Noticeable (Non-Freeway) Differences When You Cross The State Line...

[Road Hog]

In Texas all hard liquor stores are closed on Sundays and close at 9 p.m. every night the rest of the week, but you can buy beer and wine after noon on Sundays – and also until 1 a.m. on Saturday nights; the cutoff is midnight the rest of the week.

[US81]

In Texas all hard liquor stores are closed on Sundays and close at 9 p.m. every night the rest of the week, but you can buy beer and wine after noon on Sundays – and also until 1 a.m. on Saturday nights; the cutoff is midnight the rest of the week.

Texas also has its lovely (not!) patchwork of "wet" and "dry" counties where sometimes there are interesting ways - like "joining" a "club" - which allow one to purchase/consume alcohol when it would otherwise be illegal. Yeehaw, Texas.

[Road Hog]

In Texas all hard liquor stores are closed on Sundays and close at 9 p.m. every night the rest of the week, but you can buy beer and wine after noon on Sundays – and also until 1 a.m. on Saturday nights; the cutoff is midnight the rest of the week.

Texas also has its lovely (not!) patchwork of "wet" and "dry" counties where sometimes there are interesting ways - like "joining" a "club" - which allow one to purchase/consume alcohol when it would otherwise be illegal. Yeehaw, Texas.

It's worse than that. Counties can vote wet or dry, but so can municipalities within those counties, adding to the patchwork. And municipalities which annex outlying areas have to hold a new wet-dry election to make the newly-incorporated area wet.

It's going in the right direction, though. Places which were dry forever are voting to go wet with regularity. Very seldom do wet areas vote to go back. The last time I remember that happening was a few years ago when Melissa did away with liquor but kept beer/wine sales. Used to be the only place you could buy liquor between Dallas and Denison. But several other towns along 75 now sell liquor, including Plano.

[Pete from Boston]

In Texas all hard liquor stores are closed on Sundays and close at 9 p.m. every night the rest of the week, but you can buy beer and wine after noon on Sundays – and also until 1 a.m. on Saturday nights; the cutoff is midnight the rest of the week.

Texas also has its lovely (not!) patchwork of "wet" and "dry" counties where sometimes there are interesting ways - like "joining" a "club" - which allow one to purchase/consume alcohol when it would otherwise be illegal. Yeehaw, Texas.

It's worse than that. Counties can vote wet or dry, but so can municipalities within those counties, adding to the patchwork. And municipalities which annex outlying areas have to hold a new wet-dry election to make the newly-incorporated area wet.

It's going in the right direction, though. Places which were dry forever are voting to go wet with regularity. Very seldom do wet areas vote to go back. The last time I remember that happening was a few years ago when Melissa did away with liquor but kept beer/wine sales. Used to be the only place you could buy liquor between Dallas and Denison. But several other towns along 75 now sell liquor, including Plano.

Many towns around here have chosen to go what I call "damp" — retail sales, but only service in places that are mostly restaurant, and even then some have a "two drinks with a clear intent to order food" provision to keep from allowing a true watering hole.  The result is no interesting bars in those places. 

The most amusing brake I've heard on "bar-iness" is one town here that has bars, but legally prohibits patrons to drink unless sitting down (which can be... a pain in the ass!), a rule that is usually ignored.

[tidecat]

A long time ago on a family road trip from Mobile to Omaha, my dad asked my sister and I if we felt our IQ drop when we crossed from Tennessee into Arkansas.

[Kacie Jane]

Gas prices 

Ex: Illinois vs Iowa, a 40-60 cents difference
I'm sure all the bordering states have lower prices than Illinois due to the taxes, but Iowa always seems to be the most dramatic

Roads into New Jersey from New York are littered with gasoline alleys, much as roads into New Hampshire from Massachusetts usually have a liquor store very close in.

The Bellingham Costco just south of the WA/BC border is regularly filled to the brim with Canadians searching for the best bang for their buck.

As for my own shocking border crossing, probably my first time crossing into BC from Washington. I was appalled by how horribly they treated our beloved I-5...having it just end in some southern Vancouver suburb.

I-5 ends at the 49th parallel.  It's BC 99 that ends at a city street in South Van.

Not only that, but as a former resident, I get irrationally offended whenever anyone refers to Bellingham as "just south of the border". It doesn't make what you said incorrect, but Canadians at Costco are looking for the best bang for their buck on merchandise (milk is bog, go figure), the gas is just a bonus. If they were just looking for gas, there are similarly priced places 10-20 miles closer to the border.

[jakeroot]

Gas prices 

Ex: Illinois vs Iowa, a 40-60 cents difference
I'm sure all the bordering states have lower prices than Illinois due to the taxes, but Iowa always seems to be the most dramatic

Roads into New Jersey from New York are littered with gasoline alleys, much as roads into New Hampshire from Massachusetts usually have a liquor store very close in.

The Bellingham Costco just south of the WA/BC border is regularly filled to the brim with Canadians searching for the best bang for their buck.

As for my own shocking border crossing, probably my first time crossing into BC from Washington. I was appalled by how horribly they treated our beloved I-5...having it just end in some southern Vancouver suburb.

I-5 ends at the 49th parallel.  It's BC 99 that ends at a city street in South Van.

Not only that, but as a former resident, I get irrationally offended whenever anyone refers to Bellingham as "just south of the border". It doesn't make what you said incorrect, but Canadians at Costco are looking for the best bang for their buck on merchandise (milk is bog, go figure), the gas is just a bonus. If they were just looking for gas, there are similarly priced places 10-20 miles closer to the border.

KKT, I am aware that I-5 ends at the border. I'm just being selfish, but I would have thought that the Canadians would have recognized our beautiful 1000 mile long freeway and would have at least constructed BC 99 around the city. It's annoying going to Whistler from the Seattle area because you have to go through the city. Too much traffic. You can use the SFPR but it's sort of a long detour and isn't really a freeway anyway. More of an expressway.

Kacie Jane, Costco gas, at least where I'm from, is exceptionally cheaper than other stations. Canadians get their milk from Costco and then hit the petrol station...as a bonus? Absolutely. A pretty massive one at that.

[kkt]

KKT, I am aware that I-5 ends at the border. I'm just being selfish, but I would have thought that the Canadians would have recognized our beautiful 1000 mile long freeway and would have at least constructed BC 99 around the city. It's annoying going to Whistler from the Seattle area because you have to go through the city. Too much traffic. You can use the SFPR but it's sort of a long detour and isn't really a freeway anyway. More of an expressway.

Well, you don't have to go through the city, you could take Guide Meridian up to the border and then take the Trans-Canada.  Trade city streets in Vancouver for stripmall and roundabouts along Meridian.  Okay, not much of a trade, but if you go to Whistler often at least it's a little variety.

[jakeroot]

KKT, I am aware that I-5 ends at the border. I'm just being selfish, but I would have thought that the Canadians would have recognized our beautiful 1000 mile long freeway and would have at least constructed BC 99 around the city. It's annoying going to Whistler from the Seattle area because you have to go through the city. Too much traffic. You can use the SFPR but it's sort of a long detour and isn't really a freeway anyway. More of an expressway.

Well, you don't have to go through the city, you could take Guide Meridian up to the border and then take the Trans-Canada.  Trade city streets in Vancouver for stripmall and roundabouts along Meridian.  Okay, not much of a trade, but if you go to Whistler often at least it's a little variety.

It's still ridiculous that no freeway goes between the border and the TCH. Yes that is extremely selfish of me, but is it really that much to ask? I guess in 2014 it is. Or 1970s Vancouver either, apparently.

[Kacie Jane]

Kacie Jane, Costco gas, at least where I'm from, is exceptionally cheaper than other stations. Canadians get their milk from Costco and then hit the petrol station...as a bonus? Absolutely. A pretty massive one at that.

Like I said, you're not wrong, and I freely admit I'm being pedantic. But, Costco gas is exceptionally cheaper than name brand (Chevron, Shell, etc.) gas, but it's competitive with other discounted chains (ARCO, Safeway, Fred Meyer). If Canadians were coming down just for the gas, they'd be using an extra gallon or so to come all the way down to Bellingham and back, so any savings over other cheap gas in Blaine or Lynden (legitimately just south of the border) would be wasted. Thus, they're coming to Costco for the stuff inside first, and the gas is just a bonus saving them an extra stop closer to the border, even if it is a massive bonus.

[vdeane]

KKT, I am aware that I-5 ends at the border. I'm just being selfish, but I would have thought that the Canadians would have recognized our beautiful 1000 mile long freeway and would have at least constructed BC 99 around the city. It's annoying going to Whistler from the Seattle area because you have to go through the city. Too much traffic. You can use the SFPR but it's sort of a long detour and isn't really a freeway anyway. More of an expressway.

Well, you don't have to go through the city, you could take Guide Meridian up to the border and then take the Trans-Canada.  Trade city streets in Vancouver for stripmall and roundabouts along Meridian.  Okay, not much of a trade, but if you go to Whistler often at least it's a little variety.

It's still ridiculous that no freeway goes between the border and the TCH. Yes that is extremely selfish of me, but is it really that much to ask? I guess in 2014 it is. Or 1970s Vancouver either, apparently.

Yeah, I've never understood why there was BC 99 on one end, and TCH on the other, with nothing in between.  You'd think there would be something connecting the two.

The US considers its border traffic as "through traffic".  I know that Ontario considers it "local traffic" (note that neither the Seaway Bridge nor the Canadian side of the Ogdensburg-Prescott Bridge have a provincial designation) and it wouldn't surprise me if other provinces do too.  It would explain why US freeways tend to become surface streets in Canada but rarely the other way around (Peace Bridge/QEW and NB 1 near Calais), and the freeways that do continue on both sides almost invariably have an at-grade on the Canadian side near customs, the only exceptions being ON 402/I-94 and I-190/ON 405.

[jp the roadgeek]

Something I notice when I leave Indiana and enter a gas station: beer in the coolers. Also, the ability to purchase beer (or any alcohol) on that most holy of days, Sunday. Hell, I was reminded of our wonderful laws to preserve the specialness of that first day of the week when driving up I-164 yesterday to see a billboard for a Kentucky car dealership announcing that it was open on Sundays.

Connecticut recently got rid of their law banning the sale of Alcohol on Sundays. That said, there never were any liquor stores I saw conveniently located right over the border in NY, MA, or RI. When I lived in Connecticut, despite there being a liquor store in New York that was 10 minutes away, going there to buy alcohol on Sunday was rare. We usually just planned accordingly and purchased it on any of the other six days of the week.

I do remember, though, that there was a time when New York did not take part in Powerball lottery but Connecticut did. Whenever the jackpot got really high, you would see people lining up at the gas stations on the Merritt just over the state line to buy Powerball tickets.

People from CT tend to go to MA and NY for booze because prices are relatively cheaper, plus better selection. CT has minimum pricing laws which prevent prices of items from being sold below a certain price.  MA also has no sales tax on alcohol, while CT does.  One gap that is about to be closed is in distributorship.  I'd have to drive 45 minutes to Brewster, NY to find Yuengling and Shiner beers.  Then MA started selling Yuengling, and now CT sells Shiner and Yuengling is coming soon.   But anytime I go to MA I make sure to fill up before the CT border (25 cents cheaper),  No real difference in gas prices between CT and NY and CT and RI.  Oh, and about the MA/NH border, restaurants are on the MA side because NH has an 11% restaurant and hotel tax, where MA only has general sales tax of 6.25%.

[cbeach40]

The US considers its border traffic as "through traffic".  I know that Ontario considers it "local traffic" (note that neither the Seaway Bridge nor the Canadian side of the Ogdensburg-Prescott Bridge have a provincial designation) and it wouldn't surprise me if other provinces do too.  It would explain why US freeways tend to become surface streets in Canada but rarely the other way around (Peace Bridge/QEW and NB 1 near Calais), and the freeways that do continue on both sides almost invariably have an at-grade on the Canadian side near customs, the only exceptions being ON 402/I-94 and I-190/ON 405.

Ontario very much considers it to be through traffic. Which would be why we've been spending billions of dollars on border improvements over the last decade. Over 50% of all of Canada's foreign trade crosses the US border from Ontario, so you better believe we make that stuff one of our highest priorities.

Of the 13 fixed crossings to the USA from that province (that are open to the general public), 9 have provincial highways leading up to them. Of the remaining four, the approaches to the Sault Ste. Marie bridge, the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel, and the Niagara Falls Rainbow Bridge all see significant provincial and federal funding. Not to mention the province is heavily involved in the ITS projects along the tunnel and bridge approaches, and other strategic roadways in Windsor.
And per the crossing at Cornwall, I honestly don't deal with enough stuff in Eastern Ontario to know much about what goes on there. But it stands to reason that if 12 of 13 are funded, there's a good chance the thirteenth is too.

And regarding freeway connections, there really isn't a large enough sample size to make those kind of generalizations. There are five cases where a freeway on the US side connects to Ontario- Sault Ste. Marie, Bluewater Bridge, Ambassador Bridge, Lewiston-Queenston Bridge, and Thousand Islands Bridge. Bluewater and LQ both connect directly into freeways, Ambassador is being bypassed by a direct freeway-to-freeway connection, the two lane bridges at Thousand Islands creates a constraint and makes it kind of pointless to have a freeway approaching it when there's a free-flow two lane highway there (unless you need queue storage capacity), and at the Soo there simply isn't a freeway to connect to - though a controlled access arterial does connect into the provincial network from the bridge and bypass the built up section of SSM, Ontario.

[vdeane]

If you're counting the Ambassador (really interstate ramps with nothing in between, and that's a recent project) you can add the Peace Bridge.  NY will be removing the at-grade on our side in the relatively near future.

It seems like the border crossings are a lower priority on Canada's side in any case.  Ontario has the most freeway crossings due to the 400 series highways.  ON 137 is indeed a special case (and I'd be against a freeway on Hill Island unless you tunnel under it, though if the Thousand Island Bridge is ever twinned (I doubt it), MTO might find a way).  One would think ON 16 would have been re-routed onto the bridge to end at NY 812 instead of continuing to RR 2 when the downloading happened, but then the downloading left Ontario's provincial highways without a coherent system period.  I would have routed ON 138 onto the Seaway Bridge too, and I'm pretty sure that ON 420 used to connect to the Rainbow Bridge before the downloading in 1998 (wasn't the downloading determined entirely by the ratio of local/through traffic?).

I believe the Seaway International Bridge Corporation is a sub-agency of Canada's Federal Bridge agency.

EVERY other freeway crossing outside of Ontario has an at-grade immediately on the Canadian side with the exception of NB 1.

[jakeroot]

EVERY other freeway crossing outside of Ontario has an at-grade immediately on the Canadian side with the exception of NB 1.

Except BC 99, which does continue for about 50 km (guess) as freeway into the southern Vancouver suburbs.

[vdeane]

EVERY other freeway crossing outside of Ontario has an at-grade immediately on the Canadian side with the exception of NB 1.

Except BC 99, which does continue for about 50 km (guess) as freeway into the southern Vancouver suburbs.

Not quite... one at-grade, just past customs.

[jakeroot]

EVERY other freeway crossing outside of Ontario has an at-grade immediately on the Canadian side with the exception of NB 1.

Except BC 99, which does continue for about 50 km (guess) as freeway into the southern Vancouver suburbs.

Not quite... one at-grade, just past customs.

Ah yes, Beach Road. God damn Beach Road. Ruining the fun.

[SP Cook]

To me the most obvious accidental geographic change is I-77 between Virginia and North Carolina.   The border lies at the foot of a large grade and it is a good 150 miles of rough mountains in VA and WV, while the land quickly turns to rolling farmland in NC.  I call it "accidental" because the border is a straight line.  It just happens that that is where I-77 is.  If it was 20 miles further west, NC's 77 would get some mountains, 20 miles further east Virginia would have some farm land. 

[cbeach40]

If you're counting the Ambassador (really interstate ramps with nothing in between, and that's a recent project) you can add the Peace Bridge.  NY will be removing the at-grade on our side in the relatively near future.

It seems like the border crossings are a lower priority on Canada's side in any case.  Ontario has the most freeway crossings due to the 400 series highways.  ON 137 is indeed a special case (and I'd be against a freeway on Hill Island unless you tunnel under it, though if the Thousand Island Bridge is ever twinned (I doubt it), MTO might find a way).  One would think ON 16 would have been re-routed onto the bridge to end at NY 812 instead of continuing to RR 2 when the downloading happened, but then the downloading left Ontario's provincial highways without a coherent system period.  I would have routed ON 138 onto the Seaway Bridge too, and I'm pretty sure that ON 420 used to connect to the Rainbow Bridge before the downloading in 1998 (wasn't the downloading determined entirely by the ratio of local/through traffic?).

I believe the Seaway International Bridge Corporation is a sub-agency of Canada's Federal Bridge agency.

EVERY other freeway crossing outside of Ontario has an at-grade immediately on the Canadian side with the exception of NB 1.

That will be awesome when the connection gets built at Buffalo. Glad to hear it, thanks.

• I can't speak to other provinces, but in Ontario's case border issues have been one of if not the single largest item on MTO's construction agenda. In the last few years, every border crossing from Cornwall to the Soo (including the ferries) have had some pretty significant investment. And I'm sure the Northwestern Ontario ones have as well.
• The bridge already ends right at Hwy 16, so it would be physically impossible to reroute Hwy 16. Besides, the routing is signed with markers directing traffic to NY-37, which is more positive guidance than is typically seen on either side.
• When examined empirically, the 1990s restructuring in most ways improved numbering in the province. Now, intra-regional routes are one class of highway (county roads) and inter-regional routes are another (King's Highway). And again, looking at it empirically, the amount of numerical discontinuity created by the restructuring is little to none.
• The rationale behind those highway transfers is indeed based on whether it carries provincial traffic. Highway 420 is a unique situation in that it does provide a through link, but only for non-commercial vehicles. As such, the highway was transferred to the local municipality on Dec. 4, 2002. However, owing to it being a border route, it still receives provincial funding, and the route between the bridge and the provincial highways is well-signed.
• Cornwall is a similar case, where the bridge connects into urban roadways, the kind MTO has never made it their business to own or maintain. And again, as the approach road is well signed to the bridge/highways respectively, and receives border funding, then the actual difference to road users and road authorities is non-existent.

I can understand how it may appear superficially one way, but once it's looked at in depth it actually is quite the opposite.

[vdeane]

I mainly look at the system in CHM.  To say that there are a ton of holes and that routes seemingly start/stop at random is an understatement, at least in southern Ontario along the 401 corridor (especially around Niagara Falls, which shows up on my NY CHM map, along with every other clinched Canadian highway segment I've had a chance to go on).  Northern Ontario looks a lot more normal.  Of course, I'm from New York, where route shields tell you nothing about what type of road something is.  I do like Vermont's system though, which shows the difference between local/through without the discontinuities.

Here's the Buffalo project map: http://ipost.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Screen-Shot-2013-04-03-at-10.47.04-AM.png

Not the most exciting project, but that traffic light will at least be gone.

[Gnutella]

I-77 northbound from North Carolina into Virginia is a treat. In North Carolina, it's a typical highway traversing the rolling hills of the Piedmont, but once you cross into Virginia, it becomes an eight-mile climb with some spectacular scenery off to the east.

Heading southbound on I-77 is the opposite; it's very mountainous in Virginia, and then you coast down an eight-mile drop and flatten out (relatively speaking) once you cross into North Carolina.

[NJRoadfan]

Roads into New Jersey from New York are littered with gasoline alleys, much as roads into New Hampshire from Massachusetts usually have a liquor store very close in. 

They also have C-Stores with a well stocked selection of smokes, since its cheaper than buying in NY (particularly NYC).