Road

HISTORY

Stone-paved streets have been found in the city of Ur in the Middle East dating back to 4000 BC

The Sweet Track is an ancient causeway in the Somerset Levels, England. It was built in 3807 or 3806 BC and has been claimed to be the oldest engineered roads discovered in Northern Europe.

It is now known that the Sweet Track was largely built over the course of an earlier structure, the Post Track. The track extended across the marsh between what was then an island at Westhay.

The world's oldest known paved road was constructed in Egypt some time between 2600 and 2200 BC.

The Roman road system was quite remarkable in its extent - from throughout Britain in the west, to the Tigris-Euphrates Rivers (today Iraq) in the east, and from the Danube River in central Europe to as far south as North Africa.

A paved Roman road in Pompeii. By Paul Vlaar 

The Appian Way, the first of Rome's major trunk roads was constructed by Appius Claudius Caecus in 312 BC. It run initially from Rome southeast to an important new ally - the city of Capua, north of Naples.

Some of the other famous Roman Roads in Italy were the Via Aurelia, running northwest up to Genoa; the Via Flaminia, that ran north-east to the Adriatic; the Via Aemilia, that crossed the Rubicon; the Via Valeria, eastward from Rome; the Via Latina, that ran southeast.

At the peak of the Roman Empire, there were 29 military highways radiating from Rome.
With the capital as the "hub" of the system, came the now-famous saying that "All roads lead to Rome."

The total length of hard-surfaced highways constructed by the Romans has been estimated to be well over 50,000 miles / 80,000 kilometers, much of which is still visible today after so many centuries.

The Roman Roads were also noted for the high quality of their construction. Most were straight, solid-surfaced, and cambered for drainage just as modern highways are today. Along with natural stone, they often used a form of concrete made from volcanic ash and lime.

Many roads were built throughout the Arab Empire during the 8th century. The most sophisticated roads were those in Baghdad, which were paved with tar.

During the Middle Ages in Britain, Watling Street, Ermine Street, the Fosse Way and Icknield Way were regarded as royal roads; travelers were reckoned to be under the King's protection and anyone attacking them there was liable to a fine of 100 shillings.

The Great North Road near Highgate on the approach to London before turnpiking.

The Inca Road system was at least 40,000 kilometres (25,000 mi) long. The roads were carefully planned and maintained. They were paved where necessary, had bridges, stairways, and constructions such as retaining walls and a drainage system. Only 25% of the system remains visible today.

It was a Scotsman, John Loudon McAdam (September 23, 1756 - November 26, 1836), frustrated with highways that were often impassable because of rain and mud, who in the early 19th century came up with a revolutionary method of road construction. It involved placing evenly sized stones on top of each other which, when bedded down, would hold their position. The use of hot tar to bond the stones gave us tarmacadam-still the staple of toad building 200 years later.

Macadam roads started being built widely in the United States and Australia in the 1820s and in Europe in the 1830s and 1840s.

Construction of the first macadamized road in the United States began in 1823. The picture below shows workers breaking stones "so as not to exceed 6 ounces in weight or to pass a two-inch ring."

In 1903, Horatio Nelson Jackson and Sewall K. Crocker made the first documented journey by automobile from San Francisco to New York using only a connection of dirt roads, cow paths, and railroad beds. They arrived in New York City on July 26, 1903, 63 days, 12 hours, and 30 minutes after leaving San Francisco.  The journey became a national sensation, and created a demand for long distance roads. 

After leaving New York City Jackson joined his wife and drove home to Vermont. Upon reaching the threshold of Jackson's garage the drive chain of his vehicle snapped. 

A group of state and federal highway officials began to number highways with standardized road signs in 1925. Later, north-south highways were assigned odd numbers and east-west routes were given even numbers.

The "cat's eye" is the trade name of the glass reflectors, in resilient rubber pads, which are set into the surface of a highway to provide safe markings at night. They were designed in 1934 by Percy Shaw (1890–1976), and were inspired by his difficulties in driving along dark Yorkshire roads.

Reflective spheres are set into a cat's eye (UK)

Percy Shaw founded his company Reflecting Roadstuds Limited on March 15, 1935 to make cat's eyes.

Edward Hines got the idea to paint a line in the middle of the road to separate traffic after watching a leaky milk wagon leave a trail down the street. In 1935, he was awarded the George S. Bartlett Award for outstanding contribution to highway progress.

During World War II the United Kingdom removed all road signs in hopes that if the Nazis mounted a ground invasion they would get lost and have trouble navigating.

Zebra crossings were introduced to the UK roads in 1951.

FIRSTS

The first tar-paved roads appeared in Baghdad in the eighth century.

America's first state road was authorized in 1793. It was built from Frankfort, Kentucky, to Cincinnati.

The earliest recorded use of the phrase “road safety” was in 1906 in a book by Henry C Pearson entitled Rubber Tires And All About Them.

Heavy road traffic around "Dead Man's Curve" prompted a highway official to paint the US' first center line in 1911.

Britain's first white line markings in the center of the road were painted on dangerous bends on the London to Folkestone road in Ashford, Kent in 1914. They were the idea of a farmer who was a non-motorist.

The A22(T) with line markings East Sussex, England. By Christine Matthews,

The first motorways were built in 1925 in Germany and Italy.

The first directional road markings were introduced onto Britain on March 22, 1926, at Hyde Park Corner, London. The markings were painted onto the road surface in white and included arrows indicating the direction of traffic flow. The scheme was initially introduced as a trial and was later adopted more widely throughout the country.

The first automatic road-toll collector was installed on New Jersey’s Garden State Parkway on November 19, 1954. The cost was 0.25 cents.

A high-speed toll booth on SR 417 near Orlando, Florida, United States.

The Preston bypass, the UK's first stretch of motorway, opened to traffic for the first time in 1958. It is now part of the M6 and M55 motorways.

The first section of the M1 motorway, the first inter-urban motorway in the United Kingdom, opened in 1959 between the present junctions 5 and 18, along with the M10 motorway and M45 motorway

The first official Panda crossing opened in 1962 outside Waterloo station, London.

Woodward Ave in Detroit, Michigan carries the designation M-1, named so because it was the first paved road in the US.

The street plan for Detroit (left) devised by Judge Woodward 

Michigan was the first state to plow it's roads and the first to adopt a yellow dividing line.

RECORDS

Yonge Street was formerly listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the longest street in the world at 1,178 miles. It has been replaced in the yearly publication by the Pan-American Highway with a network of roads of 30,000 miles from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska to Ushuaia, Argentina.

Pan American Highway.  Created by en:User:Seaweege and released to PD 

The longest U.S. highway is route 6 which starts in Cape Cod, Massachusetts and ends in Bishop, California.

The widest freeway in the world is the I-10 in Houston, Texas at 26 lanes across.

The Bundesautobahn 10 runs in Brandenburg as an orbital motorway around the German capital Berlin, colloquially called Berliner Ring. With a total length of 196 km (122 mi), the BAB 10 is the longest orbital in Europe, being 8 km (5.0 mi) longer than the London M25 motorway.

The Monumental Axis is a central avenue in Brasília, Brazil. The street has been featured in the Guinness Book of Records as having the widest central reservation of a dual carriageway in the world

FUN ROAD FACTS

There is a difference between a road and a street. A road connects two different places or towns, whereas a street is a small public road that is well within a city or town.

Japan's road network is over 20% larger than Russia's.

The M6 toll road was built on two-and-a-half million copies of pulped Mills & Boon novels.

The stop sign has a unique eight-sided shape so that drivers facing the back of the sign know that oncoming drivers have a stop sign.

All road signs south of Tucson, Arizona are in the Metric System.

Road damage mostly results from trucks and buses. The damage a vehicle causes is proportional to the axle load raised to the fourth power, so doubling the weight an axle carries actually causes 16 times as much damage.

In 2001 India started building roads that hold together using polymer glues made from shredded plastic wastes. These plastic roads have developed no potholes and cracks after years of use, and they are cheaper to build. As of 2016, there are more than 21,000 miles of plastic roads.

Wisconsin uses briny water from cheese production to de-ice their roads in winter.

La Mancha Negra is a mysterious black goo that oozes up from beneath Venezuelan roadways, killing drivers. Despite, much study, we have no idea what the goo is.

Sources The London Times, Would You Believe This Too, Radio Times, History World