AARoads Forum

National Boards => General Highway Talk => Topic started by: kurumi on March 07, 2021, 12:34:47 PM

Title: Zillow satellite view in some areas shows old alignments
Post by: kurumi on March 07, 2021, 12:34:47 PM
https://www.thedrive.com/news/39611/zillows-satellite-view-shows-the-ghosts-of-neighborhoods-erased-by-americas-highways

Sometimes municipal records retain the definitions of old property lines predating highway construction, providing clues to original street layouts and neighborhoods -- and they show up in Zillow's satellite view. Interstates 44, 794, 90, 94, 71, and 471 are mentioned in the article.

Quote
This trick doesn't work everywhere, and not always city-wide in the places where it does. Some counties don't report that these plots even exist anymore–rendered unusable by the interstate, the old lines have been struck from the records. But in a lot of major metropolitan areas especially in the Midwest, you can zoom in close enough on a bit of highway or interchange and see dozens of examples of the same thing. Cities like Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and even Tampa, Florida will all project these ghostly outlines of what came before the highways.
Title: Re: Zillow satellite view in some areas shows old alignments
Post by: SectorZ on March 07, 2021, 04:27:38 PM
That's a cool find. Spotchecking my own area, especially where I know roads were abandoned due to interstates being built, I can't find anything interesting like that.
Title: Re: Zillow satellite view in some areas shows old alignments
Post by: CtrlAltDel on March 08, 2021, 01:02:03 AM
I noticed something similar on Google Maps a while back:

Quote from: CtrlAltDel on December 07, 2020, 08:23:47 PM
(https://i.imgur.com/4W8WhPL.png)

(Maybe they're using old plats, from before the highways were constructed?)