Unnecessary control cities

[amroad17]

I was driving down I-95 in NC today and noticed that the US 64 interchange is a mess of unnecessary control cities.



Rocky Mount - Nashville - Tarboro are a line of neighboring towns. It quite literally tells me nothing about WHERE US 64 goes beyond this small, geographic cluster. Since US 64 gets me to Raleigh, I'd use that. I'd keep Rocky Mount but Nashville and Tarboro are useless here.

Yes, it should be Rocky Mount and Raleigh on the exit BGS with Tarboro and Nashville on a supplemental sign.  The reasons Nashville is on the sign is because, I believe, that part of I-95 is in Nash County and Nashville is the county seat and when I-95 was first completed, US 64 was a regular two-lane highway instead of the freeway it is now.  The control cities should have been updated when the US 64 freeway was finished.

North Carolina loves adding control cities to signs--sometimes not in a "clean", steamlined way.  Many BGS's have three or even four cities listed on the signs.  Plus, they have a little Pennsylvania in them in that they sign non-descript control cities (Benson, Dunn, Elkin, and Hickory) instead of larger cities.  However, most DOT's in any state never really "update" themselves when it comes to signing control cities.  Signs are usually "carbon copied" and don't show changes that may have occurred in areas.  For I-95 in NC, there should be four control cities along its path--Richmond, Rocky Mount, Fayetteville, and Florence, SC.  No mentions of Benson, Dunn, Kenly, Smithfield, or Lumberton.

This makes me wonder what control cities will be used for I-42 at I-95.  Would they be Goldsboro/Raleigh (the logical one), Goldsboro/Garner, or maybe even Goldsboro/Clayton?

Take US 17 in northeastern NC, for example.  Beginning at the south end of the Elizabeth City bypass, US 17 north is signed for Chesapeake, VA--which is good since this is the next "large" city US 17 goes through.  There are two things "wrong" with this, however.  First, Chesapeake does not really have an urban, downtown area.  The part of US 17 in Chesapeake goes through rural farms then semi-suburban areas.  So, yes, US 17 goes through Chesapeake, but nowhere near a city "center", although it does go through the city for a considerable distance.  Second, after the Elizabeth City bypass ends and US 17 passes Morgan's Corner, the first distance sign encountered lists Portsmouth and Hampton.  I always found this to be fascinating.  I could understand the Portsmouth listing since US 17 does come close to its downtown area but US 17 does not even enter Hampton.  That is unnecessary.  But what I am getting at is that US 17 should be signed for Portsmouth instead of Chesapeake and that Hampton should be replaced with Newport News.

When the distance signs were first put up in 1983, US 17 followed now Business US 17 through Deep Creek and up to I-64.  Dominion Blvd. was VA 104 and headed to the I-464/I-64 interchange.  US 17 was re-routed along Dominion and I-64 around 2001-02.  So, maybe, US 17 could have Norfolk as a control city--even though US 17 does not go into Norfolk but leads to a highway that does enter Norfolk (I-464).

Of course, in (optimistically) 20-30 years, US 17 could be co-signed with I-87 and the control city would be Norfolk.

[hbelkins]

I was driving down I-95 in NC today and noticed that the US 64 interchange is a mess of unnecessary control cities.



Rocky Mount - Nashville - Tarboro are a line of neighboring towns. It quite literally tells me nothing about WHERE US 64 goes beyond this small, geographic cluster. Since US 64 gets me to Raleigh, I'd use that. I'd keep Rocky Mount but Nashville and Tarboro are useless here.

I was driving down I-95 in NC today and noticed that the US 64 interchange is a mess of unnecessary control cities.

Rocky Mount - Nashville - Tarboro are a line of neighboring towns. It quite literally tells me nothing about WHERE US 64 goes beyond this small, geographic cluster. Since US 64 gets me to Raleigh, I'd use that. I'd keep Rocky Mount but Nashville and Tarboro are useless here.

Agree.  And, since you brought up the subject, while not as formalized as interstates, other major roads, also should have informative control cities that a reasonabably knowledgable person might actually have heard of, expecially if exiting from an interstate onto another level of highway is something a major portion of the traffic is going to do at that exit.

Case in point: US 23's I-64 exit in Kentucky. Destinations are Louisa and Ashland, but US 23 serves a lot more cities than just those two towns. That corridor runs from Columbus, Ohio through Chillicothe and Portsmouth; then Pikeville, Ky.; then Norton, Va.; Kingsport and Johnson City, Tenn.; and Asheville, NC. Any of those places could legitimately be listed at the I-64 exit. I might not post the Ohio cities because Portsmouth is best reached from US 52 and Chillicothe and Columbus by other routes leading out of Charleston, but I'd be tempted to sign Pikeville and possibly Kingsport.

[briantroutman]

I was driving down I-95 in NC today and noticed that the US 64 interchange is a mess of unnecessary control cities.



Rocky Mount - Nashville - Tarboro are a line of neighboring towns. It quite literally tells me nothing about WHERE US 64 goes beyond this small, geographic cluster. Since US 64 gets me to Raleigh, I'd use that. I'd keep Rocky Mount but Nashville and Tarboro are useless here.

Based on GSV, this photo appears to have been taken in the northbound direction. Southbound, the sign has a larger Raleigh banner at the top in place of the smaller Tarboro banner shown here, though it still has Rocky Mount and Nashville listed as the control cities on main guide sign itself.

But by this point headed north, you've already passed two other all-freeway routes to Raleigh (I-40 near Benson, I-587/US 264 near Wilson), and you're entirely north of Raleigh itself and headed away from it. In other words, I-95 North to US 64 West is an illogical route to Raleigh that no one but a roadgeek wanting to rack up extra miles would take. And if US 64 serves a much more important purpose as the primary gateway to Nashville from the south, I think there's a good reason to sign Nashville, not Raleigh, facing northbound traffic, even if the primary westward control should be Raleigh to southbound traffic.

[Rothman]

I would keep US 23 at I-64 as Louisa and Ashland.  Both are significant towns in the region.

Having family in Floyd County and environs, if you get on US 23 from I-64 and you're not a coal truck, you aren't driving further south than Pikeville, usually.