Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
The League of American Wheelmen (now called League of American Bicyclists) was formed more than 100 years ago to lobby the government to start paving American roads (back when cars hardly existed). Ironically, later motorists came to feel superior, and feel bicyclists don't belong on the road.
There is a Bicycle Path here on Long Island that was started by Bicyclists exactly like you describe. Years ago it really was a path built just for bicycles that connected the North and South shores. Today it only runs about half way across the Island and is a local street.
There is a Bicycle Path here on Long Island that was started by Bicyclists exactly like you describe. Years ago it really was a path built just for bicycles that connected the North and South shores. Today it only runs about half way across the Island and is a local street.
The Wikipedia entry about Bicycle Path lays out most of the former path's route. Interestingly enough, not far from the former northern terminus of Bicycle Path, land slated to be a bypass for Route 347 has been redeveloped as a path for bicycling and walking.
If the OP can't sort this stuff out, it says something unflattering about our "educational" system, but I'm pretty sure the "global warming" scare was trumpeted from the bully pulpit.
But to get to some of the points, primitive roads go back to ancient history, but the Romans were the first to make serious use of them to sustain their empire. Interestingly, the ruts in some of these antiquities lasted for centuries. They averaged about 4 feet, 8 inches apart -- very close to the "standard gauge" of British and American railroads.
The next step was canals, particularly the Erie. Vessels encounter very little resistance when pulled, even twenty tons by a single horse, through "slack water", Once grain (feedstock of all human progress at the time) could be shipped from the Great Lakes (Buffalo) to New York (via the Hudson River from Albany) at less than 5 per cent of what it used to cost, the entire economy boomed for years.
That boomlet was multiplied several times over by railroads, which didn't freeze over in winter, could go to more places, and had much faster speeds for passengers.
Bicycles were never much of a factor, although at the start of the Twentieth Century, one visionary did come up with the idea of a network of wooden bikeways in (appropriately enough!) Los Angeles. It didn't last too long.
Paved roads for "Tin Lizzies" and the new "Bulldog" chain-drive Mack straight trucks were evolving on the fringes of the major cities before the First World War; In 1919, a young Army officer who hadn't seen combat, but learned a lot about "logistics" -- moving men and supplies -- led a convoy of straight trucks coast-to-coast; the trip took 61 days, July 7 to September 6, The young Lieutenant Colonel's name was Dwight D. Eisenhower.
And for what it's worth, the scenes of bootleg liquor moving south toward New York City from Canada through the Adirondacks and Catskills, (as depicted in films like "The Outfit" -- filmed "on location" in Oneonta, NY) in convoys of "Bulldog" Macks is not that far off base -- one of the first successful examples of long haul trucking.
Highways had languished up to this point -- no improvements other than some gravel and wooden-planked roads. but the coming of the auto and demonstration of its versatility changed that. By 1916, the U S had a primary system of designated and numbered Federal highways (completing it would take quite a while), The Pennsylvania Turnpike (Harrisburg-Pittsburgh, much of it on an abandoned railroad grade) was completed in 1940, Newark-Chicago without a stoplight by the mid-Fifties and virtually the entire Interstate System by 1973.
At this point in time, fuel-price and environmental concerns have breathed some life back into the railroads, but the construction of "true" High Speed Rail systems, the sharing of trackage with freight trains. and the challenge of local pickup and delivery (no rail spurs into the Mall or WalMart, and there never will be) cloud the picture. It should be fun to watch, even if few of us wil be around for the end of that chapter of a long, continuing story.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 07-18-2014 at 07:34 PM..
In addition to what CAllenDoudna said ^ in the 1700s and 1800s governments began to try to improve roads by allowing private companies to run them as "turnpikes". The company would promise to improve and maintain the roads in exchange for the right to collect tolls.
Your from New Jersey - in northern New Jersey they built a serious of turnpikes called "plank roads" because they were surfaced with wooded planks. Examples include the Paterson Plank Road and the Hackensack Plank Road.
So the roads definitely came first even before the rail then. When the roads were meant for horse, were they paved differently like with softer materials to protect the horses joints?
Roads and hotels have been around since ancient times. Consider the Bible; whether you believe in its literal truth or not, you'll probably agree that it was written a long time ago. It talks about roads (Jesus reappearing to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus; Paul having his conversion experience on the road to Damascus; etc.) and lodging (no room for Mary and Joseph at the inn; the Good Samaritan finding the wounded man on the road to Jericho and taking him to an inn to be tended to; etc.) And it describes these things as being ordinary parts of the landscape, implying that they were not novelties.
As for railroads in the U.S., they enjoyed their highest ridership during World War II, a time of massive mobilization, extensive travel (think soldiers being deployed to various bases), and government restrictions on automobile usage (through fuel rationing and the conversion of civilian auto manufacturing to production of war materiel). After the war, the huge pent-up demand finally exploded, and automobiles surged in popularity. One can argue whether the massive highway construction program of that era was a cause or an effect of growing auto use, but they certainly did feed off each other. Railroads, offering neither the convenience of the private auto nor the speed of jet airliners, faded to a shadow of their former self.
The basic issue in choosing between road and rail transport, usually for freight, revolves around the difference in the coefficient of friction between steel wheels on steel rails vs. wagon wheels, and later, rubber tires on a road's rougher surface. Highway vehicles can climb much steeper grades, but at considerably higher costs in energy (fuel) expended.
Steel wheels will begin to slip on a grade of as little as one per cent (vertical rise of one foot in 100 feet of distance traveled), At two per cent (1 in 50) adhesion can be enhanced by sanding the rails, but the cost continues to mount, Four per cent (1 in 25) is about the limit at which any grade can be economically surmounted, and at six per cent (1 in 17), the most powerful locomotive can pull little more than itself. Most of the remaining prominent rail grades, such as Saluda Hill in North Carolina and Tennessee Pass in Colorado, have been abandoned as the railroads merged into fewer, but larger companies, and found alternative routings.
The first primitive roads, laid out in the days before eminent domain laws (permitting the seizure of private property for public purposes) tended to skirt around every obstacle, and local authorities tended to shun any responsibility for their upkeep. But every form of improvement, be it the reduction of grades and curves, or the advance from a dirt surface to planks and paving was driven by the pursuit of simple efficiency.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 09-13-2017 at 12:02 PM..
I think you would have to revise the question to incorporate paths in addition to roads. For instance in Manhattan for centuries before the Dutch first came there were numerous Indian paths in the area which the Dutch improved on and turned into roads. Probably the best known is Broadway.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
