What are these Roads?

[Mark Sedenquist]

A query from fellow road Adventurer John Kay from New York:.
" I have a question on my last cross country trip on I40 in places there was a 2 lane black top road running next to 40 in the western states some times for 5 or 10 miles is this the old route 66? "

Does anyone know what this is? Old road?

[Don Woodmancy]

I cannot answer for every parallel stretch of road but some of them are, indeed, remaining pieces of Rt 66. There is a stretch in Arizona, just east of the California line, which is not only part of the "old mother road" but is clearly marked as such. I have seen a number of book reviews recently about mile-by-mile travel guides to Rt 66 and I believe some of them have information about existing remaining pieces. It might be worth a few hours browsing in a good bookstore. As an aside, I have vague recollections of travelling the entire length of Rt 66 as a young boy just after World War II. I suspect if my parents were still living, they would be astounded at the nostalgia that has developed for it. They remembered it as a narrow two lane road, passsing through every little village and town along the way for an interminable 2,300 miles between Chicago and southern California. They may also have been influenced by the fact they were driving a 1936 Buick, towing a trailer full of furniture, with four children, the oldest of which (me) was 5.

[Don Woodmancy]

The latest issue of Trailer Life Magazine (October 2001) has a charming article about Seligman, AZ, and its place as the beginning of the longest still-existing stretch of Rt 66 which I referred to in my previous entry in this thread. The article contains several paragraphs on the history and current features of this part of 66. It's in their America's Outback section on the last page of the magazine.