County highway
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A county highway (also county road or county route; usually abbreviated CH or CR) is a road in the United States and in the Canadian province of Ontario that is designated and/or maintained by the county highway department. Route numbering can be determined by each county alone, by mutual agreement among counties, or by a statewide pattern.
Any county-maintained road, whether or not it is given a signed number, can be called a county road.[a] Depending on the state or province and county, these roads can be named after geographic features, communities, or people. Or they may be assigned a name determined by a standardized grid reference: "East 2000" would be a north–south road running 20 blocks/miles/km east of the designated zero point. Many other variations are also used. Many locales have somewhat arbitrarily assigned numbers for all county roads, but with no number-signage at all or only on standard street name blades.
County roads and highways vary greatly in design standards, funding, and regularity of maintenance. Some county highways in urban areas are
United States
County highway markers are usually a yellow-on-blue pentagon (the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices standard pattern) or a black-on-white square (largely older signs). Some states, like Virginia and North Carolina, have no county highways in most of their counties: the state government maintains all roads in unincorporated areas. In West Virginia, the state maintains secondary roads though they may be designated as county routes.[3] Other states, like Connecticut, have no county routes because there is no government at the county level. Alaska's county-equivalent boroughs maintain roads in unincorporated areas but none are numbered. Louisiana's county equivalent of parishes have parish routes.
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In the United States, county highways are denoted or signed in various ways, differing by state. In Wisconsin, county highways are marked with letters—with one- to three-letter combinations (i.e.: C, CC, or CCC). Wisconsin's county highways are frequently and clearly marked at most intersections. Because county road names are not exclusive, a state may have many county roads with similar or identical names. In states like Illinois, county highways are marked either with a number (usually one or two digits), a single letter followed by a one- or two-digit number (i.e.: V-34, A-29), or in Rock Island County, with letters like Wisconsin but on a blue pentagon marker. These highways are usually marked at the beginning of the highway and occasionally throughout the route; they cannot be relied on as geographic directions the way more major highways are (state or interstate). In New Jersey, there are two sets of county routes: the 500-series (500–599), part of a statewide system which usually run through multiple counties, but are county-maintained; and the non-500 routes which are usually contained within a single county and are repeated in different counties. The latter generally use numbers in the 600-series; some counties have routes in the 700s and 800s. Two counties, Bergen and Monmouth, along with some routes in Ocean County, have routes outside this range with one- or two-digit numbers along with some numbers in the 100s. New Jersey's county routes are usually signed just as well as state routes (with mile- and half-mileposts), and will appear on freeway exit signage.
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In
In
Many counties in Ohio use markers to designate county roads. Ohio's county roads vary widely in construction, signage, and naming from county to county. Seneca County uses the default blue pentagon marker and limited signage (generally only at intersections); Logan County uses a square white marker with a black border (similar to the St. Louis County design in Missouri) and signage is nearly comparable to state route signage, with advance signage of intersections with county roads and termini; and Scioto County uses a marker with a county outline.
Canada
In
Not all jurisdictions in Ontario which maintain a numbered road system use the name "County Road" to designate them, however — depending on the official name of the jurisdiction which maintains them, they may instead be designated as a Regional Road, Municipal Road, Regional Highway, County Highway, District Road, Township Road, or City Road. In the unincorporated
In addition to county roads, many civil townships also have
This is to be contrasted with survey township roads which exist in Alberta after the 1981 Alberta rural addressing system was introduced. Range roads will run north to south, while (survey) township roads run east to west.
Highway 620 in Ontario, was downloaded to the
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County/Regional roads in Ontario are styled by this basic "Flowerpot" design. This marker is of Durham Regional Road 2A.
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Variant Durham regional road marker for regional highways, a special class of the regional road system of Durham Region. This marker is of Durham Regional Highway 2.
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Niagara Regional Road 20 marker. While Niagara generally conforms to the standard Ontario "flowerpot" design, the markers are white-on-blue rather than the more traditional black-on-white and have rounded corners.
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Essex County Road 22 marker, a typical county road marker in Essex County, Ontario.
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A township road marker imposed on a street name sign blade inWaterloo Region, Ontario. The marker is for Wilmot Township Road 16.
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A township road marker of the typical trapezoidal shape inFrontenac County, Ontario. This marker is of South Frontenac Township Road 10.
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City route marker of Kawartha Lakes Road 121 in theCity of Kawartha Lakes, Ontario.
Elsewhere
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In England and Wales, county road, as alluded to in section 29 et seq. of the Local Government Act 1929, was the term used to refer to any road for which a county council was the responsible highway authority.[8]
See also
- County routes in California
- County roads in Florida
- County roads in Iowa
- List of County-Designated Highways in Michigan
- County roads in Minnesota
- County routes in New Jersey
- County routes in New York
- County roads in Ohio
- County Trunk Highways (Wisconsin)
- List of county roads in Ontario
- Quadrant route (Pennsylvania)
- List of Winnipeg City Routes
Notes
- ^ For example, in the state of Michigan, all roads that are not under the jurisdiction of the Michigan Department of Transportation or a city or village are under the jurisdiction of a county road commission.[1] Under state law, these county-maintained roadways are then classified as primary county roads or local county roads,[2] regardless if those roads then carry a signed designation number or not as signage and numbering practices vary in the state's 83 counties.
References
- Michigan House Fiscal Agency. pp. 8–9. Archived from the original(PDF) on July 3, 2010. Retrieved September 27, 2010.
- ^ BTP Intermodal Policy Division (August 2000). Summary: Act 51 of the Public Acts of 1951, as Amended; 'Act 51 Made Simple' (PDF) (Report). State of Michigan. p. 4. Retrieved July 18, 2020.
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has generic name (help) - ^ "West Virginia Division of Highways Factbook" (PDF). 2002.
- ^ a b "§306.3". Iowa Code. 2009. Retrieved October 30, 2009.
- ^ Hancock, Jason. "The Iowa Highways Page". Retrieved October 31, 2009.[self-published source]
- ^ Froehlig, Adam. "Twin Cities Highways: Definitions and Acronyms". Retrieved March 28, 2006.
- ^ "620_jct_504.JPG (640x480 pixels)". Archived from the original on September 29, 2007. Retrieved September 16, 2020.
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: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) - ^ "Local Government Act 1929" (PDF). Retrieved December 3, 2011.
External links
Media related to Diagrams of county route markers at Wikimedia Commons