Why Do Some US Interstates Have Duplicates?

This is Interstate 94, this is Interstate 494, and this is Interstate 694. This is okay, there's nothing wrong with it. We know cities use spur routes to attempt to label connecting freeways properly. And you even see situations like I-180, where there's multiple of the same numbering. I-180 in Wyoming, Nebraska, Illinois, and Pennsylvania. But this is also okay, because there are only 10 digits you can use, and there's several different cities that you need them for. The important thing is that there's only one I-180 in each state. We even see something like I-295, where there are 8 different routings in different states. Maine, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts, New York, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, Maryland and D.C., Virginia, North Carolina, and finally Florida. Now something you don't see is multiple primary interstates with the same numbering. Let's use I-70 as an example. These sometimes are meant to travel across the country. I-70 goes through 10 states. So you wouldn't want another I-70 over here. But there are situations where this is found. So today I want to cover these situations and show why they make absolutely no sense. Before we get into that though, I do have a Minecraft server in the shape of the U.S., and there's an incredible interstate system currently being built. So hop on there and help the cause. It's on version 1.21.7 on PC edition. Thank you. So you probably know the directionality of the U.S. interstate system, but it's important to go over for this video. From east to west, the farther east the interstate is, the higher the number. So I-5 is over here, and I-95 is over here. Looking north to south then, the farther north you are, the higher the number is going to be. We have I-10 in the south, and I-90 in the north. Generally then, the numbers stay consistent, with even numbers running east to west, and odd numbers running north to south. I-20 is right here, and we see I-80 here. This is very important then, because now if you're north of I-80, and south of I-90, you want your number to be somewhere like I-85. We run out of numbers very fast then because there's only 100 to work with, and that's where duplicate numbers come into the equation. This is Interstate 84. It's in the northeast, and this is Interstate 84, it's in the Pacific Northwest. So let's go over both of them and kinda tell you why this might be a bit of a problem. First of all, there's the one out west. This one runs 769 miles, beginning in Portland, Oregon. And from there, it is the main highway connecting the northwest into the interior west, heading down to Boise, Idaho. After Boise, it's part of the ring that travels through Idaho, past somewhere like Twin Falls, and it's an integral route for this state. From there, it continues south into its third state, Utah, and it terminates north of Salt Lake City, past Ogden, and into the mountains. This interstate was originally named I-80 North, something planners actually did a ton back in the early days of the interstate system. But it does become fairly confusing with all the suffixes, so a 1977 guideline told them to change it to I-84. They really tried to make it different, but nope, it became the other I-84, with the first one being I-84 in the northeast. This highway goes through four states for a total of 232 miles. It begins in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and it pushes through the Pocono Mountains. This is the highway that passes Port Jervis, one of the strangest state tripoints where you could be in three states over the course of a few minutes. It goes north of New York City and through Newburgh, being the highway on the Newburgh Beacon Bridge, and it goes through Connecticut, up through Hartford, and then it goes up toward Boston. It goes over the Massachusetts border and ends at I-90. Now it is genuinely difficult, because both highways are north of I-80 and south of I-90, leaving you with only really five numbers to work with. You might think a number like I-86 or I-88 would work, but spoiler alert, both of those are already duplicate interstates, meaning there's two of each of them. Their thought is that for the average driver, the distance between the two I-84s is enough that it's not a big deal and it's not going to confuse people. But for people who do specific studies on the interstate system and know more than the base-level person, I don't love it. The next example, as I said, is I-86. And if Idaho isn't an afterthought on the national stage, I don't know what is. Because the first one is this right here. Probably like 50% of Idaho's total interstate mileage are just repeat highways from the east. But this time they use it for a shorter highway. Their justification, in a way. I-86 is just 62 miles, being the connector between Pocatello and I-84. The other I-86 is also in New York, a pattern between the two highways. It actually technically begins in Pennsylvania near Erie, and it's the main highway going through this region of the state. In Elmira, it passes over the Pennsylvania border for just a tiny little bit. And that's a fun little tidbit that I'd like to talk about. The likely occurrence is this railroad here, which predates the highway. This is also the result of downtown Waverly, which is also on the border. To connect in New York, they would have to have jumped all the way over up here to go around the city. So instead, we get not even a mile of roadway within Pennsylvania right here. Anyway, it's unfinished, where it just switches to State Route 17 for a bit and then starts up again before ending. The entire length is 244 miles. Next one is I-88, which is shared between my least favorite two states for interstate travel. The first one is fully within New York, it's 117 miles, and funnily enough, it's basically right there with I-86, our last one. It continues basically where the last one left off, going northeast from Binghampton, just north of the Catskills, through what I think is technically the foothills. Anyway, it ends near Albany in Rotterdam. The other one is my least favorite state of Illinois. This one goes from the Chicago metropolitan area and across the northern part of the state. From there, it goes and ends in the Quad City metropolitan area. Now, what's interesting about these is that, sure, they are totally different highways, and they're in different states, but it's only about 600 miles between them, one of the lower amounts on this list. Now the valid argument against that is that spur routes can be the exact same number super close to each other as long as they're in different states, and I don't really have a real argument against this, so I guess you win. The next one is another number in the 80s, it's I-87. This one is a pretty big problem, because it's a very major route in the state of New York. It runs 333 miles up the Hudson River, and importantly serves as the main connection between New York City and the Montreal metropolitan area in Canada, making it an important economic corridor. Then, I-87 is a fascinating example, because at the moment, it's just a 12-mile route in North Carolina. No big deal, and nobody really cares. No mistakes happening here, while it's actually supposed to go all the way up to the Hampton Roads in Virginia at some point in the future. We would then be looking at 165 miles or so, a much more significant route. They're both in the Far East, close enough to each other to matter. And more importantly, I-87 doesn't even make any sense as a numbering for this one in North Carolina, since it's way too far south. Available numbers that would make much more sense include I-47, I-51, I-53, I-61, I-63, I-67, and so on, meaning this one objectively sucks. I win. The good news is that we are dealing with the North Carolina DOT here, so it's not getting expanded for a few decades, if we're being realistic here. There's two more. I-76 is the first one, where one of them is in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and New Jersey. The normal one is 435 miles, it's in the east, and it's the interstate responsible for the Pennsylvania Turnpike, certainly an important route that people do know about. Interstate 76 in the west, then, is the connecting route between I-80 in Nebraska and Denver. I've probably driven this stretch like 20 times in my life, but it's definitely the odd man out in this situation. This is a really funny situation, since this one was formerly signed as I-80 South, but we explained that the Federal Highway Administration forced them to remove suffixes, so they switched it to I-76. Well, basically, the exact same thing happened to the one in the east as well. There was a portion over there that was I-80 South, and was forced to be changed. Crazy mixup overall, and now it sucks. Now, I'm finally quickly mentioning I-74, even though it technically doesn't count. Here's the portion in the Midwest, through four states, and now here's the disconnected portions of North Carolina. Technically, there are future plans to connect the two, making it not count for this video, since there are plenty of non-finished highways split in two that I could talk about if I wanted to. I simply wanted to give it a shoutout, because we all know there's no chance this gets finished in the next few decades, honestly. The area that is unfinished is too economically depressed, plus there's really no need for this to be built, a lot of it's just going to be through the Appalachian Mountains. Either way, those are all the examples. I find it confusing and annoying that this happened, and the issue isn't going to go away, because changing numbers is a lot of effort, and we're dealing with the government here, and you know they're not going to put that effort in. Thanks for watching. Thank you to the members this week, I really appreciate all of you. I always make sure to check, and so I know when new members come, and I really appreciate it, guys. If you want to become a member, the link is down in the description below, all the money just goes straight into my bank account, and so if you want to help me out, this is the best way to do it. No obligation at all. Thank you!