Roadgeek Neologisms

[vtk]

If you've recently come up with a new word for something road-related, and think it might catch on, try sharing it here!



I've recently started using the term "ramplet" for those smooth right-turn rampy thingies at intersections.  I think the conventional engineering term is "channelized right turn" but that's not very catchy.

[agentsteel53]

I call those "cutoff ramps". 

[Duke87]

I've always heard them referred to as "porkchops".

[Takumi]

I call a short numbered route that was once a significantly longer designation (VA 162, for example) a "remnant route".

[formulanone]

Remant routes, now with enhanced clinch-ability!

I call those painted intersections with crosshatched stripes "waffles".

[Scott5114]

Wow, a thread called "roadgeek neologisms" and it wasn't started by NE2...

[hbelkins]

If you've recently come up with a new word for something road-related, and think it might catch on, try sharing it here!

Viatology!

Oh, wait... 

[kphoger]

Delta junction.

I don't know if other people use it or not; I think I inherited the term from Spanish (by way of a map legend in Guía Roji).  I think it should be pretty obvious what it is, but here's an example:
http://goo.gl/maps/SjZS

[US71]

Not necessarily new, but Bugo coined the term "Oklahoma  Y"  a few years ago 

[Scott5114]

Delta junction.

I don't know if other people use it or not; I think I inherited the term from Spanish (by way of a map legend in Guía Roji).  I think it should be pretty obvious what it is, but here's an example:
http://goo.gl/maps/SjZS

The English equivalent is probably simply a "wye" or "Y junction", inherited from the rail terminology for the same sort of thing. As noted above since ODOT seems particularly fond of them, "Oklahoma Y" is a somewhat popular term.

[kurumi]

I contributed "Volleyball Interchange".

[national highway 1]

I've recently started using the term "ramplet" for those smooth right-turn rampy thingies at intersections.  I think the conventional engineering term is "channelized right turn" but that's not very catchy.

I call them sliplanes.

[roadfro]

I've recently started using the term "ramplet" for those smooth right-turn rampy thingies at intersections.  I think the conventional engineering term is "channelized right turn" but that's not very catchy.

I've always heard them referred to as "porkchops".

"Channelized right turn" is the engineering term. The "pork chop" or "pork chop island" is a term referring to the raised island (or neutral area) created between the intersecting roadways and the channelized turn lane.

[NE2]

Bip: the thing that takes you around a city.

[J N Winkler]

The English equivalent is probably simply a "wye" or "Y junction", inherited from the rail terminology for the same sort of thing. As noted above since ODOT seems particularly fond of them, "Oklahoma Y" is a somewhat popular term.

In Britain, a variant of this junction type (not designed to handle high-speed movements) used to be called a "Bennett junction."

[empirestate]

I probably coined "cloverstack", not that anybody uses that much... I also refer to 4-level full stack interchanges as the Maltese Cross, from their aerial appearance. I don't think that's ever caught on, either.

I also measure street widths by "stripe", from the number of crosswalk stripes it takes to span it. This comes from exploring Philadelphia, where they have a fascinating fractal grid of ever-decreasing street widths, from a 13-stripe (or more) main drag, through small 3-stripers (side streets) and even down to tiny one-stripe alleys, not even wide enough for motor traffic. I have a fondness for tiny streets. :-)

[J N Winkler]

I also refer to 4-level full stack interchanges as the Maltese Cross, from their aerial appearance. I don't think that's ever caught on, either.

It has.  I have seen it in official publications and there are at least 13 hits on it in this forum, all in relation to a type of fully semi-directional four-level interchange where direct connectors handling opposite-facing left turns do not cross in plan.  The term is also well known in other European languages:

http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorv%C3%A4gskorsning

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobahnkreuz#Malteserkreuz

A while ago, in another forum I frequent, I published a list of Maltese cross stacks I had compiled.  It has some omissions (and I have not attempted to keep it up to date), but I counted 71, of which 64 are in the US.  Texas alone has 29 and California is the closest runner-up with 10.

http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=23923

[empirestate]

Well how do you like that! Great minds think alike.

[US71]

UCEB: Ugly Concrete Eyesore Bridge (for most modern bridges)

[national highway 1]

Australian terms
Coverplate (greenout plates)
Focal Point (control cities)
Trailblazer (shield assembly)

[Alps]

Australian terms

Trailblazer (shield assembly)

Over here, that's an official word in the MUTCD.

[Quillz]

I call the new LED street lamps I'm seeing throughout L.A. "flatheads" based on their shape. However, I'm also seeing another variant that looks like the old cobraheads, of which I've dubbed them "flat cobras."

[hbelkins]

Virginia has expanded a number of its US routes from two to four lanes by building two lanes parallel to the existing highway, and leaving the original highway in service as one direction of travel. This is usually pretty obvious when one carriageway has two 10-foot lanes and follows the contour of the land, while the other has two 12-foot lanes and is flat.

I once called this "Virginia twinning," and then promptly forgot that I came up with the term until someone reminded me on m.t.r.

[bugo]

That's actually called a "Missouri Expressway."

[mukade]

US 31 north of Indy is that way as was old M-21 (now M-121?) between Grand Rapids and Holland.