Over the past few months, I've been using different sources to compile opening dates of different segments of the interstate / freeway network of a few different states, and create an interactive Google My Maps for each state. So far, I have maps for Virginia, North Carolina, Delaware, South Carolina, and Maryland / D.C.. I plan on expanding this "series" to other states in the future. Any future states added will be put in the folder below.
Folder to series -
https://goo.gl/y3wDtU
Individual maps -
Virginia - https://goo.gl/iGx2Hg
North Carolina - https://goo.gl/X81wC8
Delaware - https://goo.gl/ABjZEk
South Carolina - https://goo.gl/94oBBY
Maryland / D.C. - https://goo.gl/wxsgsG
I've used many different sources to compile this information, but here are some of the websites which have been a major help so far -
- http://www.pennways.com/
- http://www.phillyroads.com/history/
- http://www.vahighways.com/
- http://roadstothefuture.com/main.htm
- http://www.dcroads.net/
Another major help for the Maryland / D.C. map were from the specific Maryland State Highway Maps from each year since the 40s.
The source information for the North Carolina map has general website links, not specific to each highway, etc. For all other maps created after those, so far Delaware, South Carolina, and Maryland / D.C., have more detailed source information, such as exact web pages the dates came from, the individual highways, etc. The Virginia map was also originally formatted this way, however was corrected to include specific article links, etc. on March 17, 2019. The North Carolina map may be updated in the future, however that is currently how it is.
For the five states I currently have, I've completed all of the mainline / spur interstate system, though the non-interstate, freeway network is not completed. Any information on opening dates for unmarked segments would be useful, along with a source if possible. Also, if any dates are incorrectly marked, that would also be useful information.
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
You're also not going to find Vermont's unless you take a trip to the state archives in Middlesex, VT. The opening dates don't exist in any currently-online material.
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
You're also not going to find Vermont's unless you take a trip to the state archives in Middlesex, VT. The opening dates don't exist in any currently-online material.
The color thing was to give each segment a different color, therefore to depict each segment and make it visible. Let's say one segment of highway opened in 1972, and the next opened in 1974. If I gave it a color based on 5-year period, it would all be the same color. The different color scheme simply makes it visible that those two segments opened at different times.
I list a lot of opening months / dates for segments, but a lot of them are just not possible / easy to find. The segments that I list only years on are ones where there was no date provided or month. If it's provided though, I will list that. There's also certain highways I mention a time-frame of a couple different years, and that's because I cannot find an exact year for that segment.
How about something like this:
January 1, 1960: 255,0,0
July 1, 1960: 255,30,0
January 1, 1961: 255,60,0
July 1, 1961: 255,90,0
...
January 1, 1964: 255,240,0
July 1, 1964: 255,255,0
January 1, 1965: 240,255,0
...
Quote from: 1 on January 20, 2019, 01:22:57 PM
How about something like this:
January 1, 1960: 255,0,0
July 1, 1960: 255,30,0
January 1, 1961: 255,60,0
July 1, 1961: 255,90,0
...
January 1, 1964: 255,240,0
July 1, 1964: 255,255,0
January 1, 1965: 240,255,0
...
The problem is there's only about 40 color options to chose from.
Quote from: sprjus4The color thing was to give each segment a different color, therefore to depict each segment and make it visible. Let's say one segment of highway opened in 1972, and the next opened in 1974. If I gave it a color based on 5-year period, it would all be the same color. The different color scheme simply makes it visible that those two segments opened at different times.
However, it also requires the reader to click on the segment and look at the window or look at the table in order to see when that date is. The varying colors is also a cartographer's nightmare...not good cartography practice. With a more uniform scale...even something along the lines of what "1" suggested, one could get a general idea of when a given segment opened without having to go through all the extra click steps.
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 01:28:31 PM
Quote from: sprjus4The color thing was to give each segment a different color, therefore to depict each segment and make it visible. Let's say one segment of highway opened in 1972, and the next opened in 1974. If I gave it a color based on 5-year period, it would all be the same color. The different color scheme simply makes it visible that those two segments opened at different times.
However, it also requires the reader to click on the segment and look at the window or look at the table in order to see when that date is. The varying colors is also a cartographer's nightmare...not good cartography practice. With a more uniform scale...even something along the lines of what "1" suggested, one could get a general idea of when a given segment opened without having to go through all the extra click steps.
I suppose. I'll look into it.
I don't know when I'll get around to the three existing maps, but I'll do the future ones in that way. I'll probably do a pattern of similar colors for each 5-year period.
Also, you can get around the "only 40 color options" by creating it in Google Earth (which gives you manual control of RGB values), exporting it as a KML, then importing the KML into Google My Maps.
Quote from: sprjus4 on January 20, 2019, 01:27:20 PM
Quote from: 1 on January 20, 2019, 01:22:57 PM
How about something like this:
January 1, 1960: 255,0,0
July 1, 1960: 255,30,0
January 1, 1961: 255,60,0
July 1, 1961: 255,90,0
...
January 1, 1964: 255,240,0
July 1, 1964: 255,255,0
January 1, 1965: 240,255,0
...
The problem is there's only about 40 color options to chose from.
And some of them (like the yellow ones in 1's post) border on invisible for some of us. Taking the pastels off your palette, and sticking with high-contrast colors, would really help.
I'm editing the maps currently to have one color per category. If you're interested on a specific segment, then you can click on it to see its specific year / month / date.
Quote from: oscar on January 20, 2019, 01:45:30 PM
Quote from: sprjus4 on January 20, 2019, 01:27:20 PM
Quote from: 1 on January 20, 2019, 01:22:57 PM
How about something like this:
January 1, 1960: 255,0,0
July 1, 1960: 255,30,0
January 1, 1961: 255,60,0
July 1, 1961: 255,90,0
...
January 1, 1964: 255,240,0
July 1, 1964: 255,255,0
January 1, 1965: 240,255,0
...
The problem is there's only about 40 color options to chose from.
And some of them (like the yellow ones in 1's post) border on invisible for some of us. Taking the pastels off your palette, and sticking with high-contrast colors, would really help.
I'm updating the maps for a different color scheme. I will avoid those colors. I will agree some of them are hard to see.
I updated the Virginia map.
Is this a better concept? https://drive.google.com/open?id=1TuzkSguVYj62slgJTrAzDpPC4XsclEnr
Yes, that does look better. Though I'd find a different color for 1950-60...looks too close to 1976-1980.
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 02:29:51 PM
Yes, that does look better. Though I'd find a different color for 1950-60...looks too close to 1976-1980.
I changed the 1976 - 1980 to a pink color since it wasn't used. It progresses from darker to lighter the newer it gets.
I will change the color scheme on the other maps to this.
North Carolina & Delaware are updated with the new color scheme.
Links -
North Carolina - https://goo.gl/X81wC8
Delaware - https://goo.gl/ABjZEk
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
There is a reason why Metro systems typically use no more than 5 or 6 colors for their lines, often just the primary colors. Easy to differentiate. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange for WMATA. Silver just added recently.
Quote from: Beltway on January 20, 2019, 03:29:24 PM
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
There is a reason why Metro systems typically use no more than 5 or 6 colors for their lines, often just the primary colors. Easy to differentiate. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange for WMATA. Silver just added recently.
Makes sense. I did update the colors on the maps.
Quote from: Beltway on January 20, 2019, 03:29:24 PM
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
There is a reason why Metro systems typically use no more than 5 or 6 colors for their lines, often just the primary colors. Easy to differentiate. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange for WMATA. Silver just added recently.
...other than the fact that such systems don't usually have more than 5 or 6 lines in the first place?
And at some point, you're going to run out of primary color names. "Take the Navy Blue Line, then transfer to the Hot Pink Line, take that to the Lime Green Line..."
Quote from: US 89 on January 20, 2019, 03:42:24 PM
Quote from: Beltway on January 20, 2019, 03:29:24 PM
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
There is a reason why Metro systems typically use no more than 5 or 6 colors for their lines, often just the primary colors. Easy to differentiate. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange for WMATA. Silver just added recently.
...other than the fact that such systems don't usually have more than 5 or 6 lines in the first place?
Some have many more, see New York, London, Paris, Tokyo.
Quote from: US 89 on January 20, 2019, 03:42:24 PM
Quote from: Beltway on January 20, 2019, 03:29:24 PM
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
There is a reason why Metro systems typically use no more than 5 or 6 colors for their lines, often just the primary colors. Easy to differentiate. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange for WMATA. Silver just added recently.
...other than the fact that such systems don't usually have more than 5 or 6 lines in the first place?
And at some point, you're going to run out of primary color names. "Take the Navy Blue Line, then transfer to the Hot Pink Line, take that to the Lime Green Line..."
Unless you get sponsorship. "Take the Old Navy blue line, transfer to the pink T-Mobile line, then take that to Lime Bikeshare line..."
I've been compiling my own map for the Pacific Northwest. Feel free to copy it in your format.
https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1ILxw-86Y1JRTS1ZpEW0zFpF_YJ0&ll=47.66982420053988%2C-122.4064063613281&z=9
Quote from: Bruce on January 21, 2019, 03:59:43 AM
I've been compiling my own map for the Pacific Northwest. Feel free to copy it in your format.
https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1ILxw-86Y1JRTS1ZpEW0zFpF_YJ0&ll=47.66982420053988%2C-122.4064063613281&z=9
Nice. I'm not doing the west coast for now, but if I ever get there, I'll take a look at it.
Thanks.
I do like the format though. I might update my maps to have some sort of template for each entry. Currently, the date is the title, then any additional info in the description part. The concept having route number is interesting, I would do cost, but a lot of times I don't get that info.
New map for South Carolina - https://goo.gl/94oBBY
All of the interstates are fully complete.
I believe all of the non-interstate freeways are also completed, if I did not miss any.
A new map for Maryland / D.C. should be out eventually.
Maryland & Washington D.C. Freeway Openings - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1wD0XEdn2ljaL-nW6vzvlSKP_wVIMGn_c
Format updated to include three sections, "Opening Date", "Information", and "Cost". Not all freeway segments have all three sections filled out, but when available, they will be.
That is really cool.
Quote from: epzik8 on March 17, 2019, 10:48:00 AM
That is really cool.
Thanks for the feedback. I plan on completing more maps in the future for other states whenever I can find information on them.
Update -
Updated the format for the original Virginia map to include "Opening Date", "Information", and "Cost" sections. Along with that, I have gone ahead and added cost information for certain highways when it was available, and plan on expanding that when more information is found. A few highways with generalized opening dates (year only) were also updated to include specific opening dates (year, month, date), again after it was researched.
The source information for the Virginia map has also been updated to include specific article links as opposed to simply the website.
Finally, at least one new map, possible two maps should be completed by April or May.
This (https://gis.wilson-co.com/maps/) site has some nice imagery. Go to 2003 and you can see the Wilson Bypass (US-264) opened in two segments. First segment (US-264 ALT to I-95) opened in I believe 2000 or 2001, and the second (I-95 to NC 58) was in 2003.
This (http://www.vahighways.com/ncannex/route-log/us264.html) site does not list the segment that opened in the early 2000s.
Quote from: tolbs17 on July 27, 2021, 07:04:38 AM
This (http://www.vahighways.com/ncannex/route-log/us264.html) site does not list the segment that opened in the early 2000s.
The site is accurate. US 264 was not assigned to that segment between I-95 and US 264 ALT near Sims until the full freeway around Wilson was opened. That first section was SR 1213 when it opened. This is explicitly shown on the 1999-2000 Wilson County map and also spelled out here (https://connect.ncdot.gov/resources/safety/Route%20Changes/Route%20Changes/US264_20030217.pdf)
This series sounds interesting to me. I could help with Ohio, Indiana and Missouri if you need it.
Quote from: Beltway on January 20, 2019, 03:47:32 PM
Quote from: US 89 on January 20, 2019, 03:42:24 PM
Quote from: Beltway on January 20, 2019, 03:29:24 PM
Quote from: froggie on January 20, 2019, 08:23:17 AM
Suggestion: you have too many colors. Go with a uniform color for a given decade or 5 year period, and label the specific opening date/month for an individual section.
There is a reason why Metro systems typically use no more than 5 or 6 colors for their lines, often just the primary colors. Easy to differentiate. Red, yellow, green, blue, orange for WMATA. Silver just added recently.
...other than the fact that such systems don't usually have more than 5 or 6 lines in the first place?
Some have many more, see New York, London, Paris, Tokyo.
Which is why they use numbers, letters or names instead of colors.
There are more distinguishable colors than color names, such as this, this, this, this, and this. Five colors, three commonly used names if you include cyan and sky blue.
Quote from: Mapmikey on July 27, 2021, 08:23:21 AM
Quote from: tolbs17 on July 27, 2021, 07:04:38 AM
This (http://www.vahighways.com/ncannex/route-log/us264.html) site does not list the segment that opened in the early 2000s.
The site is accurate. US 264 was not assigned to that segment between I-95 and US 264 ALT near Sims until the full freeway around Wilson was opened. That first section was SR 1213 when it opened. This is explicitly shown on the 1999-2000 Wilson County map and also spelled out here (https://connect.ncdot.gov/resources/safety/Route%20Changes/Route%20Changes/US264_20030217.pdf)
I did kind of figure it would have been a state or a NC highway route.
And going through Nashville, US-64 was a two-lane freeway until the late 70s.
Quote from: tolbs17 on July 27, 2021, 04:31:52 PM
And going through Nashville, US-64 was a two-lane freeway until the late 70s.
US 64 misses Nashville by like 70 miles to the south.
Nashville, NC.
I've just learned to assume he means North Carolina when not giving a state name.
Quote from: SkyPesos on July 27, 2021, 09:08:57 AM
This series sounds interesting to me. I could help with Ohio, Indiana and Missouri if you need it.
Perhaps in the future, but this was a project I had started a couple years ago and just kind of gave up on. Mainly lost time to do it, and never got back into it. If I get more time, I may come back to it at some point.
But appreciate the offer.
Quote from: sprjus4 on March 13, 2019, 06:40:48 PM
Maryland & Washington D.C. Freeway Openings - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1wD0XEdn2ljaL-nW6vzvlSKP_wVIMGn_c
Format updated to include three sections, "Opening Date", "Information", and "Cost". Not all freeway segments have all three sections filled out, but when available, they will be.
In spite of the name, I do not think the section of U.S. 29 in D.C. called Whitehurst Freeway, N.W. qualifies as a freeway.
^ I included it when making that map because while substandard, it's still an elevated limited access highway segment with one interchange.
US-64 between Rocky Mount and Tarboro had at-grade intersections until the mid 90s. I think it was 1996 is when it became a full freeway.
Quote from: cpzilliacus on July 28, 2021, 10:58:19 AM
In spite of the name, I do not think the section of U.S. 29 in D.C. called Whitehurst Freeway, N.W. qualifies as a freeway.
You think wrongly.