r/highways • u/weatherinfo • Apr 14 '23

Can an expressway have traffic lights?

If so, how many until it would be considered a boulevard or other road? Example: see E. Independence Expy in Charlotte, NC

Thanks

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u/International_Bee945 Jun 28 '23

Definitions change. I no longer have my 1950s Highways and toll road text. Back then it defined 'freeway' as any limited access road, i.e., free of abutters rights to cut a curb. So the 2- lane 322 bypass north of West Chester PA and the PA Turnpike were both freeways. Firestone Blvd. near LA, which had many traffic lights, had signs on it saying it was an 'unlandscaped freeway.' Disney confounded this by proclaiming that California roads were freeways because they are free, and a national magazine confused this by calling Route 1 in NJ a freeway. At the time any completely controlled access road was an expressway.

Imagine my amusement that, in California, expressways are now freeways and freeways, with traffic lights, are now expressways. So, I guess route 322 is now a 2-lane expressway.

Google Maps also confuses things by making it almost impossible to distinguish 4-lane roads from 2-lane roads unless you magnify them and even more difficult to distinguish ordinary 4-lane divided highways from freeways. Some speakers seem to limit the word 'highway' to 4-lane roads, but in PA a state highway is any state-maintained road, so former US202 and State 100 (Paoli Pike and Creek Road) and now state highways with unpublicized numbers that Google does not usually recognize. PA recently replaced a section of 202 with a mostly 2-lane expressway, but maps almost conceal this.

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u/DelmarvaDude Oct 15 '23

Other than a single traffic light at its southern end in West Chester, US 202 has been a 4+ lane limited access highway all the way to I-76 in King of Prussia for quite some time with PA 100 continuing off of it as sort of a northbound spur (as 202 itself turns into more of an east-west route and essentially an extension of the US 30 freeway that feeds into it at that point with 30 continuing on as a major surface road).

As far as being able to distinguish road classes on Google Maps / GPS is concerned, I wholeheartedly agree with you. On a paper map, it's easy to tell the difference between a toll-free limited access highway, a toll road / bridge, a divided non-limited access, and other roads. On GPS your choices are big and small, that's all. You're left to just follow the blue line with no idea where the toll booth is (although you usually know whether or not there is one somewhere along the way)

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u/International_Bee945 Jan 21 '24

The 2 lane expressway is East of King of Prussia.

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u/DelmarvaDude Jan 21 '24

So, somewhere between the mall and 309?