Quintessential roads (per state)

[SteveG1988]

For PA: US 322, it gives you a rather solid taste of the state, cities, towns, countryside, pennsultucky, it's all there. Runners up for me would be US30, but that doesn't give you the rural mountain region, and the road that defines PA is not really good for a taste of the state, the turnpike

Delaware: US13, practically a whtiman's sampler of a road, you get all three counties, and the various regions in one drive.

[1995hoo]

I might vote for US-64 for North Carolina. Crosses in from Tennessee, runs through the highly rural mountainous areas out west, passes through the more heavily populated Raleigh area, and ultimately ends near Nags Head at the Outer Banks. It has a bit of everything. I remember well the first time I saw the sign at the state line crossing from Tennessee that said 564 miles to Manteo. North Carolina doesn't necessarily seem that big because it's easy to forget how long it is from west to east.

[NE2]

Tennessee: State Route 1, Memphis to Bristol via Nashville-Murfreesboro-Knoxville.

[Dr Frankenstein]

QC 132, QC 138. Both start in the SW corner of the province in sparse farmland, cross most of the major metro areas (except Jonquière, Gatineau and Sherbrooke) on each side of the St. Lawrence River, then go into various and very different rural areas until they reach the gulf's more rugged landscape. Country to city to sea.

Ontario: Take any TCH route from Ottawa or Toronto. Between those cities and Québec, take old 2 or old 17.

[bassoon1986]

Louisiana:

I'd say LA 1. The longest highway in the state by far and it's the main street for many major and minor towns north to south. The only drawback is that it doesn't show off New Orleans, but it does pass close enough to Baton Rouge to see the state capitol and the Mississippi River Bridges.

If you are looking for a highway with diversity that does go through New Orleans, then US 90 would be my next choice. And the Biz route shows off the Huey P. Long bridge there

[Brandon]

QC 132, QC 138. Both start in the SW corner of the province in sparse farmland, cross most of the major metro areas (except Jonquière, Gatineau and Sherbrooke) on each side of the St. Lawrence River, then go into various and very different rural areas until they reach the gulf's more rugged landscape. Country to city to sea.

Ontario: Take any TCH route from Ottawa or Toronto. Between those cities and Québec, take old 2 or old 17.

I'd say ON-11 might be a good candidate for Ontario.  From Toronto north around the Big Lakes to Thunder Bay and west toward Manitoba.

[Dr Frankenstein]

Indeed. ON 11 is part of the TCH.

[WichitaRoads]

For Kansas, I'd say either 1-35 (you see farmland, the Flint Hills, Wichita, KC Area), or I-70 (major cities, less scenery, more focus on farmland/high plains).

As much as I dislike interstates for scenery, these do show Kansas relatively well.

ICTRds

[hbelkins]

It is arguable if NE 2 really has a gap in it.

Must. Resist. Temptation. 

For Kentucky, it's US 60. Comes in out in the Jackson Purchase area, goes through the Pennyrile and Knobs area, through Louisville and Bluegrass Country, back through the Knobs and exits crossing a river at a bridge just a mile or so upstream of the river it crossed coming into the state.

Second place would be KY 80. Jackson Purchase, Land Between the Lakes, the Pennyrile, cave country and the Appalachian Mountains.

West Virginia? I'd nominate US 33.

[The High Plains Traveler]

For Colorado it should be I-70. It provides a good sampler of state geography, starting with the Utah desert in the west, gradually climbing up through the Rocky Mountains with two 10,000+ foot summits, then slicing through a large part of the Denver metro area and finally crossing the high plains of eastern Colorado.

Minnesota's most typical road is probably MN-23. It begins in an area representative of the prairie of eastern South Dakota, angles through the corn belt then into the forest and Canadian Shield area. It ends at Duluth.

I'm struggling to identify an archetypical road for New Mexico. You could identify I-25 and/or the old U.S. 85 alignments as the historic "El Camino Real", but you spend a lot of time along the Rio Grande and miss a lot of typical state geography.

[DaBigE]

It is arguable if NE 2 really has a gap in it.

Must. Resist. Temptation. 

For Wisconsin:
I nominate I-94: Cuts through most of the major urban areas (Milwaukee, Madison) in addition to a lot of farm land and picturesque landscape (Wisconsin Rver, The Dells, Tomah, Eau Claire).

Runners up: US 151, US 51, US 12

[xonhulu]

Since I don't think anybody offered an Oregon example, I'd put forth US 26.  It's not an interstate, but does have a freeway section.  It connects the coast, Coast Range, Willamette Valley/Portland, Mt Hood/Cascades, central Oregon high desert, Blue Mountains, and the Snake River area. 

US 20 is similar, but it doesn't hit the major metro area of Portland, and on the whole Us 26 is a more scenic cross-state drive. 

The original US 30 would've probably been a better choice since it includes nearly everything US 26 sees plus the Columbia River Gorge, but I ruled it out because I-84 has obscured most of its old routing.

[dgolub]

NY: NY 22. No one route can really represent all of a three-pronged state. With its original routing, NY 22 started in Manhattan along Park Avenue, heading toward suburban Westchester County. Picking up the current route, it gets urban again on a small scale in White Plains, then heads on up through forests, mountains, and farms, before the big one, the Adirondacks. There's an impressive variety of urban, rural, flat, and mountainous for something that stays east of the Hudson the entire time.

Agreed.  Another possibility would be NY 5, which does east/west through upstate.  Also, US 9 goes through the same general areas as NY 22, but I think it hits more of the cities.

Also, if we treat Long Island as a separate entity, since its road network is fairly disjoint from the rest of the state, the quintessential route would be either NY 25 or NY 27.

[corco]

For Colorado it should be I-70. It provides a good sampler of state geography, starting with the Utah desert in the west, gradually climbing up through the Rocky Mountains with two 10,000+ foot summits, then slicing through a large part of the Denver metro area and finally crossing the high plains of eastern Colorado.

Minnesota's most typical road is probably MN-23. It begins in an area representative of the prairie of eastern South Dakota, angles through the corn belt then into the forest and Canadian Shield area. It ends at Duluth.

I'm struggling to identify an archetypical road for New Mexico. You could identify I-25 and/or the old U.S. 85 alignments as the historic "El Camino Real", but you spend a lot of time along the Rio Grande and miss a lot of typical state geography.

New Mexico is a really hard state to pin- I've seen a good chunk of the state (certainly every geographic region but the Taos area), but when somebody asks me to "picture New Mexico" I come up blank. I'd agree that I-25 is probably closest to being something...but it still misses the mark.

[Scott5114]

Oklahoma: Oddly enough, I-44.  It goes through Tulsa, OKC, and Lawton.  It also goes through some really boring rural areas.  The OK 66/US 277 combo would be a good alternate but isn't a single route number.  OK 3 is long but doesn't really go through enough scenic areas and doesn't go through enough urban areas other than OKC.

OK 3, however, passes through mountainous SE Oklahoma which is an environment that I-44 doesn't even come close to. 3 also hits the panhandle, which more of a Great Plains environment than I-44 does. If only 3 extended west over OK 325 instead of heading north to CO, you could also get the more desert-like environment of western Cimarron County, which would make it unquestionably the quintessential highway of Oklahoma.

[jemacedo9]

For PA: US 322, it gives you a rather solid taste of the state, cities, towns, countryside, pennsultucky, it's all there. Runners up for me would be US30, but that doesn't give you the rural mountain region, and the road that defines PA is not really good for a taste of the state, the turnpike

For PA, I'd rate US 322 a good close second, but I'd have to go us 30 for PA, because it goes through the two biggest cities in Phila and Pgh, it does go through the southern mountains, and since it's the Lincoln Highway, I think it does represent the history of PA quite well.  And..it goes through the highly-loved Breezewood..........

[SteveG1988]

For PA: US 322, it gives you a rather solid taste of the state, cities, towns, countryside, pennsultucky, it's all there. Runners up for me would be US30, but that doesn't give you the rural mountain region, and the road that defines PA is not really good for a taste of the state, the turnpike

For PA, I'd rate US 322 a good close second, but I'd have to go us 30 for PA, because it goes through the two biggest cities in Phila and Pgh, it does go through the southern mountains, and since it's the Lincoln Highway, I think it does represent the history of PA quite well.  And..it goes through the highly-loved Breezewood..........

I was thinking US30, but 322 gives you more of the state imho

[Thing 342]

For Delaware, I'd go with DE 1. It crosses the state N-S, starting in the Beaches and passes through most of the major cities (Beaches, Milford, Dover, Smyrna, Newark, comes close to Wilmington)

[Ned Weasel]

For Kansas, I'd say either 1-35 (you see farmland, the Flint Hills, Wichita, KC Area), or I-70 (major cities, less scenery, more focus on farmland/high plains).

As much as I dislike interstates for scenery, these do show Kansas relatively well.

ICTRds

Both are good choices, but I'm inclined to nominate US 50.  It has a bunch of Western Kansas rural stuff that I've never seen, it has Super 2 Expressway and true expressway portions, it has roundabouts, it has the Flint Hills, it has commercial strips, it has Downtown Emporia, and it has the freeway portions: I-35 and I-435.  And I think it's safe to say it has the greatest variation in width out of any route in Kansas: two lanes at its narrowest to eight through lanes plus six C/D lanes at its widest!  Blink and you'll miss the signs that tell you where it exits NB I-35 and WB I-435, though.

[NE2]

Might be interesting to see how many pre-1926 state highway 1s are decent contenders.
Florida: 1 ran the length of the Panhandle to Jax, but ended there and didn't serve the peninsula.
New Jersey: 1 connected Jersey City to Trenton, but 2 continued south to Camden.

[Eth]

After some deliberation, I think I've settled on US 23 for Georgia. You get the mountains in the northern part of the state, then working down into suburbia (like it or not, a major part of the state), a bit of the city of Atlanta, then continuing down to Macon and onward into the flatter southern part of the state, ending up fairly close to the coast before crossing into Florida. (Honorable mentions would probably be US 19 and US 41 - 41, in my mind, suffers a bit mostly because it's in the shadow of I-75 for almost its entire route.)

Might be interesting to see how many pre-1926 state highway 1s are decent contenders.

In Georgia's case, SR 1 is still there, also carrying the routing of US 27. It really doesn't serve any major cities other than Columbus, and lacks the geographical variety of other options further east.

[Alps]

Might be interesting to see how many pre-1926 state highway 1s are decent contenders.
Florida: 1 ran the length of the Panhandle to Jax, but ended there and didn't serve the peninsula.
New Jersey: 1 connected Jersey City to Trenton, but 2 continued south to Camden.

NE 1 and NJ 1 are both approximately the same as what's now US 1.

[NE2]

NE 1 and NJ 1 are both approximately the same as what's now US 1.

Very approximately in the case of New Jersey - it went south on US 130 from New Brunswick to Robbinsville before turning west on NJ 33.

NY 1 and VA 1 are also now US 1. PA 1 was the Lincoln Highway, now US 1 northeast of Philly.

[aerules]

I would go with 537 for NJ.  Starts off in downtown Camden, continues through a few neighborhoods of Camden before entering Suburban Cherry Hill.  Than after moorstown it is primarley farmland until Mt. Holly.  It ends by the shore in Wall. 

[WichitaRoads]

For Kansas, I'd say either 1-35 (you see farmland, the Flint Hills, Wichita, KC Area), or I-70 (major cities, less scenery, more focus on farmland/high plains).

As much as I dislike interstates for scenery, these do show Kansas relatively well.

ICTRds

Both are good choices, but I'm inclined to nominate US 50.  It has a bunch of Western Kansas rural stuff that I've never seen, it has Super 2 Expressway and true expressway portions, it has roundabouts, it has the Flint Hills, it has commercial strips, it has Downtown Emporia, and it has the freeway portions: I-35 and I-435.  And I think it's safe to say it has the greatest variation in width out of any route in Kansas: two lanes at its narrowest to eight through lanes plus six C/D lanes at its widest!  Blink and you'll miss the signs that tell you where it exits NB I-35 and WB I-435, though.

I'll tip my hat to you on that, good sir! U.S. 50 does a pretty good job for sure. The only thing that either of our routes don't capture would be the SE region of Kansas... the Osage Questas and the bit o' the Ozarks that we have. Maybe we should throw in I-66*... er, I mean, U.S. 400... especially since it runs along 54 AND 50... just avoids KC Area altogether, though. And, this also from the guy who says Screw 400

*Hope springs eternal... someday... maybe... before I'm dead.

ICTRds