I know this topic would come up on MTR on a yearly basis, and frankly, after the first couple of times I've ignored the topic. That is till today.
I driving along the westbank of the Mississippi, between Plaquamine & Donaldsonville Louisiana (20-40 miles south of Baton Rouge) looking for a cutoff from River Road to La 1. I saw a sign for LA 69 (no jokes please), turned and discovered, much to my amazement, a gravel road.
Now I understand that I may have caught LADOTD doing a tar & chip pavement project (though none of the neighboring roads had that process). But I was caught off guard by it.
I did get a photo of the road (with accompanying La 69 shield), so soon as I get the film developed (yes, I said film), I post my proof here.
CA-173 isn't just a dirt road; it's an awful dirt road. One lane, and ungraded. In order to avoid high-centering the car, I had to drive with one set of tires down the middle between the ruts, and one set of tires on the edge about six inches away from going off a cliff.
I don't think there are any more gravel US route segments (and haven't been for several years). But there are numerous examples of gravel state routes or state primary routes. A few examples I can think of offhand include segments of VA 91, MS 50, and MN 74.
South Dakota 10 is also a dirt road.
http://www.teresco.org/pics/fourcorners-20030926-27/26/utah261.html (http://www.teresco.org/pics/fourcorners-20030926-27/26/utah261.html)
Utah 261, but I guess that's a special case. :cool:
Washington 165 turns gravel as soon as it gets out of Carbonado, and Montana has more dirt state highways than I can count. Wyoming's highways, shockingly, are all paved
Pennsylvania Route 414 from Cedar Run to Blackwood remained gravel from 1928 to 2002 - even under the PA 893 designation
Just some dirt county routes here :-(
Though, if you wait until the next hurricane to hit the panhandle, you could "drive" over a "dirt" US 98.
The southernmost 8 miles of OR 27 are unpaved. So are the northern 5 miles of OR 413, but this route is unsigned.
Alaska Route 8 is entirely unpaved. You'd expect that to happen in Alaska, although the connecting routes (2 and 3) are paved and 8 would theoretically be the best way from Canada to Denali.
I did not see any unpaved state highways in Hawai'i. SR 200 is paved, just not well maintained. CR 31 is partly unpaved, but if it became SR 31 who knows, it too may have been paved.
Vermont has/had two stretches of dirt/gravel SR. One of them is down to about a 500-foot stretch, so I would imagine that's gone pretty soon if not already.
Prince Edward Island appears to have more dirt/gravel routes than paved routes. I plan to find out more next year.
PEI does have a fair number of gravel/red-sandstone routes. But the majority of them are paved, though some could just barely be called such...
Quote from: froggie on August 28, 2009, 09:52:41 PM
PEI does have a fair number of gravel/red-sandstone routes. But the majority of them are paved, though some could just barely be called such...
I'm going by the map. The map could be pessimistic. It's enough to discourage me from clinching the island (every route)...
Quote from: AlpsROADS on August 29, 2009, 12:07:39 AM
Quote from: froggie on August 28, 2009, 09:52:41 PM
PEI does have a fair number of gravel/red-sandstone routes. But the majority of them are paved, though some could just barely be called such...
I'm going by the map. The map could be pessimistic. It's enough to discourage me from clinching the island (every route)...
Boo! Don't let the map make YOU pessimistic.
A good amount of VA 91 in Tazewell County is gravel. The VA Highways Project has a bunch of photos of it:
http://www.vahighways.com/va91/va91tazewell.htm (http://www.vahighways.com/va91/va91tazewell.htm)
QuoteI'm going by the map. The map could be pessimistic. It's enough to discourage me from clinching the island (every route)...
Depends which map. MapArt's PEI map is pretty good, but even it shows a few route segments as gravel that are in reality paved instead (and the opposite in at least one case).
But if you don't like driving on gravel (or, for the most part, red sandstone), trying to clinch every route on the island is going to be tough...not that it'd be easy to begin with.
Quote from: SyntheticDreamer on August 29, 2009, 12:55:01 AM
A good amount of VA 91 in Tazewell County is gravel. The VA Highways Project has a bunch of photos of it:
http://www.vahighways.com/va91/va91tazewell.htm (http://www.vahighways.com/va91/va91tazewell.htm)
I looked at those. I've never seen the warning sign for the transition to gravel before.
I've been to PEI a few years ago. Trust me, some of the numbered routes are gravel/dirt.
Found out the hard way meandering over to Montague from Charlottetown.
Sykotyk
QuoteI looked at those. I've never seen the warning sign for the transition to gravel before.
It's fairly common in some states.
QuoteI've been to PEI a few years ago. Trust me, some of the numbered routes are gravel/dirt.
Oh, I know. My point was that the majority of PEI routes are indeed paved. And the regional MapArt maps were fairly good at picking out which ones were and which weren't (albeith with a few errors as I mentioned earlier).
The title also says "US Routes". Are there actually still unpaved U.S. Routes? I can hardly believe that.
QuoteThe title also says "US Routes". Are there actually still unpaved U.S. Routes? I can hardly believe that.
I don't believe there are any left.
The last time I was on the western segment of WV-46 (which was at least 5 years ago, probably more), that segment was unpaved.
Quote from: njroadhorse on August 30, 2009, 10:47:27 AM
QuoteThe title also says "US Routes". Are there actually still unpaved U.S. Routes? I can hardly believe that.
I don't believe there are any left.
The last was US-183 in Nebraska, which was paved in 1967.
-Alex (Tarkus)
Quote from: osu-lsu on August 28, 2009, 02:10:10 AM
I know this topic would come up on MTR on a yearly basis, and frankly, after the first couple of times I've ignored the topic. That is till today.
I driving along the westbank of the Mississippi, between Plaquamine & Donaldsonville Louisiana (20-40 miles south of Baton Rouge) looking for a cutoff from River Road to La 1. I saw a sign for LA 69 (no jokes please), turned and discovered, much to my amazement, a gravel road.
Now I understand that I may have caught LADOTD doing a tar & chip pavement project (though none of the neighboring roads had that process). But I was caught off guard by it.
I did get a photo of the road (with accompanying La 69 shield), so soon as I get the film developed (yes, I said film), I post my proof here.
Kentucky still has several gravel roads, but to my knowledge most are of the four-digit variety. The last portion of two-digit gravel road was KY 89 in Jackson County and it was paved sometime between 1967 and 1971. That's because it connected two Republican counties and those four years were the only years KY had a Republican governor for decades.
AZ 88 is mostly a dirt road with one lane bridges even on the paved parts.
Quote from: Chris on August 30, 2009, 07:04:38 AM
The title also says "US Routes". Are there actually still unpaved U.S. Routes? I can hardly believe that.
I believe the last one was paved in the mid-1980's or so. Possibly in Colorado, or else another state out that way.
In Nebraska, NE 67 is gravel between NE 2 and US 34. NDOR is wanting to turn the road over to Otoe County, but the county wants the road paved before it will accept it.
I think there's another gravel one I can't remember the number for in Nebraska.
In the State Route category for Colorado, one that I know of:
CO-90, between Nucla & Montrose in Western Colorado (Montrose County).
However, despite there being a paved CO-90 west of Nucla and a short stretch of paved CO-90 just west of Montrose, C-DOT has yanked all the CO-90 signs in between on the non-paved sections, and does not note that stretch either on official state maps. But back in the days when many Western Colorado state highways were unpaved, CO-90 ran the full length.
There is also a section of LA 10 that is gravel.
Then there is AR 220.
Quote
Then there is AR 220.
I seem to remember being on AR 219 at some point (I had exited from I-40 to find a motel to stay at overnight) and there were signs that said something like "Paved road ends, 9 miles."
In the instance of AR 219, when the pavement ends, so does the highway: it becomes a county-maintained road (I checked it out a few years ago).
220 begins at AR 59 and used to end after crossing Lee Creek, continuing on as a Crawford County maintained road and Washington County (it was CR 61). I forget the year, but the state took over maintenance of the road, but it has never been improved. Part of the problem is it runs through the Ozark National Forest, so any improvements (which many are needed) would have to be done to minimize the impact on the forest. To date, AHTD has either been unable or unwilling to work with the National Forest Service. :eyebrow:
Isn't 220 the one that hurt your car?
Oklahoma's last highway left unpaved was SH-144 (http://"http://okhighways.com/ok144"). According to the state map, it has been paved. Eric's site has some pictures of it from when it was gravel.
Yeah, 220 took out my front axle 7-8 years ago (different van). BIG honkin' pothole. I've been hesitant to drive that road ever since :-(
That segment of LA 69 has always been gravel for as long as I have been traveling that way. That was the first such section of unpaved state road I happened to come across. There are some other unpaved LA routes of which I know: LA 10 between Melville and LA 77, LA 975, LA 1004, LA 1013, LA 645 (excepting the first block), LA 944, and LA 1003. And that's just in the same general area of the state.
North Carolina 197 is unpaved for a stretch between Barnardsville and Murchison. I remember riding it one evening in 2007 thinking it would be a shortcut to Asheville. Wrong! God bless.
QuoteHowever, despite there being a paved CO-90 west of Nucla and a short stretch of paved CO-90 just west of Montrose, C-DOT has yanked all the CO-90 signs in between on the non-paved sections, and does not note that stretch either on official state maps. But back in the days when many Western Colorado state highways were unpaved, CO-90 ran the full length.
The gravel section was turned back by 1954 (http://www.mesalek.com/colo/r80-99.html#90 (http://www.mesalek.com/colo/r80-99.html#90)). However, there is a gravel section of CO 78 near CO 165.
Quote from: AlpsROADS on August 31, 2009, 08:30:06 PM
I believe the last one was paved in the mid-1980's or so. Possibly in Colorado, or else another state out that way.
the last gravel US route was a section of US-183 in Nebraska. It was paved between 1967 and 1968.
I cannot think of any gravel state roads in Tennessee.
This just may win the longest bump award!
With zero valuable content added to the discussion.
Quote from: kphoger on February 24, 2021, 11:05:52 AM
With zero valuable content added to the discussion.
Heh, tell that to the posters who chewed *me* out for questioning someone's unneeded bump several years back.
Quote from: Avalanchez71 on February 24, 2021, 10:12:58 AM
I cannot think of any gravel state roads in Tennessee.
The west ends of TN 79 and TN 103 are now unpaved.
Quote from: Mapmikey on February 24, 2021, 11:46:04 AM
Quote from: Avalanchez71 on February 24, 2021, 10:12:58 AM
I cannot think of any gravel state roads in Tennessee.
The west ends of TN 79 and TN 103 are now unpaved.
My mistake as I thought that the western ends of some of the Mississippi River state roads ended at the end of pavement.
Quote from: Avalanchez71 on February 24, 2021, 10:12:58 AM
I cannot think of any gravel state roads in Tennessee.
Do not bump old threads unless materially adding to the discussion. If you see "agentsteel53" as one of the most recent users to post in the thread, it's too old to bump.
Isn't there a stub of CA-39 up in the mountains that's unpaved?
Quote from: Scott5114 on February 24, 2021, 12:19:52 PM
If you see "agentsteel53" as one of the most recent users to post in the thread, it's too old to bump.
Well spoken, sir.
Does bumping old threads raise server costs?
This one did bring some valuable information.
Quote from: kphoger on February 24, 2021, 01:22:45 PM
Quote from: Avalanchez71 on February 24, 2021, 10:12:58 AM
I cannot think of any gravel state roads in Tennessee.
Quote from: Avalanchez71 on February 24, 2021, 01:19:58 PM
This one did bring some valuable information.
:hmmm:
I believe this (below 👇) is the valuable information being referred to.
Quote from: Mapmikey on February 24, 2021, 11:46:04 AM
The west ends of TN 79 and TN 103 are now unpaved.
But that wasn't his post. He bumped an eleven-year-old thread with no new content. It was only after that that someone else posted new information.
Quote from: kphoger on February 24, 2021, 01:45:26 PM
But that wasn't his post. He bumped an eleven-year-old thread with no new content. It was only after that that someone else posted new information.
Not to mention there was a far more recent thread (https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=27366) we could have bumped instead.
Chris
Quote from: kphoger on February 24, 2021, 01:45:26 PM
But that wasn't his post. He bumped an eleven-year-old thread with no new content. It was only after that that someone else posted new information.
Well, of course, I know that. But, "bring valuable information" could potentially be interpreted as "bring
about (or lead to) valuable information".
Let the record show that you must add valuable information yourself when bumping an old thread.
Quote from: Avalanchez71 on February 24, 2021, 01:19:58 PM
Does bumping old threads raise server costs?
This one did bring some valuable information.
Quote from: Alex on May 21, 2009, 10:34:10 PM
By posting in our forum, you automatically agree to the following:
What's not allowed:
- Bumping topics (responding to a post older than 120 days) is highly discouraged. Topics should only be bumped if there is new and relevant information to add (such as a old topic on a proposed construction project, where construction has recently begun). Simply posting the word "Bump" (or something similar) to force a topic to the top of a page will force a newer and potentially more relevant topic to drop from the first page of the forum. Continued abuse can lead to your posting privileges being curtailed or suspended.
Quote from: webny99 on February 24, 2021, 01:55:29 PM
Let the record show that you must add valuable information yourself when bumping an old thread.
I was going to mention that's even in the forum guidelines ("Topics should only be bumped if there is new and relevant information to add"). But then I didn't, because, well...
Quote from: Alex on May 21, 2009, 10:34:10 PM
What's not allowed:
Posting in a topic that someone broke such-and-such rule. This isn't necessary. Please use the "report a post" feature.
I think it's important to remember that this is a discussion forum, not an encyclopedia. Is adding another random item to an old list or saying there isn't an example in a state significant enough to bump an ancient thread? I would say no. The number of resurrected threads as of late makes it seem like some posters may be feeling left out of the older discussions, but as in real life, you can't hope to be part of every conversation you would have been interested in.
Emphasis on the "discussion" part. What, you think any of the people on page 1 of this thread who haven't even logged in since 2011 are going to suddenly pop up to answer you?
Not to mention the fact that chances are some of the roads that were posted here in 2009 may have been paved by now...