Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
A time-lapse view of Ankrom setting up his “installation”
“Where are we now?” I ask. We're driving down a rather dreary commercial strip
between Tacoma and neighboring Lakewood, and, though I'm trying to think like a
roadgeek, I can't possibly see why this particular road is on our itinerary.
“ThisistheoldU.S.99,”saysMarkinunusuallyreverenttones.TheWestCoast'sRoute
66 (only upside-down!), Highway 99 once ran from the Canadian border all the way to
Mexico, but it was decommissioned in 1968 when I-5 was completed, and much of it is
nowanonymousandunsigned.Roadgeeksarearchaeologists aswell,findinghistoryinthe
modern urban ruins. They see the ghosts of Esso stations and motels shaped like tepees
where now there's only a waste-land of pawnshops and adult video stores.
Thelaststoponouritineraryisanotherhistoricspot:thefamedTacomaNarrowsBridge,
recentlytwinnedwithanewspanheadingwesttotheKitsapPeninsula.Theoriginalbridge
across this strait was the famous “Galloping Gertie,” which collapsed in a 1940 storm. If
youwereeverinanintroductoryphysicsclass,you'veprobablyseenthefamousfootageof
the bridge wobbling and warbling terrifyingly due to harmonic resonance before it crashed
into Puget Sound. The new bridge is reassuringly sturdy.
“Being a roadgeek is definitely something the rest of the population doesn't get,” sighs
John Spafford as we turn around and head back toward downtown Tacoma. “It's not ge-
netic—even my kids don't have it. I'm a little disappointed.” He prefers vagabond family
vacations straight out ofhis childhood, but his college-aged daughter wants a
real
vacation
like her friends get: a week by the pool in Orlando. “We never stay anyplace more than a
night,” he says, shrugging. “She's tired of seeing cornfields.”
Even if his own kids never learned to enjoy the
fabled wonders of roadgeek Amer-
ica
—the sixteen-lane stretch of I-285 near the Atlanta airport or the record thirty-six times
that I-91 and US-5 cross each other through New England—John has still managed to
jump-start a new generation of young roadgeeks. Since leaving the military, he's taught
