On Reddit today, I noticed an interesting set of Interstate data. It places the west or north terminus of each of the ten longest of them and shows their deviation from a straight line. I thought people here might want to take a look on it, so I thought I'd post the link.
https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/7nfxbd/the_10_longest_eastwest_us_interstate_highways_oc/
(https://www.aaroads.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FKNI0gQ3.png&hash=aa4cd6e06770936017323bf5b8b2d06976040cb7)
(https://www.aaroads.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Ftioejucqch701.png&hash=e7b57cf0fa53f1c88d59d1845b3d2252f6c6d41d)
(Both visualizations created by Reddit user mister54.)
I didn't know that I-80, while shorter than I-90, "stretches" a bit farther. Same with I-95 and I-75.
That's pretty cool. You could figure out which interstates are more "efficient" (like 80 would be more efficient than 90, since it travels farther across the country in a shorter distance).
I just wished it showed all 2di interstates for curiosity. Otherwise great image.
They just look like overlays of their actual routes to me. Neat comparison, though.
I have to assume they're counting "95" as though the PA Tpk/95 intersection is complete...
Zooming in on the image, it looks like they just drew a line from the end of the "southern" I-95 in Trenton to the beginning of the "northern" I-95 at I-276.
Quote from: vdeane on January 02, 2018, 12:47:58 PM
Zooming in on the image, it looks like they just drew a line from the end of the "southern" I-95 in Trenton to the beginning of the "northern" I-95 at I-276.
The line actually looks more like they used I-295 (south of US 1) & I-195 (up to the NJTP) as "part" of I-95.
^ Looks more to me like they followed an I-295/I-195 routing between Trenton and the Turnpike.
I think it's cool how they seemingly drew the actual paths from memory, which not many of us can do. And I did notice the loop around Trenton for I-95, even though that has never been a part of it.
I created a map in Google Earth that has a pin at every intersection of the 20 interstates in the above list. It doesn't have all the intersections (there are a lot of intersections near the Chicago area that I only did a few).
(https://www.aaroads.com/forum/gallery/12408_19_02_18_9_47_21.jpeg)
A few interesting things I noticed:
- St. Louis has the most interstates within a city with 4 interstates within a few miles of each other in the downtown area.
- The Chicago metro area (including Gary, IN) has the most number of interstates with 5 (80,90,94,55,65)
- Once I-69 gets finished to Memphis, this list will change. It will knock I-29 off of this list. If it ever gets completed to Laredo, then it will be even further from the "origin" than I-95.
- If I-74 ever gets connected between Ohio and NC (not very likely), it can probably knock off one of the interstates on the East-West list.
Quote from: Henry on January 03, 2018, 09:33:15 AM
I think it's cool how they seemingly drew the actual paths from memory, which not many of us can do. And I did notice the loop around Trenton for I-95, even though that has never been a part of it.
Or he just copy/pasted the lines from their actual location; which seems far, far more likely.
Or one could mess with the coordinates on a shapefile of these interstates to make them start at the same point.
Quote from: mvak36 on February 19, 2018, 10:03:34 PM
- The Chicago metro area (including Gary, IN) has the most number of interstates with 5 (80,90,94,55,65)
Since when was I-94, I-90, and I-80 end with 5?
Quote from: Hurricane Rex on February 21, 2018, 11:35:37 PM
Quote from: mvak36 on February 19, 2018, 10:03:34 PM
- The Chicago metro area (including Gary, IN) has the most number of interstates with 5 (80,90,94,55,65)
Since when was I-94, I-90, and I-80 end with 5?
I didn't say that they end with 5. I said that those 5 interstates pass through the Chicago metro area.
Quote from: mvak36 on February 22, 2018, 12:06:18 AM
Quote from: Hurricane Rex on February 21, 2018, 11:35:37 PM
Quote from: mvak36 on February 19, 2018, 10:03:34 PM
- The Chicago metro area (including Gary, IN) has the most number of interstates with 5 (80,90,94,55,65)
Since when was I-94, I-90, and I-80 end with 5?
I didn't say that they end with 5. I said that those 5 interstates pass through the Chicago metro area.
Forgotten with this list: I-57 (right into town), I-88 (makes it to suburbia), and -- stretching things a bit -- I-41.
Quote from: sparker on February 22, 2018, 12:14:01 AM
Quote from: mvak36 on February 22, 2018, 12:06:18 AM
Quote from: Hurricane Rex on February 21, 2018, 11:35:37 PM
Quote from: mvak36 on February 19, 2018, 10:03:34 PM
- The Chicago metro area (including Gary, IN) has the most number of interstates with 5 (80,90,94,55,65)
Since when was I-94, I-90, and I-80 end with 5?
I didn't say that they end with 5. I said that those 5 interstates pass through the Chicago metro area.
Forgotten with this list: I-57 (right into town), I-88 (makes it to suburbia), and -- stretching things a bit -- I-41.
I know those go into Chicago. I was only considering the 20 interstates listed in the OP.
iPhone
I-80 runs on more of a straight line while I-90 shifts a lot like from Seattle to Wyoming, then it shifts down again to Chicago before coming back up around Buffalo then a somewhat straight shot to Boston. The only area where I-80 really shifts anywhere other than a little bit in Nebraska and Wyoming is in central Nevada heading towards San Fransisco. I-90 is only longer by about 120 miles.
Since I-5 and I-15 have very similar southern origin points, as do I-75 and I-95, you can determine what the drift is between both pairs. I-5 and I-15 have the bonus of both terminating at 49º N. Rough guess is that they're about 560-575 miles apart from each other there.
It's a little harder with I-75 and I-95, but they're about 920 miles from each other at their north ends!