Most pathetic state clinches

[bugo]

I have driven the entirety of I-70 (in both directions) and US 30 (westbound) in West Virginia. I've been to exactly two counties, both discontinuous and both in the panhandle. I have barely, and I mean BARELY been to the state, but I can count even though it makes me feel dirty. I did get out of the car to drain the lizard and purchase a Coke, and getting out of the car is a requirement for each new state I visit. I-70 is 14 miles from the Ohio border to the Pennsylvania border. US 30 is a mere 3 1/2 miles from the Ohio border to the Pennsylvania border. So I've driven approximately 32 miles within the state. I drove at about 75 MPH on I-70 and probably 65 or 70 on US 30. Add in my c-store visit and I've been in West Virginia for less than a half hour. And I've been to the state three times!

The clinching of both highways was also extremely lame, especially US 30.

Can anybody beat my pathetic clinching of the Mountaineer State?

[corco]

Until a couple weeks ago, the only time I had been to Pennsylvania was on I-90 once, without ever exiting.

Until a year ago, I'd only been to Alabama once in 1994 (when I was six) when I was at a wedding in Pensacola and rode across the state line with my cousins to Alabama and promptly turned around, just so what we could say we had been to Alabama.

For now, my weakest is probably Mississippi. I've only clipped the very northeastern corner of Mississippi- came in on US 72 and left on US 45. I believe Mississippi is the only state in which I've entered without leaving the car.

[TEG24601]

How about I-94 in Indiana?  Or I-90 or US 2 in Idaho?

[Thing 342]

The only parts of Montana and Idaho I've visited have been parts of Yellowstone.

[froggie]

This doesn't beat bugo's US 30 WV example, but AZ in my case:  in on US 64, out on US 160.  A total of 9.5 miles, excluding a few footsteps at Four Corners proper.

I imagine there's somebody out there who's clinch of New Mexico consists of the 0.9 mile of US 160 near Four Corners.  Even if one drove up to the monument on the way, it's a total of about a mile-and-a-half.

Also nearby:  the extent of my driving on Colorado...in on US 160, out on CO 41, a total of 14.5 miles.  Aside from my flights through Denver airport, this is my only travel in Colorado.

[TheCatalyst31]

The only times I've been in Minnesota or Utah were airport layovers, which I'm not even sure I want to count. Minnesota is especially embarrassing since I live a state over.

[Jim]

In the past, I've had a couple pathetic clinches.  For a long time, my only visit to Alabama was a very pathetic drive down US 72 from Tennessee until the first convenient place to turn around (so maybe 10 minutes in the state).  For Arkansas my first visit was just north on US 65 to east on US 82 on a loop out of Vicksburg with the primary purpose of saying I'd visited Arkansas.  For Oregon, we crossed over into Astoria from Washington after a camping night near US 101 on the Washington side of the Columbia, but at least stopped for breakfast to make it somewhat less pathetic.  I can't be sure of this one, as it would have happened long before I kept track of such things, but I bet my first trips through New Hampshire were just I-95 to get to and from Maine, and Delaware just passing through on I-95 also.  Each can be done in, what, 10 to 20 minutes? 

Fortunately, I've been able to come up with longer visits to each since those initial clinchings.  In fact, I just looked and realized I've spent a night in all but Idaho and Nebraska, and Nebraska will be taken care of on a trip this summer.

I would have had a pathetic clinching of North Dakota a few years before I actually ended up making a more substantial visit.  I was in Minneapolis for much of April 1997, but that's the month of the massive Red River flooding, and the weekend I had set aside for that ride was near the peak of the flooding (including the big fire in downtown Grand Forks), and I probably couldn't have gotten across into North Dakota if I tried.

This one wasn't the case for me, but I think one common pathetic clinch might be to take I-684 through the segment where it clips Connecticut without an exit.  There's also the I-86/NY 17 dip into Pennsylvania, but at least there's an exit there.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

My friend and I crossed the DRB from Delaware into NJ last summer (neither of us I believe had ever been to NJ). We stopped so she could use the bathroom then went back into Delaware permanently.

[noelbotevera]

I-81 into West Virginia. One county clinched, and it's 26 miles. Seriously, with a 70 MPH speed limit that does not even last into Virginia, only 15 minutes invested, without exiting.

[GaryV]

US 522 in MD (~2 miles total, part of it concurrent with I-70)

Edit:  This wasn't the only time I was ever in MD, but it was the only time in MD that trip.

[ce929wax]

I've only been on US 58 and VA 70 in Lee County, Virginia.  That is the extent of my time in VA, and I have zero time in West Virginia.

[vtk]

I count two counties in Texas entirely because of layovers at DFW.

[vdeane]

If anyone ever managed to have their only time in DC be driving on the portion of I-95 that enters the district on the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, that would be the ultimate example of this.  Can't personally claim it though - not only have I spent a decent amount of time in DC through a combination of a school field trip and family vacation, I've never been on the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

My most pathetic county clinch in the US is Sussex County, NJ.  Only been in it on that portion of I-80 that dips though very quickly.  If we include Canada, Frontenac County, ON has it beat: only been in it by boat.

My most pathetic state clinch is RI.  Only been on I-195, RI 146, and a piece of I-95, and never got out of the car (currently the only state/province I've visited where that is true).

[1995hoo]

I have entered Utah for a total of 15 minutes at SLC airport. Flew in from Vancouver and rushed through to connect to a flight to Reagan (barely made it). It's too pathetic to count it as a state I've visited for normal purposes, but I guess for this thread I could list it. I'll remedy the situation this fall with a visit to the Valley of the Gods and the Moki Dugway en route from Albuquerque to the Grand Canyon.

For Minnesota, I have a minimal amount of road travel, probably less than ten miles. On one trip I flew into MSP for a business trip, took a cab to the hotel in St. Paul, and never went anywhere other than the courthouse across the street from the hotel. On the other trip I flew into MSP, took a cab to Minneapolis, and due to heavy rain used the skywalk between the hotel and the office I was visiting.

If anyone ever managed to have their only time in DC be driving on the portion of I-95 that enters the district on the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, that would be the ultimate example of this.

I don't know any such people, but I'm certain there are a great many of them and that almost none of them, aside from members of this forum, realize they passed through DC.

[roadman65]

I was riding back to FL from SD along I-29 when I crashed at a Motel 6 in Sioux City, IA.  The next morning I had to cross the Missouri River just to clinch Nebraska as I have not been there yet.  I ate a McDonalds right before US 77 crosses into Iowa for its very short tenor in that particular state, before continuing back on I-29 south.

[Pete from Boston]

Stopped to use a payphone on I-10 in Alabama. 

For years my only time in Kentucky was a token cross of the bridge from Rain Man (yes, we all hummed) then back into Cincinnati.

Strangely, I have never laid over in a state I have not been to before or since by land (though I set foot in Portugal this way).

[Eth]

For a period of about 15 years or so, my only time in Pennsylvania came from entering the state on I-79 (I was visiting family in the Morgantown, WV area), turning around (probably at exit 1 in Mt. Morris; hard to remember, I was about 7 years old at the time), and going back to West Virginia. I've since visited the western Philadelphia suburbs as well as the Lancaster County area.

I've also gone through both Rhode Island and New York without leaving the car. At least in the case of Rhode Island I still traversed the entire state on I-95, and in the case of New York it involved driving on city streets through the Bronx thanks to my GPS attempting to route me around traffic.

My standing most pathetic clinch (unless you count airport layovers in Texas and Colorado) is probably Ohio, which I entered solely for the purpose of visiting a family member's place of business somewhere in Marietta, probably within a half-mile of the Ohio River (she lived across the river in West Virginia). That was about 20 years ago, and I haven't been back since.

[roadman65]

Should layovers in airports of a state we never drove in, nor been on any road within, be considered a clinch of the state?

I know a bit off topic, and if you did pass through a particular state's airport, it would be far from pathetic, but I did not know in which topic to have a question about that in being not directly related to roads, but could have some of us talking about them if brought out which would bring roads into off topic.  This here is somewhat on point as it is a question about the clinch part.

[1995hoo]

I-81 into West Virginia. One county clinched, and it's 26 miles. Seriously, with a 70 MPH speed limit that does not even last into Virginia, only 15 minutes invested, without exiting.

The 70-mph limit now does carry over into Virginia since sometime after the speed limit statute was amended in 2010.

[roadman65]

I take VA is like Texas with two different parts of the state having different freeway maximums?  Western VA has the 70 while Eastern VA has 65 similar to Eastern Texas with its 75 mph and Western Texas and its 80.

[english si]

I count layovers at DTW as 'visiting Michigan'. To be fair, they weren't that short ones, and I made the effort to leave the air conditioned terminal...

...for 2 seconds. I literally walked out the door a step, then stepped backwards through the doorway.

And, in my favour, I hadn't gone through the border of the US at that point. I've slept in the state of Michigan, unlike my AZ clinch (that was an all-day trip from Vegas to the Grand Canyon).



Though that doesn't take the biscuit - I count Northumberland as 'driven through' in my English county clinch. 4 miles of road/10 minutes that I don't remember, but assume I went through, given I visited Birdoswald Roman Fort (a mile and a half outside the county).

[sipes23]

I've clinched Saskatchewan by virtue of having left the Saskatoon airport and went for a 20 minute walk to stretch my legs. Weak sauce, but I'll take what I can get.

[hbelkins]

Should layovers in airports of a state we never drove in, nor been on any road within, be considered a clinch of the state?

Different people have their own definitions. I know one person who doesn't consider a county officially visited until he sees the courthouse. For me, if I've physically been in a county or state, it counts, even if I just drove through and didn't stop, or drove there specifically to visit it and then turned around (I have a bunch of counties under my belt doing exactly that).

To answer Jeremy's original question, Nebraska. I have one county, that being Dakota. In on US 77, out on I-129, no stops. Honorable mention would be York County, Maine. That's the only county in Maine I've ever visited, but I have been there twice via different routes and actually stopped there during the Portsmouth, NH meet, although I didn't get out of the car because I got sick during the meet tour. Further honorable mentions would be Bear Lake, Idaho (drove through via US 89, but stopped) and Clark County, Nevada (had an overnight stay).

[cl94]

Someone who hits Connecticut via I-684 would be quite pathetic. No exits within the state and it's not even in Greenwich for 1.5 miles.

An interesting tidbit- I-87 gained its intrastate status only after it was moved off of I-684 and onto the Thruway

[hobsini2]

I have Mississippi clinched because I was in Memphis and drove down I-55 to MS 302 Goodman Rd and did a exit U turn before heading on to Texas on I-40 and I-30.