Get this, in New York, we have both a Route 69 and a Route 420.
Route 420 is just outside the town of Potsdam. Potsdam’s high school mascot is, I am not making this up, the 'Stoners. Officially the Sandstoners, but always shortened.
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I take it that state highways aren’t numbered like federal highways then. You can’t switch a route number from odd to even on a federal road: odds are east/west and evens are north/south. That would be the general pathway…both 90 and 94 run north/south in Chicago, but they go back to their general east/west orientation once they’re far enough out of the city.
The mile marker… needs to be there?
Yes, mile markers are standard for public highways. The exits are numbered based on those miles, so it helps you recognize how far you’ve come and how far you still need to go. Remember, highways were set up before cars had GPS.
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How many are willing to pull the signpost out of the ground with their car?
But to be both correct and unappealing to fans of 420, they could put a bar over the 9 in .9.
The numbered signs are also important because if you’re in an accident or run out of gas in an unfamiliar or rural area, you may not know the nearest landmark to tell a dispatcher. Saying you’re a little past a mile marker is a lot better than saying you think the last road you passed was 15 minutes ago and it had some kind of barn next to it. If nobody’s been a sign-stealiing jerk, you shouldn’t have to walk more than half a mile to find a landmark everyone can recognize.
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You don’t necessarily know which direction to go to the nearest sign, so you might have to walk almost a whole mile (and then back.) Then again, some roads have fractional mile markers.
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This works? I didn’t want to steal it until now.
A clever, creative solution to be sure, although there’s a novelty value to this and may become an object of desire itself.
Another solution could be to use an LED marker just on this spot, which can display 420 or any other number from 001 to 999, so it has no inherent value to the stoner memorabilia crowd.
Not being North American, I had to look up why. For anyone else:
I guess if I watched the right kind of TV & movies I should know?
420 is a bit of a thing on reddit and 4chan, enough that you can pick up the meaning eventually.
Not really a TV/movie thing, just part of the general culture. Maybe a meme in the original sense of the word, before it meant pictures of cats with poor grammar.
I don’t have a photo handy, but the Mile 69 milepost signs on I-5 through Washington State are similar. They used to be normal markers but after (presumably) being stolen one too many times they just replaced them with signs that have the word “mile” across the top and are blank where the number would normally go.
Edit: Here you go:
http://imgur.com/tgjGBRo
They may be standard, but do they need to be there? The line markings need to be there on the road to help divide the traffic properly. The road surface needs to be properly maintained for the speed of the highway. That being said, do the mile markers need to be there?
Yep. If they REALLY didn’t want it stolen, they should have done something not so obvious–419.97 or something. Would still be functional, without any of the conversation-piece-ness about it.
There was a similar problem in Melbourne .au, kids were stealing the Nirvana Ave road sign. It was replaced with a concrete bollard, which is still visible at https://goo.gl/maps/4JRx0 (intersection Waverley Rd, South East Corner). (street view screenshot: http://imgur.com/USDp6Ec)
What is it with stoners and road signs?
Maybe not when we develop even more technology, but right now, people are still using those mile markers when they call in to 911 to say “there’s an accident on east-bound 80 at mile marker X” (etc.).
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419.5 would do it.
419A. It’s not truly a number but dispatch would understand why and be able to send help to the correct location.
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Aside from the emergency purpose @anon67050589 already mentioned, those markers are important for the people who do all the work that goes into maintaining road infrastructure. Think “we’re resurfacing the inside westbound lane between mile 515 and 516” or “this clean-up crew is assigned to pick up litter along mile X.”
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