveyor’s transit.

Unlike the Midwest, Georgian highways have curves, voluptuous curves! These lovely highways wander among the streams, hills, and trees of Georgia in infinitely varying vectors that must satisfy the most avid enthusiast of rack and pinion steering. As a midwesterner, driving a Georgia highway is not just titillating, it is positively dizzying. And it’s clear that trees in Georgia, by arriving well before the roadways, have achieved dominance. The forest crowds in, forcing the highway to meekly follow a path which the trees grudgingly allow. All the while, bully boy pines stand next to the narrow ditches ready to punish any road that gets too big for its britches. It’s a long way from those midwestern trees that have been taught to stand obediently beside the road domesticated for the purpose of breaking the wind and arresting the drifting snow.

Another important question is what happened to the shoulders? Most Georgia highways seem to be completely devoid of shoulders. The ditches are beautifully manicured, but the driveways are all narrow and pull-outs are nonexistent. I’ve driven for miles trying to find a place to respond to a text. It’s like Georgia highways are all dressed up in strapless gowns to better accentuate their southern charm.

The lack of highway shoulders has had an unexpected effect on my trip this year. I carted my bicycle along with thoughts of biking down beautiful tree-lined roadways. But without a shoulder on the highway, my ardor for trekking has cooled considerably. I’m sure that the Georgia version of a bike path, which consists of frequently posted “Share the Road” signs, is well-meaning, but the comparative weight between my bicycle and an F250 pickup truck is a bit intimidating. So I enjoy the scenery from my comfortable Chevy Equinox albeit with less benefit for my cardio-vascular system.

The one thing I’ve found totally wonderful, even if a little confusing, is Georgia’s system for recycling its highways. I’m sure that it is saving Georgia taxpayers millions of dollars. Here is how it works. Georgia already has highways going almost anywhere you can imagine. For instance, I’m sure one could travel a different route from Athens to Atlanta every day for a millennium without duplication. So when someone decides to build a new highway, the contract is not let to a construction company. Instead, they put out an RFP for signage and simply add a new highway number to an existing roadway. Some highways in Georgia already have four or five highway numbers. I’m sure that if I stick around long enough Georgia will have to move to electronic signage to accommodate scrolling the list of numbers, which is far too long for an ordinary highway sign.

I know I still have a lot to learn about highways in America. Both South Carolina and Florida are within easy striking distance. And I’m determined to get off the freeway in Tennessee and Kentucky when we return north next spring. I’ve never met a road I didn’t want to go down. So with the help of my Atlas & Gazetteer and no less than four iPhone map apps, I’ll try not to get lost as I explore the roadway culture of this wonderful country in which we live.