'Public Roads' (1918-1970) now available online

[J N Winkler]

Found on Archive.org while looking for other things--the old BPR/FHWA periodical Public Roads is now available (uploaded earlier this year):

http://archive.org/details/publicroads1820offi

Other volumes are available and can be found by entering "Public Roads" in the Archive.org search box.  The run is substantially complete, but there are several gaps.  Aside from a few skipped issues in the early years, the issues from May 1921 to February 1924 (almost three years' worth) are missing.  A total of 11,676 pages are available.

Public Roads has a little something for everyone in the roadgeek community.  There are articles about highway administration and practice in other industrialized countries (France, July 1920; Britain, August 1920; Canada, September 1920), about signing and marking of state trunk highway systems (January 1919:  the author is the then state highway engineer for Wisconsin and the article includes descriptions of the original Wisconsin route marker--isn't Wisconsin traditionally credited as the first in this area?), about highway finance (receipts and disbursements at both the state and federal level were annual features from the mid-1930's onward), visibility of highway signs (articles in September 1933, April 1956, and June 1965), land acquisition, highway capacity, passing behavior, geometric design, traffic diversion curves, international road congresses to which the US sent representatives in the interwar years, Interstate completion status from the late 1950's onward, and many, many other topics.

[NE2]

the author is the then state highway engineer for Wisconsin and the article includes descriptions of the original Wisconsin route marker--isn't Wisconsin traditionally credited as the first in this area?

Yes, in the U.S. France beat them by many years though.

Anything about the New England routes?

[J N Winkler]

I didn't see anything on the New England routes specifically, but the January-February 1920 issue has an article on signing and marking which touches on coordination of route numbering across state lines.  There are also descriptions of the Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin route markers as they then existed.  (Illinois used concrete posts with state outline, route number, and milepoint; Michigan used signs on posts; Wisconsin used a triangular design which could potentially be found painted on anything--utility poles, culvert endwalls, bridge wingwalls, billboards, etc.--and was supposed to appear often enough that no motorist would ever lose sight of a marker for the route he or she was on.)

[J N Winkler]

I am posting a list of articles of interest that I found when I went through Public Roads last month to notate issue coverpages (which I tabulate and use with several article lookup scripts).  It gives an idea of what the magazine has to offer, but is not intended to be a comprehensive index, and is skewed heavily toward my main areas of interest, such as traffic signing, highway economics, and social history.

• January 1919:  articles on "reconstruction," coordination of state highway systems, laying out and marking of state trunk systems, and continuation of the series on state highway departments.
• March 1919:  over 6 million motor vehicles in USA.
• Apparent lacuna:  April 1919 issue missing.
• May 1919:  This is the convict labor issue (!).
• June 1919:  Road construction at front in France.
• July 1919:  Profile of road construction in the Southwest.
• December 1919:  Profile of highway construction in South and Pacific Coast states, and account of motor vehicle's share of highway costs.
• January-February 1920:  Articles on grade, alignment, and surface depth, and signing and marking of roads.
• June 1920:  Retrospective of first four years of the federal-aid highway program.
• July 1920:  Road conditions and administration in France (part of a comparative series dealing with arrangements in major industrialized European powers).
• August 1920:  The British profile.
• September 1920:  The Canadian profile.
• November 1919:  Superelevation and "easement" (?) as applied to highway curves.
• March 1921:  "Report on California highways ready" (not sure which one that was, but suspect it had to do with the third bond issue and the debate on whether to start levying a fuel tax to finance highway improvement and maintenance).
• April 1921:  Synopsis of California highway study (this is a very California-focused issue since the cover photo shows the Ridge Route).  Motor vehicle population just over 9.2 million.
• Major lacuna--May 1921 to February 1924 (almost three years' worth of issues missing).
• March 1924:  Highway transportation survey in Connecticut (collecting data on weight, volume, occupancy, etc.).
• April 1924:  Motor vehicle registrations now 15 million.
• May 1924:  Analysis of how states' highway debt compares to their total debt.
• August 1924:  Traffic control (considered from perspective of safety).
• September 1924:  Account of development of highway taxation.
• December 1924:  Use of highway traffic data in California.
• February 1925:  Impressions of English highway practice.
• March 1925:  Transverse distribution of traffic on roads.
• August 1925:  Commodity transportation by motor truck, and colors and forms of traffic signals.
• January 1926:  Urban aspects of highway finance (cover illustration shows cars in a city and is captioned, "60% of cars are owned in cities" or similar).
• Index, it turns out, is in the back.  Issue numbering seems to reset and volume numbering seems to increment with the March issue each year, at least at this point (mid-1920's).
• March 1926:  Cook County transportation survey.  Lake Shore Drive being planned in Chicago?
• August 1926:  Fifth international road congress in Milan, Italy; Report of Connecticut transportation survey; Virginia building demonstration road.
• November 1926:  State road building and its results.  Based on a cover photo showing a modern highway against North Carolina mountain scenery accompanied by a caption saying that North Carolina's recent economic progress is due to better roads, I think this article is about the economic impact of highway construction in NC.
• January 1927:  Collection and disposition of motor vehicle revenue.
• March 1927:  The trend of highway design.  Deals with trends in cross-section type, surface type, treatment of curves and grades, etc.
• August 1928:  "Truck is big factor in fruit transport."
• March 1929 contains much of interest--two articles, one on traffic analysis, and the other on the influence increased speed of vehicles has on highway design.
• April 1929:  Parkway features of interest to the highway engineer.  (Cover illustration shows a length of the Hutchinson River Parkway.)
• April 1930:  Plans for an international road congress announced.
• July 1930:  Program for international road congress announced.
• October 1930:  This is the International Road Congress issue.
• March 1931:  Toll roads.
• May 1932:  Highway traffic capacity.
• July 1932:  Major article (taking up the entirety of the issue) on design of highway intersections.
• August and September 1932:  Connecticut Avenue (DC) commemorates its 20th year.  This is part of a monthlong series of 20-year retrospectives of pavement life (October 1932 shows a 20-year-old concrete pavement).
• November 1932:  Extra-wide highways on state systems.
• February 1933:  BPR's Michigan profile, illustrated with an aerial photo of Woodward Avenue (divided, with wide median and what appear to be Michigan lefts or a precursor).
• 1933 issues from March onward spotlight finance concerns.
• July 1933:  Index to the cost of highway construction.
• September 1933:  Comparative visibility of standard luminous and nonluminous highway signs.
• February 1934:  This issue focuses on traffic issues, with a cover illustration of the "New Jersey high-level viaduct" (Pulaski Skyway?) and a lead article dealing with a traffic survey on it.
• Another lacuna:  August 1934 issue is missing.
• October 1934:  This issue is dedicated entirely to motor taxation.
• April 1935:  Traffic characteristics on New Jersey highways.
• December 1935:  Entire issue is part of a multi-part, multi-issue article on concrete pavement design, and this particular issue explains why haunched slabs were so popular in the 1930's.
• October 1936:  Multiple articles addressing disposition of various types of motor carrier, motor vehicle, and motor fuel receipts.
• December 1936:  More of the same.
• August 1937:  Tourist travel in the USA.
• September 1937:  State-level taxation information (disposition of receipts), as well as a major article on the passing of vehicles on highways (useful for insights into policy on unit lane widths).
• June 1938:  One article related to the 1938 international road congress.  Coverage is low-key compared to earlier issues.
• July 1938:  A couple of important traffic-related articles, dealing with (1) Accidents on the highway and (2) Segregation of various classes of traffic on the highway.
• September 1938:  Highway tunnels in western states.
• February 1939:  Preliminary results of highway capacity studies.  Comparison of methods for determining the hill-climbing ability of trucks.  (The previous issue also has traffic-related information.)
• May 1939:  Preliminary results of road-use studies.
• June 1939:  Toll roads and free roads.  Also articles dealing with state-level motoring-related tax receipts.
• September 1939:  Safety promotion activities of the state highway commission in Wisconsin.
• December 1939:  Marking and signing of no-passing zones on two- and three-lane roads.
• February 1940:  Two articles dealing with studies of motor vehicle passing practices.
• April 1940:  New techniques in traffic behavior studies.
• July 1940:  Study of motor vehicle drivers and speed in Connecticut.
• August 1940:  major (whole-issue) article dealing with marginal land acquisition for highways, including the issue of excess land acquisition for parcel adjustment and recoupment for high-type roads.
• October 1940:  state of improvement of rural roads in relation to traffic and dwellings served.
• December 1940:  Effect of highway lighting on driver behavior.
• January 1941:  Applications of ATR data in highway planning.
• March 1941:  Life characteristics of surfaces constructed on primary rural highways.
• June 1941:  Planning the interregional highway system.
• October 1941:  Stabilization of gravel runways at Washington National Airport.
• January 1942:  Distribution of motor vehicle registrations and tax payments by regions and population groups.
• March 1942:  Land-use planning in relation to highways.
• April 1942:  Some characteristics of motor-vehicle travel.  (Cover illustration caption gives a hint of the findings--"On highways it's business 2 to 1.")
• May 1942:  Hill-climbing ability of motor trucks.
• June 1942:  Major (full issue) article on results of highway capacity studies.
• July-August-September 1942:  Vertical curves for highways.
• October-November-December 1942:  Highway signs and markings for blackout conditions.
• July-August-September 1943:  Amount and characteristics of trucking on rural roads; Some problems of road construction and maintenance in Alaska.
• October-November-December 1943:  Highway land acquisition costs and practices in Illinois and Wisconsin.
• April-May-June 1944:  Land acquisition for highways in New York state.
• Vol. 24 has a very unusual format.  Quarterly publication began in 1942, when wartime austerity started to bite in the US, but each issue had a proper cover.  Quarterly publication continued from July 1944 but the covers seem to have been omitted in favor of a table of contents for all issues appearing at the start of the volume.  The volume is also extra-long, running through June 1947 for a total of 12 issues.
• There appears to have been a further change in 1950 to semimonthly publication.
• August 1952:  Highway transportation economics.
• October 1952:  Major retrospective of current uses of loan finance for new highways (turnpikes, bonding, etc.).
• June 1954:  Driver performance on horizontal curves.
• February 1955:  MUTCD revisions.
• June 1955:  Driver behavior as affected by objects on highway shoulders.
• August 1955:  Operating characteristics of passenger cars on selected routes.  (Selected how?)
• October 1955:  Whole issue is dedicated to studies of traffic usage on the Pennsylvania and Maine Turnpikes.
• April 1956:  Effect of letter width and spacing on nighttime legibility of highway signs.
• June 1956:  Investment analysis approach to estimating highway needs; The shortage of highway engineers and how to overcome it.
• June 1957:  Stopping ability of motor vehicles selected from the general traffic.
• August 1957:  Driver behavior related to types and widths of shoulders on two-lane highways; A study of traffic characteristics in suburban residential areas; Trends of factors used in determining the 30th highest hourly traffic volume.
• October 1957:  Relation between gross weights of motor trucks and their horsepower.
• December 1957:  How access control affects accident experience.
• June 1958:  New methods for determining capacity of rural roads in mountainous terrain.
• August 1958:  Later placements of trucks on two-lane highways and four-lane divided highways.
• August 1959:  Maximum wind speeds to consider in designing highway signs.
• October 1959:  Assigning traffic to a highway network.
• April 1960:  Two articles on time and fuel consumption.
• August 1960:  Traffic operations as related to highway illumination and delineation.
• June 1961:  Characteristics of passenger-car-travel on toll roads and comparable free roads for highway user benefit studies.
• February 1962:  Effect of speed-change information on spacing between vehicles.
• April 1962:  Social effects of modern highway transportation; Advance route-turn markers on city streets.
• June 1962:  Economic evidence in right-of-way litigation.
• December 1962:  Effect of expressway design on driver tension responses.
• December 1963:  Perceptual and field factors causing lateral displacement; The automobile in American daily life; Interstate accident research.
• June 1964:  Entire issue deals with land acquisition issues, including the discovery process and an evaluation of partial taking of property.
• August 1964:  Interstate system map.
• December 1964:  Timesharing between two driving tasks--simulated steering and recognition of road signs.
• April 1965:  Moving picture technique for highway signing studies--an investigation of its applicability.
• June 1965:  Effectiveness of sign background reflectorization.
• December 1965:  Attitudes of drivers determine choice between alternate highways; Illumination variables in visual tasks of drivers.
• February 1966:  Experimental isolation of drivers' visual input.
• June 1966:  A comparative evaluation of trip distribution procedures.
• August 1966:  Perceptual basis of vehicular guidance.
• October 1966:  Braking performance of motor vehicles.
• June 1967:  Design use of the capacity manual.
• February 1966:  Effects of volume controls on freeway traffic flow.
• December 1968:  Includes a map of the Appalachian Regional Development highways.
• April 1969 issue includes Interstate completion status report.

[agentsteel53]

July 1940:  Study of motor vehicle drivers and speed in Connecticut.

study conclusion: 10mph below the speed limit, in the left lane, much to the consternation of NY and MA through traffic.

[Alps]

July 1940:  Study of motor vehicle drivers and speed in Connecticut.

study conclusion: 10mph below the speed limit, in the left lane, much to the consternation of NY and MA through traffic.

Except on freeways, where they will go 90 to make up for it.

[Kniwt]

In a similar vein, while looking for these, I found that archive.org also hosts an extensive collection of "Good Roads," the journal started in the 1890s by the League of American Wheelmen.

For instance, here are some issues from 1895:
http://archive.org/details/goodroads713leag

A surprising quantity of photos!

[HurrMark]

(January 1919:  the author is the then state highway engineer for Wisconsin and the article includes descriptions of the original Wisconsin route marker--isn't Wisconsin traditionally credited as the first in this area?)

In Jan-Feb 1920, they discuss how WI was in the process of creating mile markers. Basically, the signs were 3 x 6 (about a quarter the size of the NY/VT reference markers) and had two numbers - the "south" number was always one below the "north" number . So if you see 3/4, you are in the 4th mile of the highway. I guess since cars weren't meant to go 65+ mph in those days, it was probably a bit easier to read them...