Talk:Interstate Highway System/Archive 1

DO NOT EDIT OR POST REPLIES TO THIS PAGE. THIS PAGE IS AN ARCHIVE.

This archive page covers approximately the dates between 2003 to Dec. 31, 2004.

Post replies to the main talk page, copying the section you are replying to if necessary. (See Wikipedia:How to archive a talk page.)

Please add new archivals to Talk:Interstate Highway/Archive02. Thank you. Novasource 03:36, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

---

Safety Issue

"Some stretches of highway, e.g. in the Arizona desert, are considered dangerous due to extreme heat. Local police recommends drivers to pass through as quickly as possible, on those roads, speed limit is seldom enforced."

This can't possibly be true. IIRC, AZ Highway patrol are notorious for enforcing speed limits. Besides the fact th at driving overspeed with the air conditioner on can cause overheating, and hot road surfaces would be more dangerous at speed. Removing until someone can substantiate ot

herwise. IMO, almost bad enough to be put in Patent Nonsense. --justfred

Indeed "hot road surfaces would be more dangerous at speed", esp'ly since stress on tires and heating of tires goes up with speed, and heat surely weakens tires. It seems logical that top safe speed is lower in high ambient temperature. --Jerzy 18:32, 2003 Oct 25 (UTC)

---

Grandfathering

for the benefit of non-Americans, what does grandfathered mean?

jimfbleak 09:16 5 Jun 2003 (UTC)

grandfathered - allowed to remain unchanged despite a change in rules. A toll-road grandfathered into the interstate system is allowed to remain a toll road despite the rules that new interstates must be toll-free. dml

per Jerzy & hist, the above edit was 19:45, 2003 Jun 5 by DavidLevinson &sum'd "grandfathered"

IMO this is worth a Grandfather clause article. I am pretty sure it refers to the use of GFCs in election laws in US South, post-American Civil War. There were "literacy tests", some of which required explaining a paragraph of legal language, intended to exclude African-Americans from voting. But excluding what the legislators probably actually called "po' wha' trash" ("poor white trash") was not such good politics, and any one who had a grandfather who had been registered to vote (i.e., not you-know-who) could register without the literacy test. --Jerzy 18:32, 2003 Oct 25 (UTC)

In this context, grandfathering simply has to do with the fact that many highway facilities were constructed before the various regulations or laws concerning them were passed. This older facilities often didn't meet standards but they were admitted, or "grandfathered" into the system. Absolutely nothing to with the election-related Grandfather clause.Jgalea84 06:39, Feb 27, 2004 (UTC)

---

"Interstate" vs. "interstate"

I suppose the line is hazy, but are there any good rules for when to use the capitalized Interstate versus using lower-case interstate? I've seen some edits to the various Interstate highway pages lowering the I, which kind of bugs me. I guess I'm just accustomed to seeing it upper case, since I figure it's a shortened version of the title "Eisenhower Interstate System" or whatever. Anyway, just curious if people have input —Mulad 17:39, 26 Feb 2004 (UTC)

There's no reason why the upper-case "I" should be kept when one is writing about interstate highways generally and not a specific interstate (e.g., "Florida has three interstate highways" versus "It's true that Interstate 4 runs across Florida.") Please look anywhere you please (online, in books, in the dictionary) to confirm that this is the accepted style. Moncrief 07:19, 26 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I'd recommend using an uppercase Interstate when talking about individual highways of the Eisenhower Interstate System or the system itself, but lowercase interstate when talking about plain-old roads crossing borders as in a US route (even though US routes are really maintained by each state as a standard state road).--DylanL 08:57, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

---

Urban Legends

Unless someone can cite evidence to the contrary, this is an urban legend:

Some stretches of Interstate highway can be used as field-expedient runways for the operation of military aircraft.

Snopes says that this is an urban legend, pure and simple. http://www.snopes.com/autos/law/airstrip.asp --clRedwolf, 01:41 23 August 2004 (UTC)

---

Notices of non-chronologically placed additions

• Grandfathering: 3rd 'graph --Jerzy 18:32, 2003 Oct 25 (UTC)
• Toll "Freeways": indented 2nd 'graph --Jerzy 18:32, 2003 Oct 25 (UTC)
• Safety Issue: 3rd 'graph --Jerzy 18:32, 2003 Oct 25 (UTC)
• Interstates, under Route Nomenclature ("Seeking further discussion of Interstates, including Route Nomenclature") --Jerzy 20:14, 2003 Oct 25 (UTC)

---

Marker shield graphics and a menu

I have created a MediaWiki menu listing all of the primary one- and two-digit Interstates, as well as Interstate 238 and the three signed Interstates in Hawaii. I have also uploaded my versions of route marker graphics for each of those Interstates, which have just the word "Interstate" and the number. I would like to take the same route (no pun intended, of course) that I followed with the series of B.C. Highway articles and embellish all of the primary Interstate pages with this new MediaWiki menu, as well as each Interstate's respective marker shield graphic. The menu is located at Template:Interstates, and each marker graphic can be found at [[Image:Interstate##.png]], where ## is any of the designations mentioned in the MediaWiki menu. Would this proposed action sit well with you? Denelson83 23:53, 27 May 2004 (UTC)

Well, since I haven't received an answer on this in almost two months, I will assume that it's okay for me to do. Denelson83 20:36, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Splitting 3-digit interstate articles

Can anyone try to focus on expanding the sections for the 3-digit interstate articles so that they can have separate articles of their own that are not substubs?? Are you wondering how the articles should be titled; the answer is something like Interstate 275 (Florida). 66.245.16.193 16:02, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

• Currently, I split up Interstate 76, a 2-digit interstate, and it appears that everyone wants the 2 highways treated as if they were one highway based on what Vfd says. 66.245.10.194 01:03, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)

High-speed driving

'controlled-access superhighway or freeway allowing for safe high-speed driving when traffic permits' - I don't have a strong opinion on this one, but AFAIK most freeways have a lower speed than equivalent motorways/freeways in other Western countries (which are typically more in the 70-80mph range). Of course they are higher-speed than local roads. Might it be worth clarifying this? Andrewferrier 19:59, 2004 Dec 21 (UTC)

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has a page detailing the various Interstate Highway speed limits throughout the US. To quote them: "As of June 2003, 29 states had raised speed limits to 70 mph or higher on some portion of their roadway systems."-- Cyrius|✎ 20:16, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)