I squirrel out of New England through Connecticut\u2014the bane of New England automotive travelers. It\u2019s the stopper. After New Haven, traffic constricts heading to New York and points south on I-95. To step up to I-84, the other east\u2013west crossing, requires navigating secondary highways that suddenly become municipal roads with stoplights, unexpected turns, worrying low bridges for an RV, and meanders around natural or built features\u2014a glacier\u2019s rock outcrop or a surprise loading dock for an abandoned factory. Reaching Newtown, the highway becomes a glide into New York State and down into the Hudson Valley with Dutch names and reminders of pre-Revolutionary America\u2014 a time, place, and culture New Englanders tend to forget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Avoiding the city to cross higher on the Hudson, I become lost in the nines when I step off the interstate. There\u2019s 9W\u2014not a westbound highway (that would violate the convention of odd numbers running north\u2013south, even numbers east\u2013west), but the western spur of Route 9. Then there\u2019s the kaleidoscope of 9D, 9G, 9H, 9J, 9L, and possibly 9R. Their names give no hint of their identity and ensure that none but locals know which road leads where. With the quiet voice of the GPS, however, I navigate these routes that once frustrated me when using paper maps and make my way from Beacon to Storm King, then back to the interstate and out of New York to the west.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I hit my first concrete road with its regular expansion joints\u2014thump, thump, thump<\/em>\u2014I feel them in the van. On a bike, they\u2019re really felt. The driver grips the handlebars and feels the pavement\u2019s irregularity in the wrists. The rhythm saps concentration, but there\u2019s the throttle, brake, and stretch of arms. For the pillion rider, there\u2019s no distraction\u2014the thump, thadum, thump, thump<\/em> like the click of a railroad car wheels induces sleep. The driver senses a slacking, an increased weight leaning in, as of a lover moving closer in bed. The arms about the waist loosen. A sudden movement could jar the rider awake, shifting weight and unbalancing the bike, or the rider might relax so much as to fall from the speeding machine. Grip the handlebars tighter; squeeze your arms around the passenger\u2019s loosening hold. Slow, slow, slow the bike to move off the travel route, hoping the shoulder isn\u2019t gravel. Bring it to an easy, quiet, controlled stop. No recrimination\u2014just, by way of explanation, \u201cI gotta pee. Maybe you should stretch your legs too.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pennsylvania, on its license plates and state documents and throughout its statehouse, calls itself the Keystone State. I\u2019d rename it the Funnel. Highways through Pennsylvania lead from the Northeast to the West\u2014and also to the South. Routes I-90, I-86, I-84, I-80, I-78, and I-76 (the historic Pennsylvania Turnpike, a technological advance in repurposing tunnels from an obsolete railroad line) all run east\u2013west. North and south run I-81, I-83, I-95, and I-99, sneaking in the middle, violating the pure highway numbering logic\u2014low numbers west, high numbers east. Only Indiana, with its hub-and-spoke model centered on Indianapolis, rivals Pennsylvania\u2019s interstate connections. Trucks cluster and form convoys, jockeying so the slower ones move right on the hilly rises as engines grind against gravity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pennsylvania highways, however, are idiosyncratic. Whether it\u2019s because modern routes overlay older roadways or just muddled engineering, the roads are different. Gettysburg became a battle site, in part, because roads and rail converged there\u2014the Confederate armies marched from Virginia, while the Army of the Potomac mobilized from Maryland and Washington, supported by Union battalions from Pennsylvania, New York, and beyond. Highway exits can be short, straight shots from 65 mph roadways\u2014200 yards terminating at a stoplight. Or, two exits later, outside populated areas, huge sweeping cloverleaf interchanges bounding lush green lawns, as though posing for a contemporary postcard\u2014or, from a drone\u2019s eye, the concrete curves look like a Cy Twombly chalkboard sketch\u2014control traffic changing routes. I imagine the exacting colors of those modern postcards on carousels next to the historic cardboard cards with oversaturated reds and blues and overdressed women walking from plump fifties cars to the very travel centers where we are now spinning the metal frame.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Crossing through more recently expanded towns, the lanes suddenly narrow from the standard twelve feet to seemingly eight and a half, so the mirrors of large trucks appear to brush the roofs of sedans. What once might have been a median has become two high-speed lanes in opposite directions with negligible separation between them. Instead of Jersey barriers\u2014designed to nudge an errant car back into its lane\u2014or corrugated metal fences that crumple to absorb momentum, the lanes are separated only by three slack wires looping between angle-iron posts. I breathe easier and loosen my grip when the highway resumes its normal form\u2014the lanes widen, shoulders appear to the right and left, and the median, America\u2019s great lawn running from coast to coast, separates me from oncoming traffic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I dip into Maryland. Uniquely, I find at-grade crossings\u2014sometimes marked by a flashing light, more often just a signpost. At the posted speeds and on the map, I had expected a traditional limited-access highway, but here, crossing four traffic lanes are secondary roads butted directly to the main road, as though in a suburban neighborhood. But Maryland lies so close to Virginia and the capitol that bureaucratic order dictates design and the road soon becomes a looping, crowded ring road. The posted speed limit is aspirational\u2014possibly achieved between 2 and 4 a.m. on a Tuesday or Thursday. And I crawl. Shift lanes, hopefully. And crawl again. Marking the red truck with a long tank of hazardous liquid\u2014am I ahead? Yes. No. Yes. No. No. No. No. Yes. I exit to a sudden smoother ride, quickly traveling at more than the speed limit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Shenandoah National Park, and left turn onto Skyline Drive. I enter the park designed for the automobile and the middle-class adventurer. The great national parks of the West relied on railroads to bring tourists\u2014an early public\u2013private partnership before that term became vogue. The East languished: fewer wild spaces, greater population densities, commuter rail rather than transcontinental sleepers\u2014all made a national park seem anachronistic. But with proximity to Washington and the need for employment during the Great Depression, the Civilian Conservation Corps worked and shaped the parkways, resorts, campgrounds, and trails along the backbone of the Appalachians in the East. I am here to fulfill that dream.<\/p>\n\n\n
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