Stragest Common State Borders

[ilpt4u]

If you told someone that Illinois and Tennessee were very close together, they'd think you were lying to them. The average person wouldn't think that there are people in the same state as Chicago who would have Nashville, Tennessee as their closest big city.

Not very many in Southern IL live closer to Nashville than St Louis, but the parts near Metropolis, Brookport, Cave-In-Rock, Elizabethtown, etc do - but almost all of them live closer to Nashville than Chicago.

Heck, Atlanta is closer to the far reaches of Southern IL than Chicago

Chicago is almost a foreign land. And this is from a Chicagoland expat living in Southern Illinois

I'll put it this way: When Marion/Williamson County Veterans Airport of Southern Illinois/MWA rebid their government-subsidized commercial air service carrier, Cape Air won the bid with 8-seat turbo-prop Cesna flights from Marion to both STL and BNA Airports (previous service was only to STL). SkyWest DBA United Express also bid, but did not win - they were offering Regional Jet service from Marion to ORD, 1 or 2 roundtrips/day

I think that is slightly telling about Southern IL's attitude towards Chicago vs St Louis and/or Nashville - and that is a very limited example

One interestingly unique thing about Southern IL: It is in a TV market with Southeastern Missouri and Western Kentucky, and basically we end up with 3 Local newscasts, but really 1 newscast for SEMO by the CBS/FOX affiliates (separate owners, but they share the same local news on-air and production talent) KFVS/KBSI out of Cape Girardeau, 1 newscast for Western KY by the NBC affiliate WPSD out of Paducah, and 1 newscast for Southern IL by the ABC affiliate WSIL out of Carterville, IL. I'm not going to say the 3 are completely different animals, but each clearly focuses more on its "home"  part of the greater TV market

Does that mean that there are greater regional differences from Southern IL versus Western KY and Southeastern MO? Interesting food for thought, anyway

[CtrlAltDel]

I do see a slight deviation in the North Line, but didn't the Twelve Mile Arc extend further into Maryland when it was first surveyed?

I don't claim to be an expert on this, but I don't believe so, no. According to this image from the Wikipedia, the dent is fairly small.



The official shape files seem to verify this.

[JayhawkCO]

A couple to add that haven't been mentioned:

NV & OR - Deserts vs. Green & Lush (I'm just using people's "perceptions")
NV & ID - Deserts vs. Mountains
MO & TN - Although Missouri has become more "Southern" lately

Bonus Canadian Border:
SK & NU - A four corners situation, but that one seems to me to be the most incomprehensible

Chris

[KCRoadFan]

Iowa and Minnesota.

When many people think of Iowa, they think of farms and cornfields - the "Heartland."
When they think of Minnesota, they usually picture "the North"  - woods and the "Land of 10,000 Lakes."

I've made the drive up I-35 to Minneapolis many a time - from that experience, I can tell that most of the state south of the Twin Cities basically looks like Iowa (especially south of Faribault). However, once you reach the metro itself and then get further to the north - that's when the lakes and trees become more common and Minnesota begins to look more like the popular perception of that state.

[Konza]

Side note, even though I have driven across the Roebling Bridge, I still find it very weird that Ohio and Kentucky share a common border.

I've walked across the Roebling Bridge.  When I did that, I walked from the Midwest into the South.  I've never done something similar near Louisville or Evansville, but I think the situation is more pronounced in Cincinnati than anyplace else because the city is bigger and on the Midwest side of the river.

Note that the Mason-Dixon Line does not extend as far west as the Ohio River.  One or the other is the delineator between North and South east of the Mississippi River.  I'd offer that a wide river is a bigger divide in a number of ways than a thin line, and in no place are those divides more striking than when you cross the Ohio.

[ran4sh]

This isn't really a border, but Texas is about 35 miles from Colorado at its closest point. That especially feels weird.

I like this.  I think it should be included.  States that don't border but almost do, which are culturally and geographically different.  I don't think Texas has anything in common with Colorado, yet it's a short jaunt (basically across one county) from Texas to Colorado.

I'll cheat again and expand my previous post:

If you told someone that Illinois and Tennessee were very close together, they'd think you were lying to them. The average person wouldn't think that there are people in the same state as Chicago who would have Nashville, Tennessee as their closest big city.

Virginia and Pennsylvania are also only separated by a small sliver of Maryland.

It's only a very small part of Illinois that has Nashville as the closest big city, most of southern Illinois is closer to St Louis.

[ran4sh]

NY and RI share a water border.  RIDOT exploits this by using NYC as a control for I-95 South and skipping over CT cities.

I think New York is a valid control city from RI regardless of the border.

[keithvh]

A couple to add that haven't been mentioned:

NV & OR - Deserts vs. Green & Lush (I'm just using people's "perceptions")
NV & ID - Deserts vs. Mountains
MO & TN - Although Missouri has become more "Southern" lately

Bonus Canadian Border:
SK & NU - A four corners situation, but that one seems to me to be the most incomprehensible

Chris

Agree quite a bit on these two.

Everyone thinks of Las Vegas first with Nevada, but you can go north from Vegas for a long time (400+ miles) and still be in the Silver State.  Eventually reach the latitude of Oregon & Idaho.

Nebraska/Missouri --- I've crossed that border a couple times in recent years, but it still does feel weird.  Iowa & Kansas aren't connected but those 2 feel like they would be more "natural" than Nebraska/Missouri.

-----------------------

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

[Takumi]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

[SD Mapman]

You can start in the flat, Iowa-type farmland of Eastern South Dakota, and only crossing one state line, end up in Glacier National Park. On another note, the SD/MT border is I think the only state border in the country not traversed by a paved road.

[JayhawkCO]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

If we're going international, Norway/Russia wins for me.

Chris

[SD Mapman]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

If we're going international, Norway/Russia wins for me.

Chris

There's also the 20-or-so foot long Zambia-Botswana border: https://www.google.com/maps/@-17.7911559,25.2622646,17.08z

[JayhawkCO]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

If we're going international, Norway/Russia wins for me.

Chris

There's also the 20-or-so foot long Zambia-Botswana border: https://www.google.com/maps/@-17.7911559,25.2622646,17.08z

Soon to be crossed by a bridge!

Chris

[zzcarp]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

If we're going international, Norway/Russia wins for me.

Chris

There's also the 20-or-so foot long Zambia-Botswana border: https://www.google.com/maps/@-17.7911559,25.2622646,17.08z

Soon to be crossed buy a bridge!

Chris

Nearly completed, but it's been delayed from its planned 2020 opening.

[kphoger]

On another note, the SD/MT border is I think the only state border in the country not traversed by a paved road.

MO/KY

[Scott5114]

On another note, the SD/MT border is I think the only state border in the country not traversed by a paved road.

MO/KY

IL/MI.

[frankenroad]

Note that the Mason-Dixon Line does not extend as far west as the Ohio River.  One or the other is the delineator between North and South east of the Mississippi River.  I'd offer that a wide river is a bigger divide in a number of ways than a thin line, and in no place are those divides more striking than when you cross the Ohio.

I had always assumed that the Mason-Dixon line continued as the border between Marshall and Wetzel Counties in (West) Virginia, but you are right.  It ends at the southwest corner of Pennsylvania.  Learn something new every day!

[zachary_amaryllis]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

If we're going international, Norway/Russia wins for me.

Chris

what about us/russia? the bering sea thing...

[TheHighwayMan3561]

Iowa and Minnesota.

When many people think of Iowa, they think of farms and cornfields - the "Heartland."
When they think of Minnesota, they usually picture "the North"  - woods and the "Land of 10,000 Lakes."

I've made the drive up I-35 to Minneapolis many a time - from that experience, I can tell that most of the state south of the Twin Cities basically looks like Iowa (especially south of Faribault). However, once you reach the metro itself and then get further to the north - that's when the lakes and trees become more common and Minnesota begins to look more like the popular perception of that state.

Eh, I'm not sure about this one. People know they're both cold northern states.

[kphoger]

Yeah.  For me, everything between Northfield (MN) and Ames (IA) is just one big blur, with the occasional truck stop thrown in.

[briantroutman]

Note that the Mason-Dixon Line does not extend as far west as the Ohio River.  One or the other is the delineator between North and South east of the Mississippi River.  I'd offer that a wide river is a bigger divide in a number of ways than a thin line, and in no place are those divides more striking than when you cross the Ohio.

I had always assumed that the Mason-Dixon line continued as the border between Marshall and Wetzel Counties in (West) Virginia, but you are right.  It ends at the southwest corner of Pennsylvania.  Learn something new every day!

Similarly, the Mason-Dixon doesn't stop at the Pennsylvania/Maryland/Delaware tri-point, nor does it continue due east through Delaware, slicing just south of Downtown Wilmington and onward through Glassboro and Long Beach Island, New Jersey. Instead, it turns generally south and ends at the Transpeninsular Line at the southwestern corner of Delaware.

In fact, despite all of the Civil War and North/South imagery popularly associated with "Mason-Dixon" , the only small fraction of the line–basically the southern border of Greene and Fayette Counties (far removed from most of the action)–ever separated the Union from the Confederacy. And even then, it did so for only about half of the war, until West Virginia seceded from Virginia.

[1995hoo]

On a global level: China & Afghanistan.  Russia & North Korea (mentioned already by someone else).  Kenya and Somalia.

Even more jarring to me is China and Kazakhstan, which is more due to how far east Kazakhstan extends. Also Kazakhstan and Mongolia are only 37 miles apart from sharing a border at one point.

If we're going international, Norway/Russia wins for me.

Chris

what about us/russia? the bering sea thing...

Brazil and France having a land border.

[andrepoiy]

Coming back to Canada, when I vacation in northwest Ontario, it's crazy to think I'm in the same province as the country's largest city.  Hell, they have a "Polar Bear Provincial Park" in the same province as one of the largest metros on the continent.  That's wild!
Similar observations could be made about Quebec, but I haven't personally been there so that's why I'm singling out Ontario.

The isolated communities of Northern Quebec are very different from Quebec, I believe they don't speak French there in most of them.

[hbelkins]

Note that the Mason-Dixon Line does not extend as far west as the Ohio River.  One or the other is the delineator between North and South east of the Mississippi River.  I'd offer that a wide river is a bigger divide in a number of ways than a thin line, and in no place are those divides more striking than when you cross the Ohio.

I had always assumed that the Mason-Dixon line continued as the border between Marshall and Wetzel Counties in (West) Virginia, but you are right.  It ends at the southwest corner of Pennsylvania.  Learn something new every day!

There's a monument of some kind at that county line along WV 2. I stopped there years ago but can't remember much about it, but I seem to think it noted the Mason-Dixon Line.

[Dirt Roads]

Note that the Mason-Dixon Line does not extend as far west as the Ohio River.  One or the other is the delineator between North and South east of the Mississippi River.  I'd offer that a wide river is a bigger divide in a number of ways than a thin line, and in no place are those divides more striking than when you cross the Ohio.

I had always assumed that the Mason-Dixon line continued as the border between Marshall and Wetzel Counties in (West) Virginia, but you are right.  It ends at the southwest corner of Pennsylvania.  Learn something new every day!

There's a monument of some kind at that county line along WV 2. I stopped there years ago but can't remember much about it, but I seem to think it noted the Mason-Dixon Line.

You are correct.  There is an extra West Virginia Roadside Historic Marker on WV-2 at the Marshall/Wetzel County border that reads "Mason-Dixon Line: Made famous as line between free and slave states before War Between the States. The survey establishing Maryland-Pennsylvania boundary began, 1763; halted by Indian wars, 1767; continued to southwest corner, 1782; marked, 1784."  This marker was never on the actual Mason-Dixon Line.

There was an identical marker on WV-69/PA-18 at the state border but it has been missing for many years.  For some reason, most maps show this location as the western end of the Mason-Dixon Line.  Since the dispute was between Maryland and Pennsylvania, this section was not part of the original Mason-Dixon survey.  Shortly after the Revolution, Pennsylvania and Virginia agreed to extend the boundary survey westward to the Northern Panhandle back in 1779.  The actual survey line gets very close to where US-250 crosses the Marshall/Wetzel County border.  I've always wondered if the WV-2 marker was supposed to be installed on US-250, but got moved to the wrong location for political reasons.