The Most Boring Stretches of Highway

Started by nwi_navigator_1181, March 07, 2013, 12:10:25 AM

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nwi_navigator_1181

Hey there.

I was reading the "I-64 in Indiana" thread, and it had me thinking...about the opposite.

The Indiana portion of I-64 is said to be the one of the most beautiful experiences in interstate driving. However, there are stretches that, personally, makes me want to say, "Please end this."

Two great examples here: the stretch on I-65 between U.S. 231 in Crown Point and Indianapolis (with minor exception in Lafayette) is just open field and not much else. It has been tempered a bit by the wind turbines installed north of Lafayette in 2009, but it still leaves a lot to be desired.

The stretch of I-55 from I-80 to I-74 in Illinois is just death. There's absolutely nothing going on. The only fun there is if you somehow drive alongside an Amtrak train coasting along the tracks that sit just east of the highway.

What examples do you have? Share them here. I thank you for your time.
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corco

#1
Heh, my 1-9 years of life were spent with way, way too much time on I-65 in NW Indiana due to constant trips from Chicago to Ohio. It's amazing I'm a road enthusiast after that.

Maybe it's a grass is greener on the other side thing (been in the west since late 97), but I'll take the vegetation of the midwest over fields of sagebrush any day.

US 20 from Riverton WY to Casper, WY

US 20 from Bend OR to Ontario OR, made worse by the inexplicable double nickel speed limit

I-84 from I-86 to I-15

I-70 from Denver east to pretty much wherever the Flint Hills start

SR 86 in Arizona- yeah, there's mountains there but those are entertaining for 30 seconds

US-2 from Wenatchee to Spokane WA

Nevada





OCGuy81

I-5 from Redding south to Sacramento.  And 505.

NE2

pre-1945 Florida route log

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Takumi

Quote from: corco on March 07, 2013, 12:15:47 AM
Nevada
:-D

US 60 west of Richmond exurbia
I-85 between Petersburg and Henderson
(Insert long rural central VA state route besides 6, 45, or 153 here)
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on_wisconsin

I-90 through southern Minnesota (west of Rochester)
I-39 in Illinois and central Wisconsin
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djsinco

#6
I-80/*90 Cheyenne east to, well, at least Erie.
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KEK Inc.

Quote from: OCGuy81 on March 07, 2013, 12:16:29 AM
I-5 from Redding south to Sacramento.  And 505.

Done that many times.  Although, I still don't think it's nearly as bad as I-5 from Stockton down to Wheeler Ridge.
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Brandon

I-80 between Wendover and Toole, Utah, across the salt flats.  Straight, flat, and monochrome.  I'll take the Midwest and Plains interstates over that any day of the week.  Those have color and curves on their side.  I-39, I-55, and I-80 at very interesting, IMHO.

I-15 between Barstow, CA and Las Vegas, NV.  Again, very monochromatic and boring, IMHO.

US-395 between CA-14 and Bishop was almost as bad.  You couldn't even tell when the mountains were there.
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Roadsguy

In PA:

I-78 from the first US 22 merge in the west to Hamburg in the east. Long... straight... rural... not as long as others, but I take it fairly often.

The Turnpike isn't quite like that. It's not laser-straight, but west of Valley Forge where it starts to have trees on either side, it's very repetitive.
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CentralCAroadgeek

I-10 in West Texas. Such a long and boring 500 miles and home to my only recent case of sleeping on a road trip.

jeffandnicole

The majority of I-95 between Richmond and Jacksonville.  OK, maybe the 1st time or two it's interesting, but it gets old quick.

corco

#13
QuoteI-80 Cheyenne east to, well, at least Erie.

That's a drive I find quite interesting, but the frame of mind has to be shifted to a more macro view. Cheyenne is so completely different from Erie, and the transition so subtle, it's really quite cool.

If you could do that drive at 300 MPH (realizing that I-80 doesn't go to Erie), it would be more obviously entertaining.

QuoteI-80 between Wendover and Toole, Utah, across the salt flats.

With you on that- that's another one of those drives that's interesting for five minutes and then you just want to get to SLC

1995hoo

Quote from: jeffandnicole on March 07, 2013, 10:24:49 AM
The majority of I-95 between Richmond and Jacksonville.  OK, maybe the 1st time or two it's interesting, but it gets old quick.

Now that the old funny South of the Border billboards are gone and replaced with politically correct versions, I'll agree with you there. I enjoyed the old non-PC billboards and they at least made the part of the drive prior to South of the Border a bit more interesting. It was always more fun if you had a passenger who hadn't seen those billboards before, though.

I find Florida's Turnpike from the Lantana barrier to Fort Pierce to be boring. I limit it to that segment because we've never had reason to stay on the Turnpike north of there. I'd find the Bee Line (FL-528) boring as well except that the traffic is usually pretty heavy and moving at fairly high speeds. I guess that means the road itself is boring but the act of driving it is not, if that makes any sense.

I've only driven across Ohio on I-70 to Dayton one time, so it wasn't boring to me because it was somewhere new, but if I made that trip more often I'd find it mind-numbing (as my wife does, since she's driven it hundreds of times over the years–she grew up there). Relatively flat, nothing much to see, fair amount of traffic. Only saving grace was listening to the Nationals game on XM radio. I doubt it's a drive I'll ever make very often, though, because (a) she only has one relative left there and (b) on the way home I tried taking US-50 to I-79 and I enjoyed that a lot more than I-70 so in the future I'd go that way.

I also agree with Takumi about I-85 from Petersburg to Henderson, especially the Virginia portion because it's basically just a long canyon cut through the trees. (What used to frustrate me in the 1990s was that no matter how fast I drove on that road, sometimes upwards of 95 mph, it always took me four hours to get from Durham to Fairfax County.)
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vdeane

NY 104 around Sodus Point is pretty boring.  Trees, trees, and more trees.  Little else.
Please note: All comments here represent my own personal opinion and do not reflect the official position of NYSDOT or its affiliates.

kphoger

#16
I echo the vote for I-39 in Illinois.

I haven't driven in Wyoming, but I hear I might change my vote if I did.

I-35 between San Antonio and Laredo is also pretty boring, as is Mexican highway 85(D) between Laredo and the Mamulique area–especially the latter, since there are no towns.
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cu2010

The NY Thruway, especially west of Syracuse. Just cars and trees. Always has been the least favorite part of my semi-frequent trips to Rochester.
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US 41

Quote from: NE2 on March 07, 2013, 12:18:51 AM
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US 41

Interstate 75 in GEorgia is pretty boring, mainly because you feel like you're never going to get out of GEorgia and finally get into Florida.
Visited States and Provinces:
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Canada (5)= NB, NS, ON, PEI, QC
Mexico (9)= BCN, BCS, CHIH, COAH, DGO, NL, SON, SIN, TAM

kkt

I-80 Nebraska

I-5 from Woodland to Red Bluff and Los Banos to Wheeler Ridge and Eugene to Tigard

I-90 from the Columbia to Spokane

agentsteel53

Quote from: US 41 on March 07, 2013, 11:51:46 AM
Interstate 75 in GEorgia is pretty boring, mainly because you feel like you're never going to get out of GEorgia and finally get into Florida.

Interstate 75 in FLorida ain't much more to write about either...
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cpzilliacus

Two east-west freeways in the old Confederacy between I-95 and Atlantic Ocean seaport cities.

  • Virginia's I-64 between I-295 and Newport News; and
  • South Carolina's I-26 between I-95 and Summerville.
Both are four-lane freeways with a relatively high percentage of truck traffic, with a heavily-treed median and on forests on both sides (though SCDOT has plans to chop most of them on the median of I-26) with little to see in either direction.
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agentsteel53

Quote from: Brandon on March 07, 2013, 06:38:18 AM

US-395 between CA-14 and Bishop was almost as bad.  You couldn't even tell when the mountains were there.

did you drive it when it was overcast or something?  that's one of my absolute favorite stretches of road in California.

the only parts of 395 that suck are the first few miles in Adelanto (I always take Air Expressway to avoid most of that), the Nevada line to I-580, and a bit of the northern dregs of Spokane.  the rest is all excellent scenery.
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A.J. Bertin

The entire stretch of I-70 in Illinois is pretty boring. There's hardly anything to look at (including very few billboards).
-A.J. from Michigan



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