Well, after seeing the 'longest period' question regarding interstates, it had me thinking. What's the longer distance, in one trip (not just around town, for instance) that you drove off an interstate (or a freeway, if you want to go that route, as well).
I've driven from I-94 in Miles City, MT to I-29 on US12. Also, US83 from Brownsville (not counting the stretches now an interstate) north through Laredo, to US277, to US90 and west through Alpine to Van Horn, TX (I-10). I've driven several times across Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Kansas without driving on an interstate (or Freeway, as well).
There's also I-35W near Fort Worth on US287, cut north to Borger, then west back to US287 and up to I-70 near Limon. I avoided I-40 because I was hitting some counties in northwest Texas.
Any other long stretches of purposeful off-interstate driving?
58 miles
http://goo.gl/maps/7kkBx
(Note: The western end was my destination.)
I drove US 71 from Kansas City to Bella Vista, AR before it was converted to I-49. With the exception of its overlap with I-44 it is over 200 miles.
Then I drove it from Fort Smith, AR to Shreveport, LA later on which was a long distance as well.
Also I drove US 54 from I-35 at Wichita to I-40 at Tucumcari, NM. Even with a short detour to Dodge, it was still off interstate though.
A few years back I did all of US 31 from the I-465 Beltway around Indy to its northern terminus in Michigan. True it is some freeway with an overlap with both I-94 and I-196, but it still has a long distance between Indy and Benton Harbor, MI and from Holland, MI to Mackinac, MI as well. So I would mention both segments of this route.
Then in 1991 I went from Orlando to New Orleans on US 441, US 27, US 27 Alternate, US 19, US 98, and US 90. Took over a day and a half, but had a moment to see the NAS in Pensacola.
I've probably done a few worth mentioning -- I'll try to take the time to think of them later -- but the longest was certainly Bellingham, WA to Missoula, MT via WA 20 and ID/MT 200.
Outside this country - thousands of miles :P
Inside this country - well over 1,000 miles (US 2 from ND to WA, and a lot of other roads, between I-194 and I-82)
Arizona and Utah, from I-40 in Flagstaff, up U.S. 89 and various local roadways to Zion and Bryce Canyon National Parks. About 290 miles, give or take.
If it's just one-way mileage, I got a 709-miler from Longview, WA, to Ontario, OR (using a VERY roundabout way).
If it's two-way, I routinely do 750 and 800 mile round trips to visit family.
US-69 and 75 in Oklahoma and Texas en route from KC to Dallas: 280 miles
A youth mission trip I went on a few summers ago involved going to KI Sawyer, MI (near Marquette), stopping along the way in Kaukauna, WI and a camp near Eagle River. The non-interstate stretch was around 400 miles. (map (http://goo.gl/maps/GRGzm))
I've driven much further than this on numbered routes, but I drove 125 miles continuously on a road that wasn't an interstate or state highway at all: from Baker CA to 29 Palms on Kelbaker Road, National Trails Road, and Amboy Road.
Without getting on any expressway or freeway, 558 km / 347 mi, from my home to Toronto (the start of the Gardiner Expressway), which took 13 hours with a few short stops.
Probably a segment over the course of about a week totalling around 550 to 700 miles from the western end of the freeway near Ottawa out to North Bay, up to Greenwater Provincial Park near Cochrane, then back south through Timmins to Sudbury. I don't have an old map handy to tell me whether the Trans-Canada Highway near Sudbury used a freeway alignment at the time, so the distance may have been somewhat longer down the eastern side of Georgian Bay, but I just don't remember.
In recent memory, there was a drive of around 230 miles from Laramie, Wyoming, down to I-70 where US-40 meets it west of Denver. This was a screw-up. I meant to stay off the Interstate, but I wanted to go to Estes Park and then take the scenic road down to Denver along the mountains. We had taken US-287 on the way up to Laramie, so I planned to turn onto Colorado Route 14, then take a left to connect down to US-34, basically just so we could go via a different route than the one we took going north. But I missed a turn (there was no sign with the road number and the rented sat-nav missed the turn) and wound up going over the mountains, then down a dirt road to Rand and on down through Granby and Winter Park, total of some 125 miles out of the way. My wife was not amused. At least the rental car was appropriate for a dirt road (a Dodge Charger).
If you're willing to allow for portions of "Interstate look-alike" freeway on otherwise non-Interstate roads, two weeks ago I had a 259-mile drive down US-29 between I-66 at Gainesville, Virginia, and I-40 at Greensboro, North Carolina. There's a fairly new segment near Lynchburg that is Interstate-grade with a 70-mph speed limit, a couple of other segments that probably qualify as Interstate look-alikes, and a couple of other freeway segments that don't rise to Interstate-quality, so I'm not sure this would count. The drive down from Laramie mentioned above was all non-freeway.
Drove the entire Lake Michigan Circle Tour, most of which is not interstate.
I routinely drive 200+ miles within Indiana off interstates for the sole purpose of clinching segments of US and state highways.
It would be hard to go through my memory and come up with every specific instance, but I do have several lengthy such trips under my belt.
I guess my most recent long-distance trips were from Mt. Vernon, Ky. to Chattanooga, Tenn. (The fact that I opted to drive from home to Somerset via Richmond and Berea instead of via Tyner and London considerably shortened the qualifying mileage on that trip) and from Wichita, Kan. to Springfield, Mo., by way of Ada, Okla.
Not counting trips to Canada (or at least assuming Autoroutes and Ontario 400-series routes are interstate-equivalent)...
About 472 miles. (http://goo.gl/maps/7xlEU)
Ignoring several route clinching trips in Arizona and Wyoming that would have gone several hundred miles off interstate, but whose exact routes I can't possibly remember...I think http://goo.gl/maps/YmJZC (585)? maybe?
Actually, wait, no, it's almost definitely this 812 mile drive http://tinyurl.com/mnupl2p taken en route to the Wichita meet this summer.
If it weren't for five stinking miles on I-29 in Iowa, it'd have been 1,375 miles http://tinyurl.com/oxeahxj (I actually used I-29 on that along its US 275 concurrency, but ran out of route pins and had to use "Avoid Highways").
Dafter Twp, MI to Duluth, MN, 404 miles, using M-28 and US-2.
Close second is North Platte, NE to Custer, SD, 350 miles, using US-83, US-20, and US-385.
Great Cacapon, WV to Newport News, VA via WV-9, US-340, US-15, and US-17.
Quote from: Sykotyk on December 10, 2013, 10:12:18 PM
Well, after seeing the 'longest period' question regarding interstates, it had me thinking. What's the longer distance, in one trip (not just around town, for instance) that you drove off an interstate (or a freeway, if you want to go that route, as well).
U.S. 340 south from I-66 in Front Royal, Va. to Skyline Drive to the Blue Ridge Parkway all the way to U.S. 441 at Cherokee, N.C.
About 550 miles. Not including going back to I-40 by way of U.S. 19 and U.S. 74, which adds about 30 miles.
Actually I forgot to mention that I drove US 1 from Titusville, FL to Fort Lee, NJ in one sitting! That only overlaps one interstate in particular at the VA-DC border on the 14th Street Bridge with I-395.
That one is noteworthy very much as it is for me when I used US 52 from Cincinnati to Huntington, WB twice in both 89 and 94.
Quote from: roadman65 on December 12, 2013, 11:58:31 AM
Actually I forgot to mention that I drove US 1 from Titusville, FL to Fort Lee, NJ in one sitting!
Holy fucking bladder control. (PS: it also overlaps I-440 in Raleigh.)
Quote from: NE2 on December 12, 2013, 12:05:41 PM
Quote from: roadman65 on December 12, 2013, 11:58:31 AM
Actually I forgot to mention that I drove US 1 from Titusville, FL to Fort Lee, NJ in one sitting!
Holy fucking bladder control. (PS: it also overlaps I-440 in Raleigh.)
Not to mention that's one heck of a fuel tank to go that distance.
Quote from: NE2 on December 12, 2013, 12:05:41 PM
Quote from: roadman65 on December 12, 2013, 11:58:31 AM
Actually I forgot to mention that I drove US 1 from Titusville, FL to Fort Lee, NJ in one sitting!
Holy fucking bladder control. (PS: it also overlaps I-440 in Raleigh.)
I forgot that one, so sue me! It not like we all have not made any mistakes before.
Quote from: 1995hoo on December 12, 2013, 12:07:27 PM
Quote from: NE2 on December 12, 2013, 12:05:41 PM
Quote from: roadman65 on December 12, 2013, 11:58:31 AM
Actually I forgot to mention that I drove US 1 from Titusville, FL to Fort Lee, NJ in one sitting!
Holy fucking bladder control. (PS: it also overlaps I-440 in Raleigh.)
Not to mention that's one heck of a fuel tank to go that distance.
LOL, I did not mean it that way, but did not leave the road except for the necessities along the way.
Findlay, OH to Parkersburg, WV on a regular basis. OH-15 to US-23 to US-33 to US-50. You can do the math on the miles.
Kamloops, B.C., where freeway-like road ends to Yellowknife, N.T., and back. 2000 km each way. But that might be contrary to the spirit of the question, because I wasn't deliberately avoiding freeways...
Wilmington DE to Norfolk VA via US 13 (Eastern Shore) - back before it was four-laned and before Toll Route 1 opened. Approximately 240 miles. And there used to be a place where two distance signs spaced several miles apart showed the same distance to Norfolk.
I-10 at US 69/96/287 in Beaumont, Texas to I-20 at Greenwood, LA, via US 96, 59, and 79: 191 miles.
NC 24 at I-95 near Fayetteville, NC to Camp Lejeune, NC, via NC 24 (although there is an overlap with I-40), 105 miles.
US 58 at I-95 at Emporia, VA to I-264 at Bowers Hill, Chesapeake, VA, 56 miles.
I guess Texas wins. I thought the other two were significantly longer than that.
It's hard to determine exactly what my longest trip off a freeway is, because sometimes, expressways turn into freeways without you really noticing it. I did once drive from Altoona, Iowa to DeKalb, IL using US 65, IA 330, US 30 (with a side trip to the Lincoln Highway Bridge), US 151 Business through Cedar Rapids, US 151, IA-IL 64 and (Annie) Glidden Road into DeKalb. Not sure how many miles that is.
Edgewood, MD to Brewster, NY. US 40, MD 152, US 1, US 202, PA 611, Portland Toll Bridge, NJ/NY 94, NY 17, US 6, Bear Mountain Parkway, US 6, NY 312. Decided to jump I-84 the last 50 miles home. Also did another variation to Newburgh continuing on NY 94 to NY 32.
A regular off-Interstate routing for me is the drive between Reno and Las Vegas. 447 miles total trip distance, with about 417 miles being non-Interstate (and about 320 miles being two-lane highway).
Longest other routes I can think of that I've done:
- Reno to Las Vegas (via Carson City, US 395, CA 120 & US 6 back to US 95) was about 450 miles off-Interstate.
- Las Vegas to Reno (via US 93, SR 375-Extraterrestrial Hwy & US 6 back to US 95) was also about 450 miles off-Interstate.
- Reno to Portland, OR (via Crater Lake and OR 138) was about 420 miles off-Interstate.
About 700 miles, from leaving I-90 at Buffalo WY to entering I-15 at Bringham City, UT
(via Thermopolis WY, Cody WY, West Yellowstone MT, Jackson WY, Montpelier ID, Logan UT)
Probably more like 800+ miles if you included all the sightseeing driving around Yellowstone NP.
Growing up, the youth in my church took trips most summers from Shreveport, LA to Brownsville, TX. 591 miles total, although there is a tiny blip on I-37 to follow US 77 near Corpus Christi, and some of that highway is now I-69E and I-69, although it wasn't then.
From our church to US77/I-37 in Corpus is 439 miles with no interstate
Quote from: jp the roadgeek on December 13, 2013, 10:13:09 PM
Edgewood, MD to Brewster, NY.
If you don't mind me asking, what made you start in Edgewood? (I live close to there now and lived there the first 5 years of my life.)
My record is ~375 miles from outside Marion, NC to Colonial Heights, VA (part of a road trip from Asheville, NC). From I-40 to US 221 to US 58 to US 360 to US 460 to US 301 to my friend's street of residence.
iPhone
The most I drove was on the Natchez Trace from Jackson to Nashville. It's at least 350 miles.
About 650 miles, from Merced, Cal., to Interstate 15 near Holden, Utah via CA 140, CA 120, US 6, and US 50 (with a few other roads sprinkled in there).
What was incredible was that east of Yosemite Village (~560 miles) we passed through all of five settled places the whole way, maybe one of which has a traffic light (Ely, Nevada).
It's an amazing and beautiful drive across one of the loneliest parts of this country.
I've done a batch of drives of 50 miles or so on local roads back on Long Island. I did Port Washington to Stony Brook many times back when I still was on my permit and hadn't taken the road test. I took different routes different times, including NY 25, NY 25A, NY 347, and the service road of I-495.
Seeing this pop back up reminds me of a few such trips.
For years, when my aunt and uncle lived at Wax, Ky., in Grayson County at a place on Nolin Lake, I would drive the entire route there without using the interstate by following basically KY 52, KY 84, US 31W, KY 224 and KY 479.
I had a week-long class in Blacksburg, Va., about 10 years ago and got there via KY 9000, KY 9009 ( :D ), KY 114 and US 460.
The second long multi-day road trip I ever took involved non-interstate travel on US 60, US 71 and US 62 in a loop from Sikeston, Mo.
The outbound leg of my "Bad Roads of the Arctic" tour of 2012 included over 4600 miles between when I left the AB 2 freeway north of Red Deer, AB, and my entry into Alaska at AK 2 (paper Interstate A-1). Add about 900 miles (including substantial side trips) before I reached the freeway portion of Interstate A-1 near Palmer AK. That took me at least two weeks, and included a major detour to travel all of the Northwest Territories highway system except NT 8 to Inuvik (covered on the return leg).
The return leg also included a long jaunt off the Interstates/freeway network, about 4000 miles from when I left Interstate A-1 at Tetlin Junction AK to when I reached a freeway portion of Trans-Canada 1 near Kamloops BC. That also involved major side trips, including the trip to Inuvik NT. There were a few interchanges along the way on TCH 16 between Tete Juane Cache BC and Jasper AB, but I think that stretch really was expressway at best rather than freeway.
I put in 6000km in northern Norway, Sweden, and Finland without anything more elaborate than a single grade separation in Tromso, 6km into my trip. hell, I think I put in 3000km between traffic lights! Tromso to Narvik, the long way.
(most kilometers between grade separations, anyone?)
I think in the US I've stayed off the freeway for only about 1600 miles at a time before taking one for at least an exit or two. no telling if there were any incidental grade separations, and I'm sure I hit a traffic light or two.
One trip on the same highway probably US 50 from Newton, KS to Owensville, Ohio. Or from Owensville, Ohio to the Atlantic on another trip.
Maybe US 66 before I-44 and I-40 were completed. I'd have to measure each of them to get the longest in one trip.
4 weeks and 7500 miles by car through western US and Canada without interstate travel. 16 days and 5600 miles by motorcycle mostly in the mountain states with maybe 100 miles of interstate at most.
Took a recent trip from Ohio to DFW and back. Was county-clinching both ways and took some extended times off the interstate or freeway in general.
Here's one stretch from near Springfield, IL to Joplin, MO
Google maps has it at 566 miles.
http://goo.gl/maps/ecmGY
Then on the return trip, I went from Springdale, AR off I-540 until eastern Illinois on I-64 near Mill Shoals.
Google maps has it at 731 miles.
http://goo.gl/maps/DMHC2
Quote from: kkt on December 12, 2013, 01:48:48 PM
Kamloops, B.C., where freeway-like road ends to Yellowknife, N.T., and back. 2000 km each way. But that might be contrary to the spirit of the question, because I wasn't deliberately avoiding freeways...
In college, bored and carless, I searched the atlas for the most remote place connected by road and resolved to drive to Yellowknife. Never did it, but at least now I know it's doable. How was the drive?
If I had to guess, it would either be from Amarillo to Colby KS or Spearfish SD to the border crossing north of Williston ND on US 85.
Last spring I made a loop around Michigan's Upper Peninsula that was a good 900 miles, over the course of a few days. In fact, on that trip, if not for crossing the Mackinac Bridge twice (I-75), I would have had about 1500 consecutive miles of non-freeway driving, including along the shores of Lakes Huron and Michigan. Best gas mileage I've ever had.
Quote from: Rupertus on February 08, 2014, 02:31:21 PM
Last spring I made a loop around Michigan's Upper Peninsula that was a good 900 miles, over the course of a few days. In fact, on that trip, if not for crossing the Mackinac Bridge twice (I-75), I would have had about 1500 consecutive miles of non-freeway driving, including along the shores of Lakes Huron and Michigan. Best gas mileage I've ever had.
Sounds like fun. Only once ever did I go to Traverse City this past year. Furthest north in Michigan I've been. I do plan on hitting the rest of the counties in the lower peninsula and hopefully all of the UP in one trip (and Wisconsin/Minnesota).
Any favorite locations or route/road anomolies worth checking you that you stumbled upon?
Quote from: Pete from Boston on February 08, 2014, 10:57:40 AM
In college, bored and carless, I searched the atlas for the most remote place connected by road and resolved to drive to Yellowknife. Never did it, but at least now I know it's doable. How was the drive?
Yellowknife isn't that remote anymore. You don't even have to leave the pavement to get there, if you go through Alberta.
For remote, try Inuvik NT (or in a few years Tuktoyaktuk, when the all-season gravel road is extended there), or Deadhorse AK. Or if you must stay on pavement, Radisson QC at the north end of the James Bay Highway.
Quote from: Sykotyk on February 08, 2014, 05:40:03 PM
Sounds like fun. Only once ever did I go to Traverse City this past year. Furthest north in Michigan I've been. I do plan on hitting the rest of the counties in the lower peninsula and hopefully all of the UP in one trip (and Wisconsin/Minnesota).
Any favorite locations or route/road anomolies worth checking you that you stumbled upon?
There are some old divided highways that are interesting drives: US 2/41 to the north out of Escanaba and US 41/M-28 in Marquette. If you're going to do it properly, though, you'll need to drive all the way up the Keweenaw Peninsula to Copper Harbor, where US 41 ends at a cul-de-sac, and then come back down M-26 along the Lake Superior shoreline. It's spectacular even when cold and rainy, as it was when I made the trip. Along the way you'll encounter the Portage Lake Lift Bridge between Houghton and Hancock, which is likely to be one of the stranger bridges you'll ever drive across. If you haven't crossed the Mackinac Bridge before, that will also be memorable.
I have done US 130 here in New Jersey a few times. Have also taken 9 instead of the Parkway from Cape May up to Newark, as well as 1
Quote from: Rupertus on February 08, 2014, 02:31:21 PM
Last spring I made a loop around Michigan's Upper Peninsula that was a good 900 miles, over the course of a few days. In fact, on that trip, if not for crossing the Mackinac Bridge twice (I-75), I would have had about 1500 consecutive miles of non-freeway driving, including along the shores of Lakes Huron and Michigan. Best gas mileage I've ever had.
The UP is great. I think I could spend all summer driving around up there. Wife, daughter, granddaughter and I did a trip around the UP last summer. I looped Lake Superior by motorcycle the year before. Wife used to camp the UP when she was a kid in the Detroit area.
If we count non-Interstate freeways, my daily commute is 60 miles. The regular route has 49 miles after leaving I-295 via NJ 42, AC Expressway, and GS Parkway. The alternate route is 52 miles total, no interstates at all via NJ 70, NJ 73, AC Expressway and GS Parkway, 23 miles of which are continuous non-freeway, 20 miles of which is the same route (NJ 73).
Quote from: Pete from Boston on February 08, 2014, 10:57:40 AM
Quote from: kkt on December 12, 2013, 01:48:48 PM
Kamloops, B.C., where freeway-like road ends to Yellowknife, N.T., and back. 2000 km each way. But that might be contrary to the spirit of the question, because I wasn't deliberately avoiding freeways...
In college, bored and carless, I searched the atlas for the most remote place connected by road and resolved to drive to Yellowknife. Never did it, but at least now I know it's doable. How was the drive?
The drive was great. The roads were excellent, design speed 70 mph+, except the last 40 miles or so into Yellowknife. Enormous shoulders on both sides, which in one place was in use to land a helicopter engaged in forest fire fighting. Although it's a two-lane road, at every entrance there's exit and entrance lanes, so the fast lane never has to slow down. Even if it's just to serve one house.
The NT part of the highway has bison along it and occasional bears. They're the speed enforcement -- can you see a bison that blends in with its surroundings in time to stop? Because they're certainly not moving.
The waterfalls in the parks along the way are well worth stopping.
North of High Level, gas stations become scarce and 89 octane disappears. Into NT, 91 octane also disappears.
The country near Yellowknife is really different than you'll see most places. There's not much soil, the trees and plants are trying to live on the bare rock. It's very flat and marshy, or ice in the winter. There are trees, but they're scraggly dwarfs, 8 to 12 feet high with some dead branches. The trees are widely spaced, so you could easily walk between them most places. We observed the Transit of Venus from an outcrop that was maybe 30 feet high, and at that height we could see hundreds of miles in any direction.
Quote from: oscar on February 08, 2014, 06:41:25 PM
Quote from: Pete from Boston on February 08, 2014, 10:57:40 AM
In college, bored and carless, I searched the atlas for the most remote place connected by road and resolved to drive to Yellowknife. Never did it, but at least now I know it's doable. How was the drive?
Yellowknife isn't that remote anymore. You don't even have to leave the pavement to get there, if you go through Alberta.
True, the road is excellent, but signs of human habitation away from the road are few.
Technically when we went two years ago we did have to leave the pavement, to cross the Mackenzie River on the ferry Merv Hardie. Now the bridge is open, though.
My longest was either Buffalo, WY to Livingston, MT, via Yellowstone NP or Rawlins, WY to Idaho Falls, ID, via Yellowstone NP.
Quote from: kkt on February 10, 2014, 02:25:03 PM
The NT part of the highway has bison along it and occasional bears. They're the speed enforcement -- can you see a bison that blends in with its surroundings in time to stop? Because they're certainly not moving.
for those wondering what NWT looks like:
https://www.aaroads.com/blog/2011/10/03/northern-canada-sept-11-part-i/
https://www.aaroads.com/blog/2011/10/19/northern-canada-sept-11-part-ii/
https://www.aaroads.com/blog/2011/12/05/northern-canada-sept-11-part-iii-8/
(//www.aaroads.com/shields/blog/photos/115687.jpg)
From I-75 at exit 29 in Corbin, KY to I-81 exit 8 near Morristown, TN: 101 miles. That's the furthest on a single route which is what I presume the question to be.