Bob W, What did they do in London after the fire? Did they retain their old street layout?
Most of the roads in the US were laid out along the railroads. All the railroads were laid out with primitive engineering tools. Think of 'lock levels' to judge slopes and passes thru hill country. Most of those railroads avoided anything over a 1.5% grade. So most of our roads have modest grades following the rails. The interstates are an Eisenhower innovation and they rarely have grades. Regards, Bob S. On Mon, Apr 28, 2008 at 2:00 PM, Bob W <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > I'm originally from around there. I like Boston, but there is > > absolutely no way to actually give directions. The street system is > > based on 17th century cow paths. > > > > I like the chowder and donuts, however. > > > > it's the only way to lay out a city properly. It means the human > element is retained. Most old towns and cities around the world were > laid out that way, or some similar way. If you look at the places that > have big, straight, wide streets and grid plans they tend to be places > where an invader or tyrant has bulldozed the old town so that he could > have somewhere for military parades where the rebellious locals > wouldn't be able to throw up barricades quickly. > > The Anglo-Saxons when they came to England built their new towns on a > grid plan, and they seem to be the main exception to my little rule of > thumb, having applied the same principle in the new worlds they > discovered in later centuries. > > Similar rules apply to roads. Where they have developed of their own > accord they have followed old drove roads, with few difficult hills > that cattle and people can't easily get up, sticking to contour lines, > and nowadays making for pleasant cycling. Invaders on the other hand > tended to build straight roads, obliterating local ones and dominating > the landscapes. Roman roads, autobahns, motorways. If civilisation > collapses and we lose motorised transport, the motorways will fall > into disuse because they go straight up and down hills, and people and > animal-drawn transport won't be able to use them. > > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
