West of Effingham, Illinois, US 40 makes a wide curve and passes over a railroad track. An earlier alignment of the road was left behind when the overpass was built.
Here’s what all of this looks like from the air.
Humorously, on the ground this alignment looks like this. I can hear the chatter at the highway maintenance garage now: “I know! Let’s get drunk and go stripe some road!”
There are a couple houses on this little stretch of road. I wonder what the owners think of the hilarity at the end of their front yards.
It’s a time-honored tradition in road realigning to just bury an old alignment under a mound of dirt to build the new alignment.
All of these photos are from two visits I made here in 2007.
I’ve driven the National Road from its beginning in Baltimore, MD to its end in Vandaila, IL. To read everything I’ve ever written about it, click here.
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