Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
Orange is a color that often stands out among the other hues, tints, and tones perceptive to the human eye. That color can be bright and unique. Unsurprisingly, orange has therefore long been a valued color for use within construction work zones and for other safety purposes along highways across the United States. An example of... Continue Reading →
The first National Work Zone Awareness Week (NWZAW) was held in April 2000. It took place about four months after a memorandum of agreement (MOU) to create such a week was jointly signed by Kenneth R. Wykle, administrator of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA); Thomas R. Warne, president of AASHTO and executive director of the... Continue Reading →
To help commemorate this year’s Work Zone Safety Awareness Week, here is something about one of the more readily identifiable features of many of those road construction areas across the country: the humble but important traffic cone. Many people trace the origins of the traffic cone to 1914, which also happens to be the year... Continue Reading →
April 17, 2016 After 129 years of service, the Jubilee Bridge in eastern India was permanently closed. This structure crosses over the Hooghly River (a distributary of the Ganges River) between the city and municipality of Naihati and the town of Bandel in the Indian state of West Bengal. The bridge was created for railway... Continue Reading →
April 16, 2003 In Argentina, a major portion of the east-west road known as National Route 7 was opened to traffic in the province of San Luis. San Luis is located near that South American country’s geographical center, and the portion of National Route 7 that was built within the province is 137 miles (221... Continue Reading →
April 15, 1997 A groundbreaking ceremony was held to launch the reconstruction of Interstate 15 (I-15) in the vicinity of Salt Lake City. This project, which involved renovating 16.2 miles (26.1 kilometers) of I-15 between 600 North Street in Salt Lake City and 10600 South Street in the city of Sandy, became first major Interstate... Continue Reading →
April 14, 1900 The Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI), which remains the international governing body for sports cycling well over a century later, was established at a meeting in Paris, France. UCI was founded as a replacement for the International Cycling Association (ICA), which had been organized eight years earlier as the first world body for... Continue Reading →
April 13, 1846 The Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) received its charter. The first president of this railroad was Samuel Vaughan Merrick, who had been born in Maine in 1801. He moved to Pennsylvania as a teenager, settling in Philadelphia. Merrick subsequently acquired a strong knowledge of engineering, and in 1824 he helped establish what was then... Continue Reading →
April 10, 1899 The Napoleone Pimpinelli Company was awarded a contract to build an electric tram (streetcar) line in the city of Perugia in central Italy. The company subsequently carried out that construction project under the supervision of the German electrical engineering company Siemens & Halske AG. The project was part of a larger modernization... Continue Reading →
April 9, 2019 (Image courtesy Alstom.) The first two X’Trapolis Mega electric passenger trains to be assembled in the Republic of South Africa were officially introduced to the public. The X’Trapolis Mega is a type of high-capacity train produced by the French multinational rail transportation company Alstom and designed for use in suburban and regional... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 