I think US/State Highways should be signed through national parks.

[Molandfreak]

I stayed at a ranch outside both Yellowstone and Grand Tetons National Park, near Moran, when I traveled out west a few years ago. From Mammoth Hot Springs, with no stops and after dark, it took a little over 3 hours to drive the roughly 125 miles back to my sleeping accommodations. Had this been on one of the signed US Highways outside the park, it would've been a bit under 2 hours drive time.

Between the tourists, the wildlife, and the roadways built for gentle cruising through the park (max 45 mph), the park roadways are NOT for through traffic in any way, shape or form. It defeats the purpose of making it a national park if you punch a 70+ mph major highway through it. Commerce is more than sufficiently served by the Interstate and US highway network feeding into the park, as well as around the park itself.

But WAAAAAIIITTT!!! What about Theodore Roosevelt National Park, you ask? The Interstate predates the National Park. The park was opened in 1978. The last stretches of I-94 in North Dakota were completed and opened to traffic in 1969.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park? Opened 1974, or about 20 years after the Ohio Turnpike. Also note the utterly massive set of bridges carrying both I-271 and the Ohio Turnpike over much of the park.

Suffice it to say that Interstates through National Parks are major exceptions to SOP, especially in the modern era.

Is effective navigation unimportant on a road you can't travel on at 70 mph?

[Roadgeekteen]

I stayed at a ranch outside both Yellowstone and Grand Tetons National Park, near Moran, when I traveled out west a few years ago. From Mammoth Hot Springs, with no stops and after dark, it took a little over 3 hours to drive the roughly 125 miles back to my sleeping accommodations. Had this been on one of the signed US Highways outside the park, it would've been a bit under 2 hours drive time.

Between the tourists, the wildlife, and the roadways built for gentle cruising through the park (max 45 mph), the park roadways are NOT for through traffic in any way, shape or form. It defeats the purpose of making it a national park if you punch a 70+ mph major highway through it. Commerce is more than sufficiently served by the Interstate and US highway network feeding into the park, as well as around the park itself.

But WAAAAAIIITTT!!! What about Theodore Roosevelt National Park, you ask? The Interstate predates the National Park. The park was opened in 1978. The last stretches of I-94 in North Dakota were completed and opened to traffic in 1969.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park? Opened 1974, or about 20 years after the Ohio Turnpike. Also note the utterly massive set of bridges carrying both I-271 and the Ohio Turnpike over much of the park.

Suffice it to say that Interstates through National Parks are major exceptions to SOP, especially in the modern era.

You need to watch out for wildlife on many roads outside of National Parks, such as moose in northern Maine. Not a great argument for not signing roads at all. And most national park roads aren't used for thru traffic, but in massive parks like Yellowstone and Death Valley there aren't any other options- you can't just drive around them.

[pderocco]

I stayed at a ranch outside both Yellowstone and Grand Tetons National Park, near Moran, when I traveled out west a few years ago. From Mammoth Hot Springs, with no stops and after dark, it took a little over 3 hours to drive the roughly 125 miles back to my sleeping accommodations. Had this been on one of the signed US Highways outside the park, it would've been a bit under 2 hours drive time.

Between the tourists, the wildlife, and the roadways built for gentle cruising through the park (max 45 mph), the park roadways are NOT for through traffic in any way, shape or form. It defeats the purpose of making it a national park if you punch a 70+ mph major highway through it. Commerce is more than sufficiently served by the Interstate and US highway network feeding into the park, as well as around the park itself.

I don't think anyone is arguing that NPs should have higher speed roads. Every time I've been to Yellowstone, I've gone in on one road and come out on another, and that's almost always true whenever I visit Death Valley, Joshua Tree, Yosemite, Lassen, etc., so I think continuing numbered routes through the park would be useful. There are some parks which are dead ends, like, well, everything in Utah, but they're not interrupting numbering on routes outside the park.

[Quillz]

At one point, 89 was pretty well signed within Lassen. 

[Scott5114]

Not in more than sixty years.

Or if you live in the weird roadgeek time capsule I do. I see so many 1957-spec Interstate shields on a daily basis now that the ones on the road look wrong.