Youthful Misconceptions

[jakeroot]

I'm *extremely* unfamiliar with southern NJ and the Philly area. Can anyone explain to me how the gap in the 95 developed? Seems like it could have been routed to interchanges with ramps. I know the plans for original 95 freeway route were scrapped, but why was the original routing plan itself not scrapped and 95 rerouted to another stretch of pavement? I'm sure this is an easy answer; I assume it's something to do with tolls?

This has been discussed at some length in the thread dealing with the I-95/Pennsylvania Turnpike interchange, but in brief, the freeway plan that was scrapped in 1982 (the Somerset Freeway) would have run in or close to the US 1 corridor between Trenton and what is now I-287, a bit to the north of the Turnpike.  The language removing it from the Interstate network provided for I-95 to be routed along the Pennsylvania Turnpike (via a direct connection that did not exist until last year) and across the Delaware River and then along the New Jersey Turnpike.  Although it took almost 40 years to develop the interchange project, it was never abandoned, and to do so would likely have involved giving up Interstate Construction funds.  (It has been described as the "golden spike" in the Interstate system because it was the last segment for which IC funds could be used.)

Stranger drivers in my situation--going from DC to NY and wishing to stay on freeways while avoiding both the Delaware Memorial Bridge and the bottom segment of the NJ Turnpike--would have benefited from interim signing guiding us along what is now I-295 and I-195 (past the then missing direct connection) to the NJ Turnpike access point.  I do not recall that this was provided, and in all honesty, this is a bit of a gumboil routing around the north of Trenton.

Thank you for the summary. Do you know if there's a map that has the original routing, versus what became the signed route?

If I had another question, I guess it would be about the timeline. What held up that connection for so long? I-90 through King County, WA, took about 25 years to come to complete fruition, and I thought that was a long timeline (despite the hundreds of acres of ROW needed for construction). Here, it doesn't seem like there was anything holding it up. There must have been something significant, but if the project was maintained for 40 years for funding purposes, it would seem to me that "getting it done" would have been a higher priority since the 80s.

[J3ebrules]

So I know this isn't a highway-related misconception, but highway-adjacent...

When I was a kid/teen/probably a bit now, I always had really strange knowledge gaps about the weirdest things.
My best friend at the time, my mom, and I were playing a neat board game we found somewhere that was supposed to teach life lessons - my friend and I were 16 or 17 year old fairly intelligent and not particularly sheltered young women at the time, and I think it was more like a game to laugh at the absurd answers.........

Until I answered the open-ended,  "Your car is on fire..."  scenario with "call AAA."

So, I'd apparently been raised that when you have any car issue, you call AAA. My mother has not realized she'd accidentally and inadvertently taught me this, and spluttered through tears of laughter, "Right, nothing like getting in a middleman. I love getting bounced around customer service when I'm in something that's ON FIRE. For them to ask if they should call the fire department for you? Did you at least get out of the car for your little chat with AAA?"

[renegade]

When I was growing up in Michigan, I lived within a half-mile of the Ohio state line.  My best friend at the time believed that Ohio was this place you had to get in the car and ride for hours and hours and hours and hours to get to.  It wasn't till he was fourteen or so before he realized that the fence at the back of the property where he lived was on the state line.   

[D-Dey65]

• I misunderstood my mom, and thought if you turn your blinker on, the car will make the lane change for you (Teslas can actually do this now)

That's actually kind of scary if you turn it on by accident.

• I thought Sunrise Highway on LI was a surface road for its entire run to Montauk, until the GPS told me to take it one day and found out it was a freeway (that should be 65 mph!)

For a long time, it was. In fact when I was growing up the only limited-access part was from NY 109 to west of Saxon Avenue. NY 111 and Suffolk CR 17 had concrete arch underpasses, while NY 27 was actually a four-lane undivided concrete road, but still a surface road.

[DaBigE]

• I misunderstood my mom, and thought if you turn your blinker on, the car will make the lane change for you (Teslas can actually do this now)

That's actually kind of scary if you turn it on by accident.

Better keep the Teslas away from the stereotypical Florida retirees. They'll never stop doing donuts. 

[D-Dey65]

• I misunderstood my mom, and thought if you turn your blinker on, the car will make the lane change for you (Teslas can actually do this now)

That's actually kind of scary if you turn it on by accident.

Better keep the Teslas away from the stereotypical Florida retirees. They'll never stop doing donuts. 

You mean that hasn't happened already?

[roadman]

• I misunderstood my mom, and thought if you turn your blinker on, the car will make the lane change for you (Teslas can actually do this now)

That's actually kind of scary if you turn it on by accident.

Better keep the Teslas away from the stereotypical Florida retirees. They'll never stop doing donuts. 

You mean that hasn't happened already?

No.  But Floridians driving Teslas seem to have mastered the talent of running into vehicles crossing their path.

[D-Dey65]

I used to believe...
...that the whole NJTP was I-95. It took me a while to learn that the whole segment below I-276 wasn't I-95.

And in fact until more recent times the whole segment below I-287/NJ 440 wasn't I-95.

...that New Jersey Route 27 and New York Route 27 were two separate highways. After all, both ended in New York City, didn't they? I always thought that if you started in Princeton and kept going north along Route 27, you'd eventually reach a dead end at the tippy top of Long Island in Montauk.

That would actually be kind of cool. Of course you'd have to extend NY 27 into an overlap with the Gowanus Expressway, and onto West Avenue after the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel, and juggle the NJ 27 extension around Newark, Harrison and Jersey City.

...that the Bronx River Parkway, the Sprain Brook Parkway, and the Taconic State Parkway were one long highway. This belief was reinforced by Google Maps' usage of orange (indicating a freeway) on the contiguous route up north, and yellow (indicating a non-freeway) for the other parts that came past the Sprain Brook Parkway.

I wish the FHWA would recognize that they're not the same long highway. They seem to prefer that NYSDOT restart their exit numbers on the Bronx River Parkway after the interchange with the Sprain Brook Parkway.

Bonus: My dad once told me that I-78 went all the way to California. Luckily, I wasn't that dumb by then, but my brother believed it.

I feel sorry for him. Does he know better now?

[ce929wax]

When I was a kid around the time of the Gulf War, I thought that Saddam Hussein was "Saddam Who's Saying,"  I wondered what he was saying until I got older.

[TheGrassGuy]

When I was little, I took a trip to Ocean City, and our hotel was near Salisbury. Now, Salisbury has two business routes, US 13 and 50 BUS. The concept of bannered routes was very alien to me at the time; I was always under the impression that only busses could take the "bus" routes.

Another related one: I thought that TOLL and OLD were bannered routes. Still wish that US 220 OLD existed between Bedford and Bellefonte.

[GaryV]

Not roads, but I used to think the guy who sang on New Year's Eve was Guylom Bardo.  And the football coach was Vincelom Bardo.

[OracleUsr]

Also not road related, but it does have to do with navigation.

As an early on lighthouse fan, I thought the pattern on the outside of the tower indicated how you got to the top (so basically, a lighthouse that had no pattern--such as Ocracoke--had an elevator...not sure how I thought towers like the Bodie Island Light with horizontal stripes worked)

[US 89]

Once on a trip to Albuquerque as a kid, we were driving on Paseo del Norte and passed a sign for "Bus. Dist." I couldn't figure out what bus distance was or why it would be on a road sign. (That sign has since been replaced with a new one that just leaves the business district out altogether.)

[ErmineNotyours]

At a thrift store I saw an older transistor radio with a connection for an external antenna, abbreviated as "EXT. ANT."  I flipped the word order and thought it was a marked exit for an ant that and walked into the radio.

[Mergingtraffic]

As I kid I had an image of some guy in a high crime area turning on the switches for all the street lights around NYC every night and then coming back and turning them off in the morning.

[D-Dey65]

As I kid I had an image of some guy in a high crime area turning on the switches for all the street lights around NYC every night and then coming back and turning them off in the morning.

Why have I never noticed that wooden light whenever I'm at Prospect, Sunrise, and the Cross Island?

[vtk]

When I was seven years old or so, I had a grotesque idea of what "body shop" meant.  I imagined it was some sort of doctor's office where you could go to swap out body parts or something.

If only...

[Ketchup99]

When I was really small we'd take family trips from State College to NY and CT to visit grandparents, and there was a toll at every state line I was awake for - the Delaware River Bridge on I-80 from PA-NJ, a Thruway toll around the NJ-NY line at the I-287/87 interchange, and I was zonked out by the time we hit Connecticut. So naturally, I assumed that there were tolls at every state line.

I also assumed that Route 26 - which ran through State College - didn't actually go anywhere else. I was shocked when I saw a 26 sign in Huntingdon and it had to be explained to me how state highways worked.

I assumed that the little plaques on PA exits on I-80 that read "Old Exit XX" referred to something from the 1800s, and I imagined a dirt road with those exit numbers.

I thought that my parents would go to jail for driving a couple miles over the speed limit. I have one memory of I-99 posted at 55, my dad at 58, and me really worried. I also thought the only point of I-99 was to take people from the big road (I-80 east of Exit 161 - west of there did not exist to me) on the little road (I-99) to State College.

I never understood how we could be going east on one road and south on another road at the same time.

I thought the Pennsylvania Turnpike was some exotic highway that we only drove on verryyyyyy rare occasion.

[CapeCodder]

That US 40 only existed in St. Louis and nowhere else. That I-55 turned into I-70 in downtown St. Louis. Finally, my grandparents listened to KMOX a lot and at the top of the hour, the 1983 CBS news sounder played. I didn't realize that every CBS station used that sounder, so I thought all stations were KMOX.

[TheGrassGuy]

So I know this isn't a highway-related misconception, but highway-adjacent...

When I was a kid/teen/probably a bit now, I always had really strange knowledge gaps about the weirdest things.
My best friend at the time, my mom, and I were playing a neat board game we found somewhere that was supposed to teach life lessons - my friend and I were 16 or 17 year old fairly intelligent and not particularly sheltered young women at the time, and I think it was more like a game to laugh at the absurd answers.........

Until I answered the open-ended,  "Your car is on fire..."  scenario with "call AAA."

So, I'd apparently been raised that when you have any car issue, you call AAA. My mother has not realized she'd accidentally and inadvertently taught me this, and spluttered through tears of laughter, "Right, nothing like getting in a middleman. I love getting bounced around customer service when I'm in something that's ON FIRE. For them to ask if they should call the fire department for you? Did you at least get out of the car for your little chat with AAA?"

What was the name of this game, may I ask?

[kernals12]

I thought interstate 84 started at Exit 3 in Danbury, CT on that short stub of what I now know is US 7.

[J3ebrules]

So I know this isn't a highway-related misconception, but highway-adjacent...

When I was a kid/teen/probably a bit now, I always had really strange knowledge gaps about the weirdest things.
My best friend at the time, my mom, and I were playing a neat board game we found somewhere that was supposed to teach life lessons - my friend and I were 16 or 17 year old fairly intelligent and not particularly sheltered young women at the time, and I think it was more like a game to laugh at the absurd answers.........

Until I answered the open-ended,  "Your car is on fire..."  scenario with "call AAA."

So, I'd apparently been raised that when you have any car issue, you call AAA. My mother has not realized she'd accidentally and inadvertently taught me this, and spluttered through tears of laughter, "Right, nothing like getting in a middleman. I love getting bounced around customer service when I'm in something that's ON FIRE. For them to ask if they should call the fire department for you? Did you at least get out of the car for your little chat with AAA?"

What was the name of this game, may I ask?

Oh, no clue... this was about 20 years ago if not more. 😂😂

[therocket]

For a short while when I was little, I thought that California was the only state that had state routes as freeways. I thought that other states either had them as 3dis, U.S. Routes, or unnumbered freeways.

[Quillz]

Not sure if I posted or not, but when I was very little, I didn't understand state routes. I just assumed everything with a number was a freeway, except for the times there were numbers in a green sign (the California miner spades). So I started calling them "street routes" and assumed they could only be allowed on surface streets. I didn't understand that states had their own networks until years later.

[bwana39]

In Texas the US Highways were mostly wider and better maintained than the State Highways. All in all that is still the case.

The one thing I had in my mind was why so many towns had a road called "FRONTAGE ROAD" . In my childhood age, it was a street name, not a descriptor for the lanes of the service road. It didn't hurt any that even though we were in NE Texas that mom used the vernacular from greater Houston to describe them as "the FEEDER".

I also had an idea that the SH routes off of I-30 were numbered because of their distance from a given point.

SH-19 had the label "Emory 19"

SH-37 was "Clarksville 37".

At the exit to SH-50 the sign said "Paris 50" (SH-50 has since been truncated in Commerce and it never went all the way to Paris. SH-24 that has replaced SH-50 from Commerce to I-30 does indeed go to Paris.

While it wasn't at I-30, SH 49 in Mount Pleasant said "Jefferson 49"

This was probably before I was ten or so.