Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 12:19, 1 July 2006

It has been suggested that Autobahn be merged into this article. (Discuss)

It has been suggested that Motorway be merged into this article. (Discuss)

A freeway (sometimes known as an expressway or motorway, or any of a large number of other terms, depending on the area of the world) is a highway, usually divided and carrying at least two lanes in each direction, designed primarily for high-speed movement of large numbers of motor vehicles. Access to freeways is fully controlled, with traffic entering and leaving only at grade-separated interchanges. Because traffic never crosses at-grade, there are generally no traffic lights or stop signs. This is often called controlled access or limited access, but both terms can also apply to arterial roads with partial control of access.

National networks

Many countries have national networks of freeways. These do not always include all the freeways or even all the major freeways in the country.

• France: Autoroutes
• Germany: Autobahns
• Italy: Autostrada
• Poland: Autostrada
• United Kingdom: Motorways
• United States: Interstate Highways

This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items.

General characteristics

Freeways, by definition, have no cross traffic in the form of other roads, railroads or multi-use trails. Elimination of cross traffic is typically achieved with grade separation using underpasses and overpasses. In addition to sidewalks attached to roads that cross a freeway, specialized pedestrian bridges or underground tunnels may also be provided. These structures enable pedestrians and cyclists to cross the freeway without a long detour to the nearest motor vehicle crossing. Movable bridges are occasionally present on freeways, requiring drivers to yield to river traffic.

Access is typically provided only at interchanges, though lower-standard right-in/right-out access can be used for direct connections to side roads or driveways to adjacent property. In ideal cases, sophisticated interchanges allow for smooth, uninterrupted transitions between intersecting freeways. However, sometimes it is necessary to exit onto a surface road to transfer from one freeway to another. (See Breezewood, Pennsylvania for an example.) Exits are sometimes numbered to help drivers identify their exit.

Two-lane freeways, often undivided, are sometimes built when traffic volumes are low or right-of-way is limited; they may be designed for easy conversion to one side of a four-lane freeway. Otherwise, freeways typically have at least two lanes in each direction; some busy ones can have as many as 16 or 18 total lanes. These wide freeways may use separate local and express lanes to separate through traffic from local traffic, or special high-occupancy vehicle lanes, either as a special restriction on the innermost lane or a separate roadway, to encourage carpooling. These HOV lanes, or roadways open to all traffic, can be reversible lanes, providing more capacity in the direction of heavy traffic, and reversing direction before traffic switches. Sometimes a collector/distributor road, a shorter version of a local lane, shifts weaving between closely-spaced interchanges to a separate roadway or altogether eliminates it.

Freeways can have frontage roads, normal surface roads parallel to and on either side of the freeway, to provide access to adjacent properties. Frontage roads typically have one-way traffic flow in urban areas and two-way traffic flow in rural areas.

Except on some two-lane freeways (and very rarely on wider freeways), a median separates the opposite directions of traffic. This strip may be as simple as a grassy area, or may include a crash barrier such as a Jersey barrier to prevent head-on collisions. On some freeways, the two carriageways are built on different alignments; this may be done to make use of available corridors in a mountainous area or to provide narrower corridors through dense urban areas.

Speed limits are generally higher than on similar non-freeways, and are sometimes nonexistent (for instance on some German Autobahns). Because the high speeds reduce decision time, freeways are usually equipped with a larger number of guide signs than other roads, and the signs themselves are physically larger. In major cities, guide signs are often mounted on overpasses or overhead gantries so that drivers can see where each lane goes.

In most parts of the world, there are public rest areas or service areas on freeways. Many countries also provide emergency phones alongside freeways at regular intervals.

Access restrictions

To reduce the probability that high-speed freeway traffic will have to slow down for slower same-direction traffic, access to freeways is usually limited to classes of motor vehicles that are powerful enough to maintain a certain minimum speed. Some East Asian countries partially restrict the use of motorcycles or ban them completely from freeways (see restrictions on motorcycle use on freeways).

Travelers using low-powered modes of transportation (such as pedestrians, cyclists, equestrians, and mopeds) are banned at all times from most freeways. However, in some areas, the freeway is the only road, and these users are allowed (see non-motorized vehicle access on freeways).

Special classification

In many countries, a national network of freeways has special status with respect to funding, signage, construction standards or access. For instance, motorways in the United Kingdom are the only roads from which slow vehicles can be banned, and are assigned labels beginning with M and special blue signs. Normal highways (A roads) built to freeway standards are open to all traffic and use green signs.

Effects and controversy

Freeways have been constructed both between urban centres and within them, making common the style of sprawling suburban development found near most modern cities. As well as reducing travel times, the ease of driving on them reduces accident rates, though the speeds involved also tend to increase the severity and death rate of the collisions that do still happen.

Freeways have been heavily criticized by environmentalists and preservationists for the noise, pollution, and economic shifts they bring. Additionally, they have also been criticized by the driving public for the inefficiency with which they handle peak hour traffic.

Often, rural freeways open up vast areas to economic development, generally raising property values. But mature freeways in urban areas are quite often a source of lowered property values, contributing to the deleterious effects of urban blight. One major problem is that even with overpasses and underpasses, freeways tend to divide neighborhoods — especially impoverished ones where residents are less likely to own a car that could easily take them around the freeway. For these reasons, almost no new urban freeways have been built in the U.S. since 1970.

Some have even been demolished and reclaimed as boulevards, notably in San Francisco (Embarcadero Freeway) and Milwaukee (Park East Freeway). Growing anti-urban freeway sentiment has resulted in some significant policy changes; the most noteworthy was an FHWA case study involving the West Side Highway in Manhattan, a quintessential urban freeway in need of expansion and reconstruction. The outcome of the study basically concluded that the current elevated highway should be replaced with a new, at-grade boulevard with integrated pedestrian facilities. This case study may be a precedent for areas where a typical, elevated urban freeway is not desirable and/or may not be effective at handling impacted traffic. In Boston the elevated Central Artery, originally built in the 1950s, was demolished in 2005 when new tunnels were built for an expanded Central Artery directly beneath the pre-existing elevated highway. Completion of the project, referred to as the Big Dig allowed Boston to reunite it's business district with the waterfront, severed by the original elevated Contral Artery, while maintaining the expressway through downtown, now located underground.

Some argue that freeway expansion is self-defeating, in that expansion will just generate more traffic. That is, even if traffic congestion is initially shifted from local streets to a new or widened freeway, people will begin to run errands and commutes to more remote locations which took too long to reach in the past. Over time, the freeway and its environs will become congested again as both the average number and distance of trips increase. This controversial idea is known as the induced demand hypothesis.

Pro-freeway advocates point out that properly designed and maintained freeways are aesthetically pleasing, convenient, and safe, at least in comparison to the uncontrolled roads they replace or supplement. Freeways expand recreation, employment and education opportunities for individuals and open new markets to small businesses. And for many, uncongested freeways are fun to drive.

At present, freeway expansion has largely stalled in the United States, due to a multitude of factors that converged in the 1970s: higher due process requirements prior to taking of private property, increasing land values, increasing costs for construction materials, local opposition to new freeways in urban cores, the passage of the National Environmental Policy Act (which imposed the requirement that each new project must have an environmental impact statement or report), and falling gas tax revenues as a result of the nature of the flat-cent tax (it is not automatically adjusted for inflation) and the tax revolt movement.

Gallery of freeways around the world

• The "Sound Tube", CityLink Freeway, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
• Autopista Central, Santiago, Chile.
• Autopista Los Libertadores, (International Freeway) Santiago, Chile
• US 75 (North Central Expressway) southbound in Dallas, Texas US 75 (North Central Expressway) southbound in Dallas, Texas
• Interstate 376 eastbound in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
• Europeway E6 E20 in southwest Sweden in Varberg Europeway E6 E20 in southwest Sweden in Varberg
• An older German Autobahn without an emergency lane
• Interstate 94 entering the Lowry Hill Tunnel in Minneapolis, Minnesota

History

The examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. You may improve this article, discuss the issue on the talk page, or create a new article, as appropriate. (Learn how and when to remove this message)

The concept of limited-access automobile highways dates back to the New York City area Parkway system, whose construction began in 1907–1908; but parkways are traditionally distinguished from freeways by lower design speeds and a ban on commercial traffic. Designers elsewhere also researched similar ideas, especially in Germany, where the Autobahn would become the first national freeway system.

However, in 1925, Italy was technically the first country to build a freeway, which linked Milan to Lake Como. It is known in Italy as the Autostrada dei Laghi.

Meanwhile, in England, the related concept of the motorway was first proposed by Sidney Webb in a 1910 book, The King's Highway, but was not formally embraced by the government until the passage of the Special Roads Act 1949. In 1926, the English intellectual Hilaire Belloc recognized the necessity of grade-separated roads for "rapid and heavy traffic", but thought they would be the exception rather than the rule:

The creation of a great network of local highways suitable for rapid and heavy traffic is impossible. Even if the wealth of the community increases, the thing would be impossible, because it would mean the destruction of such a proportion of buildings as would dislocate all social life.

The word "freeway" first surfaced in the mid-1930s in proposals for the improvement of the New York City parkway network.

The first long-distance rural freeway in the United States is generally considered to be the Pennsylvania Turnpike, which opened on October 1, 1940. The Turnpike was so advanced for its time that tourists even had picnics in the median (that is, after it was already open to traffic) and local entrepreneurs did a brisk business in souvenirs. It was designed so that straightaways could handle maximum speeds of 102 miles per hour, and curves could be taken as fast as 90.

Shortly thereafter, on December 30, 1940, California opened its first freeway, the Arroyo Seco Parkway (now called the Pasadena Freeway) which connected Pasadena with Los Angeles. And in 1944, Michigan opened its first freeway, the Davison Freeway, within Detroit. Meanwhile, traffic in Los Angeles continued to deteriorate and local officials began planning the huge freeway network for which the city is now famous.

Today, many freeways in the United States belong to the extensive Interstate highway system (most of which was completed between 1960 and 1990). Nearly all Interstate highways are freeways. The earlier United States highway system and the highway systems of U.S. states also have many sections that are built to controlled-access standards (though these systems are mostly composed of uncontrolled roads). Only a handful of sections of the Interstate system are not freeways, such as I-81 as it crosses the American span of the 2-lane Thousand Islands Bridge and a segment of Interstate 93 through Franconia Notch, New Hampshire that is a 2-lane road with partial access control.

Recent developments

Outside the U.S., many countries continue to rapidly expand their freeway networks. Examples include: Australia, Canada, Chile, China, France, India (with its Golden Quadrilateral project) , Israel, Mexico, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Spain and Taiwan. Australia and France in particular have been innovative in using the newest tunneling technologies to bring freeways into high-density downtowns (Sydney and Melbourne) and historic rural areas (Versailles). China already has the world's second largest freeway network in terms of total kilometers and will probably overtake the U.S. well before the end of the 21st century.

In Australia, the city of Adelaide pioneered the concept of a dedicated reversible freeway. The M2 expressway runs toward the city in the morning and out of the city in the evening. Its ramps are designed so that they can double as on- or off-ramps, depending upon the time of day. Gates and electronic signage prevent motorists from driving in the wrong direction.

Meanwhile, major progress has been made in making existing U.S. freeways and expressways more efficient. Experiments include the addition of high-occupancy vehicle lanes (HOV lanes) to discourage driving solo, and building new roads with train tracks down the median (or overhead). California's Caltrans has been very innovative in squeezing HOVs into limited right-of-way (by elevating them), and in building special HOV-only ramps so that HOVs can switch freeways or exit the freeway without having to merge across regular traffic. Many states have added truck-only ramps or lanes on heavily congested routes, so that cars need not weave around slow-moving big rigs.

Intelligent transportation systems (ITS) are also increasingly used, with cameras to monitor and direct traffic, so that police, fire, ambulance, tow, or other assistance vehicles can be dispatched as soon as there is a problem, and to warn drivers via variable message signs, radio, television, and the web to avoid problem areas. Research has been underway for many years on how to partly automate cars by making smart roads with such things as buried magnets to guide sensor-equipped vehicles, with on-board GPS to determine location, direction, and destination. While these systems may eventually be used on surface streets as well, they are most practical in a freeway setting.

Public-private partnerships in the United States

Until the late 1990s, funding of construction and maintenance of the Interstate Highway System was by the national gasoline tax. Additionally, the original Highway Act of 1956 prohibited states from collecting tolls on Interstate-funded expressways. As more miles of expressways were completed, the cost of maintaining the infrastructure increased dramatically. A major issue that has slowed new expressway constructing in America has been the application of highway funds to maintaining and repairing existing infrastructure. Most of the expressways in America are near or have exceeded their deisgned life span, which necessitates replacing of bridges and overpasses and reconstruction of the driving surfaces on many expressways nationwide.

To address the issue of lack of funding for new expressways and maintenance of existing roads, legislation enacted in 1998 gives states greater flexibility in funding major highway projects. Specifically the legislation, known as TEA-21 in official documents, authorizes states to add tolls to Interstate-funded expressways. Additionally, it gave states the latitude to enter into public-private partnership P3 arrangements to facilitate expansion and maintenance of the expressway network. Texas, Florida, and California quickly took advantage of the TEA-21 legislation and began on massive projects to expand their respective states' expressway networks, complementing existing interstate expressways with privately funded and operated toll expressways. In 2004 and 2005, Illinois and Indiana joined the club of states looking to private sector investment for expanding and maintaining expressways. Meanwhile in New York and Massachusetts, the respective state public authorities that operate the New York State Thruway and Massachusetts Turnpike have generated enough revenue to assume maintenance of other expressways beyond the roads on which tolls are collected. The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority provided more than 50 percent of the funding to complete the Big Dig project in Boston, and later assumed responsibility for operating the Central Artery, the Sumner Tunnel, and the Callahan Tunnel following the project's completion in 2005.

As federal funding dries up for expanding and maintaing America's expressway network, states are looking to innovative solutions using a combination of state and federal funding, toll collection through public authorities, and private sector investment.

In the United States, a few short privatized tolled freeways have also been built by private companies with mixed success.

Nomenclature

You must add a |reason= parameter to this Cleanup template – replace it with {{Cleanup|section|reason=<Fill reason here>}}, or remove the Cleanup template.

This article possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Freeway is the term used in most of the United States and parts of Australia — mostly Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia. The United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, New Zealand and other Commonwealth countries prefer motorway. Most of Canada uses expressway or freeway, but the provinces of Quebec and New Brunswick use Autoroute.

Some RIRO expressways have at-grade intersections. While some people consider them to be freeways because they have design speeds of 65 mph or higher, others argue that RIRO expressways are not freeways since existing private businesses are allowed to retain their entrances.

Australia

In Australia freeways are named as either freeway or motorway, although in New South Wales some freeways are called expressways. This outdated term is used only by the earliest to be built, whereas a freeway was generally built in the 1970s or 1980s, generally without a toll (though some had relatively small government tolls that have long since passed). The term motorway was brought to prominence in the 1990s with the proliferation of private tolls, largely as a public rejection of the term free (even though this is not the correct meaning of the term), especially on freeways that had a toll added during this period to finance expansion. While motorways have only existed since the 1990s, a few do not have tolls, and a few are called freeways by governments who built them toll-free to promote political advantage. Tollways are not explicitly named, that is, Toll is appended to the designation. Tolls are usually collected at toll booths or by electronic tolling technology (first used in Melbourne, Australia "E-Tag" on CityLink).

Ausway (Melway) describes a freeway as: Those roads having full access control and grade separated intersections, with the primary function of servicing high volume traffic movements. Australian freeways can fit the definition of Californian freeway or expressway, except in New South Wales where official signposts are strictly used only on "Californian" freeway conditions. Typically the change between the two is not visible to the casual driver, and the signposts may seem superfluous; most maps indicate a continuation of freeway conditions, because the feature most desired is "dual carriageway" status. The "Californian" expressway-style upgrades are becoming more common as construction costs increase, and these cheaper upgrades typically do not keep the previous highway as a separate fully-functioning road in a single piece with an official designation. Therefore, while these "dual carriageways" are designated as freeways on maps and considered as freeways by the public, they are used by all types of vehicles.

Most freeways are between two and five lanes each way depending on the importance of the freeway. They are generally upgraded when traffic demand exceeds the infrastructure available. Roads with partial access control or no access control, of similar size and traffic volume, are given the name highway.

Canada

In Canada, there does not appear to be a national standard for nomenclature, although freeway appears to be winning out except in Ontario where expressway or highway is used, and in Quebec where they are called autoroutes (French for 'expressway').

In Ontario, while the definitions of freeway and expressway are consistent with that of the United States, highway is used far more often than freeway, especially inside the Greater Toronto Area.

While this has caused some confusion because the province applies "highway" (The King's Highway) to principal roads in its network, whether freeway or non-freeway, it is usually resolved simply by using the 400-series number to distinguish the freeway. Nonetheless, outside of the GTA, the 400-series numbering does not entirely solve the problem as there are non 400-series freeways built to similar standards such as the Conestoga Parkway (which includes sections of Highways 7, 8 and 85, including a long 7/8 multiplex). The only freeway officially labelled as such is the Macdonald-Cartier Freeway but it is usually known as Highway 401 or "the 401". It is not unusual for Ontario residents to refer to a numbered freeway as The (Number) versus Number (Number) for non-freeway routes. Several roads labelled expressways in the municipal network are actually fully controlled-access freeways such as the Gardiner Expressway and Spadina Expressway (later renamed Allen Road).

Other provinces use varying rules in their official road designations.

Prince Edward Island and the territories do not have freeways.

United Kingdom

Main article: Motorway

In the UK the term motorway is used almost unanimously and refers to a specific type of road. Although the term expressway is sometimes vary rarely used, it amounts to little more than a street name, with motorway the only term officially recognised. A parkway is sometimes confused by outsiders with being a type of freeway, a parkway is actually a type of railway station. UK motorways are engineered to some of the highest standards in the world, with almost all motorways having a full-width hard shoulder (breakdown lane), full grade-separated interchanges with long on/off ramps and a barriered central reservation which is a compulsory requirement for a motorway (the term "median strip" is unknown in British English). Without a barried central reservation, or if a multilane road fails to meet any of the other requirements to become a motorway, it is simply referred to as a dual carriageway.

All UK motorways have an "M" prefix (e.g. M1) or, where an "A" road has been upgraded to motorway status, an "M" suffix in brackets (e.g. A1(M)). Because the term motorway refers to the legal status of the road rather than the standards to which it is built, occasionally quirks are sometimes thrown up, such as the Walton Summit Motorway in Lancashire, England, which is a very short section linking a motorway roundabout with a standard non-motorway road. Although it has the "special status" of motorway, it has just one lane in each direction with no central reservation. This oddity is also the only motorway in the UK with no number.

There are very many roads in the UK which have achieved or almost achieved motorway standard (mostly "A"-prefixed primary routes) but have not been designated motorways. Examples include the A27 in Hampshire, the A34 in Berkshire and many sections of the A1 throughout England and Scotland.

United States

General definitions

In the United States of America, a freeway (or controlled-access road) is a divided highway with full control of access. This means two things. First, adjoining property owners do not have a legal right of access, meaning that they cannot connect their lands to the highway by constructing driveways. When an existing road is converted into a freeway, all existing driveways must be removed and access to adjacent private lands must be blocked with fences or walls. Second, traffic on the highway is "free-flowing", although many non-engineers misapprehend the "free" in "freeway" to mean that such a highway must be free of charge to use. All cross-traffic (and left-turning traffic) has been relegated to overpasses or underpasses, so that there are no traffic conflicts on the main line of the highway which must be regulated by a traffic light, stop signs, or other traffic control devices. Achieving such free flow requires the construction of many bridges, tunnels, and ramp systems. The advantage of grade-separated interchanges is that freeway drivers can almost always maintain their speed at junctions since they do not need to yield to crossing traffic.

In contrast, an expressway (or limited-access road) is defined as a divided highway with partial control of access. Expressways may have driveways connecting to adjacent properties, although the trend over time has been to minimize driveways when possible. Expressways also may have at-grade intersections, though these tend to be spaced farther apart than on most arterial roads. In urban areas, expressway intersections are usually controlled by traffic lights, but in many rural areas, cross-traffic is governed only by stop signs, and there are no restrictions on through traffic. Vehicles crossing an expressway at rural intersections must cross four lanes with vehicles coming at them at prevailing speeds, which can easily exceed 80 mph. Thus, expressways are more dangerous than freeways and cannot carry traffic as efficiently as a freeway.

This distinction was apparently first developed in California with the June 1959 legislative creation of the California Freeway and Expressway System (as distinguished from the existing State Highway System). To remedy massive confusion among transportation officials from different parts of the country, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials published a book of Standard Definitions that same year which incorporated the California definitions. In turn, the definitions were incorporated into AASHTO's official standards book, the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, which would become the national standards book of the U.S. Department of Transportation under a 1966 federal statute. As an official government regulation, and as a reasonable exercise of the Department's authority, the Manual carries the force of law (see Administrative law). The same distinction has also been codified into the statutory law of six states: California, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, and Wisconsin.

Exceptions

However, the distinction between these two terms is not universal. In several states that built freeways very early on (including Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island), the terms expressway and freeway have the same meaning, and usually expressway or just highway, an older usage, is preferred.

In the New York metro area, the term expressway officially refers to a limited-access highway which large trucks are permitted to drive on, while many other limited- or controlled-access roads are designated parkways, and are for passenger car use only.

In New Jersey and Pennsylvania, newer roads are often officially styled freeways, where older roads retain the title expressway. These are also states which have toll roads, and therefore the distinction is made between a tollway (or turnpike) and a freeway, the latter not costing toll. According to some residents of these states, an "expressway" is the general category, and then, depending on whether the expressway is toll or free, it may be either a tollway or a freeway.

In Florida, an expressway is defined as a limited-access toll road, while a freeway is any other limited- or controlled-access road which costs no money to travel on. However, most cities in Florida name their limited-access roads "expressways" whether or not they have tolls, such as the Palmetto Expressway in Miami, Arlington Expressway in Jacksonville, Crosstown Expressway in Tampa, and the East-West Expressway in Orlando.

Frequently, in the Midwest and the South, neither "freeway" nor "expressway" is commonly used, and the preferred term is interstate, even in cases where the expressway might not have been designated an Interstate Highway.

In the rest of the country, freeway is the usual term; however, the distinction between freeways and expressways is not always as clear or well-understood as it is in California, which has many of both kinds of highway.

Worldwide nomenclature

• Rodovia, a Portuguese word, in Brazil
• Autocesta in Croatia
• Dálnice in the Czech republic
• Autosnelweg is used in the Dutch-speaking world.
• Autoroute (used in French-speaking Canada) is also used in France and other Francophone countries.
• Autobahn is used in the German-speaking world.
• Autopista is used in Spanish-speaking countries including Spain, Colombia , Mexico and Puerto Rico.
• Autostrada is used in Egypt, Israel, Italy, Poland and Romania.
• Auto-estrada is used in Portugal and Brazil.
• Diaľnica in Slovakia
• Avtocesta in Slovenia
• Otoyol in Turkey

• In the Nordic countries, apparent variations on the British motorway are used:
  • motorvej in Denmark
  • moottoritie in Finland
  • motorveg/motorvei in Norway
  • motorväg in Sweden

• In China, Japan and Korea, expressway is used on roadsigns, as the English translation of the words in their respective languages. Formerly, freeway may also have been prevalent. The terms all literally mean "high-speed road":
  • 高速公路 (gāosùgōnglù) in China. 公路 (gōnglù) is merely translated to highway.
  • 고속도로 (gosokdoro) in Korea
  • 高速道路 (kousokudouro) in Japan

References

1. Anonymous, "Median barriers prove their worth", Public Works 123, no. 3 (March 1992): 72-73.
2. Hugo Martin, "Sounding Off On Noise: Freeways' Neighbors Struggle To Drown Out Road Racket, Experts Say The Din Creates Mental And Physical Hazards", Los Angeles Times, 20 April 2003, B1.
3. Sandy McCreery, "Don't just sit there, enjoy it!" New Statesman, 23 July 2001, 23.
4. Martha Smilgis, "Trapped behind the wheel; clever commuters learn to live in the slow lane", Time, 20 July 1987, p. 64-65.
5. Gerard Coulombe, "Doing The Turnpike Crawl", New York Times, 6 July 1986, sec. CN, p. 16.
6. Jeffrey Spivak, "Today's road opening represents progress, pain", Kansas City Star, 27 July 1999, sec. A, p. 1.
7. Case Study: "Route 9 Reconstruction", Federal Highway Administration
8. Robert Cervero, "Road expansion, urban growth, and induced travel: a path analysis", Journal of the American Planning Association 69, no. 2 (Spring 2003): 145-164.
9. Hugo Martin, "Will More Freeways Bring More Traffic?" Los Angeles Times, 10 April 2002, sec. B, p. 1.
10. Drusilla Van Hengel, Joseph DiMento, and Sherry Ryan, "Equal Access? Travel Behaviour Change in the Century Freeway Corridor, Los Angeles", Urban Studies 36, no. 1 (March 1999): 547.
11. Borth, 248 and 264.
12. Brian D. Taylor, "Public perceptions, fiscal realities, and freeway planning: the California case", Journal of the American Planning Association 61, no. 1 (Winter 1995): 43-59.
13. Paul Hofmann, "Taking to the Highway in Italy", New York Times, 26 April 1987, 23.
14. Geoffrey Hindley, A History of Roads (London: Peter Davies, 1971), 142.
15. Hilaire Belloc, The Highway and Its Vehicles (London: The Studio Limited, 1926), 39.
16. E.L. Yordan, "The 'Freeway' System Expands: Broader Roads With Grade Crossings Eliminated Are Built And Latest Designs Envision Still Greater Speed And Safety", New York Times, 24 February 1935, p. 21.
17. Phil Patton, The Open Road: A Celebration of the American Highway (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986), 77.
18. Phil Patton, "A quick way from here to there was also a frolic", Smithsonian 21, no. 7 (October 1990): 96-108.
19. Cecilia Rasmussen, "Behind the Wheel: Harrowing Drive on State's Oldest Freeway — Curvy, quirky 110 carries motorists between downtown Los Angeles and Pasadena", Los Angeles Times, 6 November 2001, 2.
20. Gladwin Hill, "Traffic Chaos Spurs Los Angeles To Plan 'Freeways' On Mass Scale: Coast Metropolis, Lacking Rapid Transit System Such as New York Possesses, Maps $300,000,000 Highway Set-Up", New York Times, 13 January 1947, p. 12.
21. Section 1A.13, Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, 2003 ed.
22. This part of the word's meaning was codified in 1939 at Section 23.5 of the California Streets and Highways Code.
23. Christy Borth, Mankind on the Move: The Story of Highways (Washington, D.C.: The Automobile Safety Foundation, 1969), 8.
24. Cal. Streets & Highways Code, Section 257.
25. Mississippi Code, Section 65-5-3, subdivisions (b) and (c).
26. Missouri Revised Statutes, Section 304.010.
27. Nebraska Statutes, Sections 60-618.01 and 60-621.
28. Ohio Revised Code, Section 4511.01, subdivisions (YY) and (ZZ).
29. Wisconsin Statutes, Sections 59.84(1)(b) and 346.57(1)(am).

See also

• Freeway information system
• Freeway revolts
• Hierarchy of roads
• List of major freeway systems
• List of roads and highwaysTemplate:Link FA

• Limited-access roads