Highway History Bibliography
General and Travel
The latest additions are in bold
Albert, William, The Turnpike Road System in England 1663-1840, Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Algeo, Matthew, Harry Truman's Excellent Adventure: The True Story of a Great American Road Trip, Chicago Review Press, 2009. (In June 1953, former President Truman, a man who loved cars and roads, embarked on his last great road trip - this is the story of that trip.)
Altshuler, Alan, and Luberoff, David, Mega-Projects: The Changing Politics of Urban Public Investment, Brookings Institution Press and Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2003. (A history of public investment in major urban projects, including the Central Artery/Tunnel Project in Boston, with emphasis on the consequences and the future of mega-projects.)
America's Highways 1776-1976, Federal Highway Administration, 1976. (Over 500 pages of history prepared as the FHWA's contribution to the Bicentennial. Out of print but available in libraries or through inter-library loan)
Angell, Roger, "Romance," The New Yorker, May 26, 2003. (The great sports writer's evocative memoir of childhood car trips in the 1930's. The blurb: "Car Trips in the nineteen-thirties took you to some unexpected places.")
Ascher, Kate, The Works: Anatomy of a City, Penguin Books, 2005. (The book combines text, maps, and graphics to describe how New York City functions. The first section, "Moving People," discusses streets, subways, bridges, and tunnels in New York City (pages 2-55), while the second section, "Moving Freight," covers rail freight, maritime freight, air cargo, and markets (pages 58-89).)
Avila, Eric, The Folklore of the Freeway: Race and Revolt in the Modernist City, A Quadrant Book, University of Minnesota Press, 2014. (Discusses the damage construction of the urban Interstates caused as well as the creative strategies devised by communities to fight them.)
Bain, David Haward, The Old Iron Road: An Epic of Rails, Roads, and the Urge to Go West, Viking, 2004. (Historian Bain and his family trace the great western roads-the pioneer overland trails, the transcontinental railroad, and the great western highways of the 20th century, including the Lincoln Highway and I-80. Invoking the literary tradition of William Least Heat-Moon and Ian Frazier, the book jacket refers to the Bain family's trip as "a quintessentially American journey.")
Ballon, Hilary, and Jackson, Kenneth T., Robert Moses and the Modern City: The Transformation of New York, W. W. Norton and Company, 2007. This book, which accompanies exhibitions at the Queens Museum of Art and the Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Art Gallery at Columbia University, examines the works and impact of Robert Moses, one of the greatest builders of roads, bridges, and other public works in history, on New York City. It's the first major examination-in some ways a reexamination-of the works of Robert Moses since Robert Caro's 1974 biography, The Power Broker (see separate entry).
Barker, Theo, and Gerhold, Dorian, The Rise and Rise of Road Transportation, 1700-1990, Cambridge University Press, 1993. (A survey of road transportation in Britain over the past 3 centuries.)
Bay, Mia Traveling Black: A Story of Race and Resistance, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2021. (With chapters on Plessy v. Ferguson and travel by train, car, bus, and plane, the book tells the story of why the journey to racial equality often takes place on the road.)
Beckett, Derrick, Bridges, Paul Hamlyn, 1969. (Part of the Great Buildings of the World, this book focuses on British bridges.)
Belasco, Warren James, Americans on the Road: From Autocamp to Motel, 1910-1945, The MIT Press, 1981. (Classic work on the subject.)
Borgeson, Griffith, "Forerunner of the Freeway: The California Cycleway," Automobile Quarterly, Second Quarter 1983. (Amidst the Bicycle Craze of the 1890's, Pasadena became the home of the 2-mile Cycleway reserved for bicyclists.)
Borth, Christy, Mankind on the Move: The Story of Highways, Automotive Safety Foundation, 1969.
Brodsly, David, L. A. Freeway, An Appreciative Essay, University of California Press, 1981.
Bromley, Michael L., William Howard Taft and the First Motoring Presidency, McFarland and Company, Inc., 2003. (From the back cover: "particularly (but not exclusively) on his relationship to the automobile and the role of the automobile in the turbulent politics of his day.")
Brouws, Jeffery T., Polster, Bernd, and Patton, Phil, Highway: America's Endless Dream, Stewart Tabori, and Chang, 1997. (Essays on the history of highways and their cultural impact, accompanied by photographs by Jeff Brouws.)
Bruce, Leonard C., On The Move: A Chronology of Advances in Transportation, Gale Research, Inc., 1993. (The chronology begins circa 30,000 B.C., when "Aborigines are believed to have reached Australia aboard some sort of seagoing craft." It ends on December 19, 1991, with agreement among local jurisdiction on completion of the last 13.5 miles of the Washington area's Metro rail system.)
Bryan, Mike, Uneasy Rider: The Interstate Way of Knowledge, Alfred A Knopf, 1997. (Noting that the U.S. numbered "blue" highways are a vision of the past, Bryan takes off on a "Blue Highways" type journey along the Interstate routes of the Southwest.)
Bryson, Bill, The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America, Harper and Row, 1989.
Buck, Rinker, The Oregon Trail: A New American Journey, Simon and Schuster, 2015. (The author traveled the trail in a covered wagon and wrote this book about his experiences, a mix of memoir and history.)
Burns, John M., Thunder at Sunrise: A History of the Vanderbilt Cup, the Grand Prize, and the Indianapolis 500, 1904-1916, McFarland and Company, 2006. (Early auto racing, such as the Vanderbilt Cup, was a spur to the Good Roads Movement.)
Butler, John L., First Highways of America: A Pictorial History of American Roads and Highways from 1900-1925, Krause Publications (700 East State Street, Iola, Wisconsin 54990-0001), 1994.
Cantor, George, Where the Old Roads Go: Driving the First Federal Highways, Harper and Row, 1990 (Northeast) and Southwest (1992). (Mini-tours, similar to those in the American Guide Series (see below), along many of each region's U.S. highways.)
Cantor, George, Old Roads of the Midwest, The University of Michigan Press, 1997. (Continuation of Cantor's Where the Old Roads Go series).
Caputo, Philip, The Longest Road: Overland in Search of America, from Key West to the Arctic Ocean, Henry Holt and Company, 2013. (Caputo and his wife Leslie drive from Key West, Florida to the Deadhorse oil fields of Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, over 8,300 miles, mainly off the Interstates, with an Airstream in tow. The narratives of driving the Alaska Highway and Dalton Trail are especially interesting.)
Caro, Robert A., The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York, Knopf, 1974. (Highly critical biography of one of the most powerful road, bridge, and parkway builders of the 20th century.)
Cigliano, Jan, and Landau, Sarah Bradford, editors, The Grand American Avenue 1850-1920, Pomegranite Artbooks, 1994. (Collection of articles about the evolution of Fifth Avenue, Woodward Avenue, and 10 other grand avenues.)
Cima, Bill, Rest Area Guide: To the United States and Canada, College Publications, 5th Edition, May 1997
Cohan, Steven and Hark, Ina Rae, editors, The Road Movie Book, Routledge, 1997. (A study of the road in movies.)
Conover, Ted, The Routes of Man: How Roads are Changing the World and the Way We Live Today, Alfred A. Knopf, 2010. (Conover travels roads in Peru, India, Kenya, the West Bank, China, and Nigeria. The New York Times says, "His modesty and compassion make "The Routes of Man" less a series of travel adventures than an empathetic look at the contradictory effects of modernity.")
Coster, Graham, A Thousand Miles from Nowhere: Trucking Two Continents, North Point Press, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1995). (In which the author accompanies an English trucker from England to Russia and an America trucker across the United States.)
Creighton, Jeff, Bridges of Spokane, Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2013. (Photographic collection in the Images format depicting the "City of Bridges.")
Cribb, John, A Field Guide to Interstate 95, Madison Books, 1989. ("The Traveler's Companion to the History, Geography & Trivia that Lie Beneath the Nation's Busiest Highway.")
Crosse, Jesse, The Greatest Movie Car Chases of All Time, Motorbooks, 2006. (Discusses the craft behind great movie chases and includes the author's Top 20.)
Cruikshank, Dan, Bridges: Heroic Designs That Changed the World, HarperCollins, 2010
Davidson, Janet F., and Sweeney, Michael S., On The Move: Transportation and the American Story, National Geographic, 2003. (Extensive, well-illustrated companion to "America on the Move," the permanent exhibition that opened at the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of American History on November 22, 2003.)
Davies, Pete, American Road: The Story of an Epic Transcontinental Journey at the Dawn of the Motor Age, Henry Holt and Company, 2002. (The story of the 1919 convoy on which Dwight D. Eisenhower learned the value of good roads.)
DeYoung, Bill, Skyway: The True Story of Tampa Bay's Signature Bridge and the Man Brought it Down, University Press of Florida, 2013. (The story of construction of the original Sunshine Skyway bridge, its collapse after being struck by the Summit Venture freighter, and the aftermath.
Dillon, Richard (Text), and DeNevi, Don and Moulin, Thomas (Photo Editors), High Steel: Building the Bridges Across San Francisco Bay. Celestial Arts, 1979.
DiMento, Joseph F.C., and Ellis, Cliff, Changing Lanes: Visions and Histories of Urban Freeways, The MIT Press, 2013. (The book, according to the book jacket, describes "the evolution of the urban freeway in the United States, from its rural parkway precursors through the construction of the interstate highway system to emerging alternatives for more sustainable urban transportation.")
Dreiser, Theodore, A Hoosier Holiday, Indiana University Press, 1997. (This is a reprint of the novelist's 1916 book about his 2,000-mile, 2-week automobile trip from New York to his home town of Terre Haute, Indiana.)
Duncan, Dayton, and Burns, Ken, Horatio's Drive: America's First Road Trip, Alfred A. Knopf, 2003. (Companion to a Ken Burns PBS documentary, this book chronicles the adventures of Horatio Nelson Jackson and Sewall Crocker in 1903 as they became the first to travel cross country, San Francisco to New York, by automobile.)
Duncan, Dayton, Out West: An American Journey, Viking, 1987. (Following the trail of Lewis and Clark, the road and the history of the Corps of Discovery, told in an interesting way.)
Dunn, James A., Jr., Driving Forces: The Automobile, Its Enemies, and the Politics of Mobility, Brookings Institution Press, 1998. (Automobiles, highways, sprawl--it's all here in a challenge to the politically correct viewpoint.)
eXitSource: A Complete Directory of Services, Businesses & Attractions Within a Quarter Mile of Every Exit on Every Major Interstate From Coast to Coast in the United States, Interstate America. 2001.
Exploring America's Scenic Highways, National Geographic Society, 1985.
Fenster, Julie M., Race of the Century: The Heroic True Story of the 1908 New York to Paris Auto Race, Crown Publishers, 2005.
Fetherston, Drew, The Chunnel: The Amazing Story of the Undersea Crossing of the English Channel, Times Books, 1997.
Finch, Christopher, Highways to Heaven: The AUTO Biography of America, Harper Collins, 1992.
Fleming, Alice, Highways into History, St. Martin's Press, 1971. (Contains history of segments of many U.S. and State highways.)
Flink, James J. America Adopts the Automobile, 1895-1910, The MIT Press, 1970. (In addition to discussing evolution of the car, Flink discusses automobile clubs, motor vehicle regulation, roads, and "Motives for Adoption," among many topics.)
Flint, Anthony, Wrestling with Moses: How Jane Jacobs Took on New York's Master Builder and Transformed the American City, Random House, 2009. (The Clash of Titans between the autocratic, imperious master builder Robert Moses and the author of the classic The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961) over three Moses developments, including a 4-lane highway through Washington Square and an elevated 10-lane Lower Manhattan Expressway through SoHo, Little Italy, Chinatown, and the Lower East Side.)
Foster, Lynn V., Fielding's California The Mission Trail, San Diego to San Francisco, Fielding's Travel Books, 1988.
Foster, Lynn V. and Foster, Lawrence, Fielding's Spanish Trails in the Southwest, Fielding's Travel Books, 1986.
Francis, William, Along the Kirkwood Highway, Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2014. (About a portion of State Route 2 in New Castle County, Delaware, in the heavily illustrated Images of America format.)
Francis, William, Building Interstate 95 in Delaware, Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2018. (With an emphasis on photographs in the Images of America format, this book is less about construction and more about what was in place before and after the construction, with a lengthy chapter on construction of I-95 in Wilmington.)
Frick, Karen Trapenberg, Remaking the San-Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge: A Case of Shadowboxing with Nature, Routledge, 2017. (The 25-year saga of replacing part of the historic bridge damaged by the 1989 Loma Prieta Bridge.)
Gandy, Matthew, "Technological Modernism and the Urban Parkway," Concrete and Clay: Reworking Nature in New York City, The MIT Press, 2002. (The parkway section includes chapters on "Automobilization of the American Landscape," "Robert Moses and the Radiant City," "The Demise of Technological Modernism," and "Fractured Cities.")
Garreau, Joel, Edge City: Life on the New Frontier, Doubleday, 1991. (A pragmatic look at a phenomenon of the late-20th century, edge cities spurred by the Interstate System.)
Gass, Anne B., We Demand: The Suffrage Road Trip, Maine Authors Publishing, 2021. (A novel based on the true story of a transcontinental automobile ride by three women bound for Washington, D.C., with petitions demanding a constitutional amendment on voting rights for women. Book cover blurb: “A thrilling cross country road trip by three remarkable women.”)
Gies, Joseph, Bridges and Men, Doubleday and Company, 1963. (The history of bridges, from the early logs across streams to the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.)
Gillespie, Angus Kress, Crossing Under the Hudson: The Story of the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels, Rivergate Books, Rutgers University Press, 2011.
Gillespie, Hugh M., A Century of Progress: The History of Hot Mix Asphalt, National Asphalt Pavement Association, 1992.
Goddard, Stephen B., Getting There: The Epic Struggle Between Road and Rail in the American Century, Basic Books, 1994. (The epic struggle as told by an author who wishes the railroads had defeated the "high and mighty" road builders.)
Goddard, Stephen B., Colonel Albert Pope and His American Dream Machines: The Life and Times of a Bicycle Tycoon Turned Automotive Pioneer, McFarland & Company, 2000. (Biography of a pioneer of the Good Roads Movement, the bicycle industry, and the automobile industry.)
Gordon, Jan and Cora J., On Wandering Wheels: Through Roadside Camps from Maine to Georgia in an Old Sedan Car, Dodd, Mean and Company, 1928.
Gruskin, Paul, Rockin' Down the Highway (Voyageur Press, 2006). The book jacket describes this book as a heavily illustrated "history of the long and winding interplay between rock & roll and the automobile."
Gudis, Catherine, Buyways: Billboards, Automobiles, and the American Landscape, Routledge, 2004.
Haddad, Paul, Freewaytopia: How Freeways Shaped Los Angeles, Santa Monica Press, 2021. (Chapters tell the story of each Los Angeles freeway as a way of exploring how social, economic, political, and cultural demands created the freeways that had come to symbolize the city.)
Hall, Karen J., and FRIENDS of the Blue Ridge Parkway, Inc., Building the Blue Ridge Parkway, Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2007.
Hamblin, Dora Jane and Grunsfeld, Mary Jane, The Appian Way: A Journey, Random House, 1974
Haycraft, William R., Yellow Steel: The Story of the Earthmoving Equipment Industry, University of Illinois Press, 2002.
Hayes, Kevin J., An American Cycling Odyssey, 1887, University of Nebraska Press, 2002. (Story of George Nellis' transcontinental journey by bicycle from Herkimer, New York, to San Francisco, California.)
Hazard, John L., Managing National Transportation Policy, The Eno Foundation for Transportation, Inc., 1988. (A history of the U.S. Department of Transportation with commentary on the Secretaries and their accomplishments.)
Heat Moon, William Least, Blue Highways: A Journey Into America, Little, Brown and Company, 1982. (Popular narrative of the author's travels around the country off the Interstate System.)
Heitmann, John, The Automobile and American Life, McFarland and Company, 2009
Herow, William C., Rest Areas & Welcome Centers Along US Interstates, Roundabout Publications (P.O. Box 19235, Lenexa, Kansas 66285), 2001.
Hessler, Peter, Country Driving: A Journey Through China from Farm to Factory, Harper, 2010. (Traveling the roads of China, Hessler provides readers a look at the Chinese people and their changing culture.)
Hollis, Tim, Dixie Before Disney: 100 Years of Roadside Fun, University Press of Mississippi, 1999. (Roadside attractions-"wacky, tacky tourist traps"- in the South before Disney World signaled a change in style.)
Holt, W. Stull, The Bureau of Public Roads: Its History, Activities and Organization, Service Monographs of the United States Government No. 26, Institute for Government Research, The John Hopkins Press, 1923 (Reprint: AMS Press, 1974).
Horton, Tom (Text), and Wolman, Baron (Photography), Superspan: The Golden Gate Bridge, Chronicle Books, 1983.
Howard, Thomas Frederick, Sierra Crossing: First Roads to California, University of California Press, 1998.
Hunter, Dave, Along the I-75, Mile Oak Publishing, Inc., 11th Edition, 2003. (A Guidebook for I-75, including services, scenery, history, battlefields, and attractions.)
Isenberg, Joseph M., Iowa Highway Research Board: 1949-1999, Center for Transportation Research and Education, Iowa State University, 1999.
Jackson, Robert W., Highway Under the Hudson: A History of the Holland Tunnel, New York University Press, 2011.
Jakle, John A., and Sculle, Keith A., Motoring: The Highway Experience in America, University of Georgia Press, 2008. (From the book jacket: "Motoring unmasks the forces that shape the American driving experience-commercial, aesthetic, cultural, mechanical-as it takes a timely look back at our historically unconditional love of motor travel.")
Jakle, John A., and Sculle, Keith A., Signs in America's Auto Age: Signatures of Landscape and Place, University of Iowa Press, 2004.
Jakle, John A., Sculle, Keith A., Rogers, Jefferson S., The Gas Station in America, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994. (The history, architecture, and business of gas stations.)
Jakle, John A., Sculle, Keith A., Rogers, Jefferson S., The Motel in America, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996. (The history, architecture, and business of motels.)
Karnes, Thomas L., Asphalt and Politics: A History of the American Highway System, McFarland and Company, 2009. (From the book jacket: "The book offers an analysis of state and federal road funding, modern road-building options, and the successes and failures of the current highway system.")
Kaszynski, William, The American Highway: The History and Culture of Roads in the United States, McFarland and Company, 2000. (A good survey, well illustrated, of highway history in the United States.)
Keller, Ulrich, The Highway as Habitat: A Roy Stryker Documentation, University Art Museum, 1986. (An interesting essay on highway history, the meaning of highways, and highway photography, accompanying photos taken by Roy Stryker for Standard Oil of New Jersey.)
Kimes, Beverly Rae, "The Vanderbilt Cup Races 1904-1910, Automobile Quarterly, Fall 1967.
Kost, Mary Lu, Milepost I-80 San Francisco to New York, Milepost Publications, 1993.
Kussy, Edward V. A., "Surface Transportation and Administrative Law: Growing Up Together in the 20th Century," 1996 TRB Distinguished Lecture, Transportation Research Record No. 1527, Transportation Research Board, 1996. (Kussy, FHWA's Deputy Chief Counsel, describes the relationship between the growth of transportation systems and administrative law in the United States, with reference to zoning, contracting, and environmental requirements.)
Labatut, Jean, and Lane, Wheaton J., editors, Highways in Our National Life: A Symposium, Princeton University Press, 1950. (An oft-cited survey on all aspects of highways.)
Lackey, Kris, RoadFrames: The American Highway Narrative, University of Nebraska Press, 1997 (The jacket explains: "In a lively discussion of books written as early as 1903 and as recently as 1994, Kris Lackey reveals the crucial roles the highway and automobile travel have played through generations of American writing.")
Laderman, David, Driving Visions: Exploring the Road Movie, University of Texas Press, 2002.
Lay, Max G., Ways of the World: A History of the World's Roads and of the Vehicles That Used Them, Rutgers University Press, 1992. (Detailed history of road development throughout the world.)
Lerner, Barron., One for the Road: Drunk Driving Since 1900, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011. (This history of efforts to stop drunk driving, according to the dust jacket, "provides crucial historical lessons for understanding the ongoing epidemic of drunk driving.")
Longhurst, John, Bike Battles: A History of Sharing the American Road, University of Washington Press, 2015. (Tells the story of how America adapted to the bicycle in the late 19th century, lost interest, then tried again beginning in the 1960s to the present.)
Macy, Sue, Wheels of Change: How Women Rode the Bicycle to Freedom (With a Few Flat Tires Along the Way), National Geographic Society, 2011. (Written for ages 12 and up, this book tells how the Bicycle Craze of the late 18th century allowed women to break through the many restrictions on their lives to "ride into a new world full of all sorts of freedoms," as the book jacket puts it.)
Mair, George, Bridge Down, Stein and Day, 1982. (Beginning with the collapse of the Silver Bridge and Sunshine Skyway, Mair discusses the condition of the Nation's bridges in an alarmist text.)
Margolies, John, and Yorke, Jr., Douglas A., Hitting the Road: The Art of the American Road Map, Chronicle, 1996.
Margolies, John, Home Away From Home: Motels in America, Bulfinch, Press, 1995.
Margolies, John, Pump and Circumstances: Glory Days of the Gas Station, A Bullfinch Press Book, Little, Brown and Company, 1993.
Mauch, Christof, and Zeller, Thomas, editors, The World Beyond the Windshield: Roads and Landscapes in the United States and Europe, Ohio University Press, 2008. (A collection of articles about roads and their historical development, including such subjects as the American parkway, roadside landscaping, the Highway Beautification Act of 1965, Germany's autobahn, and the Capital Beltway.)
McAdoo, Richard B., Eccentric Circles: Around America in a House on Wheels, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1991.
McConnell, Curt, Coast to Coast by Automobile: The Pioneering Trips, 1899-1908, Stanford University Press, 2000.
McConnell, Curt, "A Reliable Car and a Woman Who Knows It: The First Coast-to-Coast Auto Trips by Women 1899-1916," McFarland and Company, 2000. (The story of Alice Ramsay, the first woman to cross the country by auto, and other women who tried or succeeded.)
McDonald, Shannon Sanders, The Parking Garage: Design and Evolution of a Modern Urban Form, Urban Land Institute, 2007.
McMurtry, Larry, Roads: Driving America's Great Highways, Simon and Schuster, 2000. (The novelist travels Interstate highways, with essays about the driving experience, what he sees along the roads, and what it reminds him of from literature and life.)
McNichol, Dan, "Connecting the United States: Governors and the Building of the Interstate System," in Brooks, Clayton McClure, editor, A Legacy of Leadership: Governors and American History, University Press, 2008, p. 85-109.
McNichol, Dan, Paving the Way: Asphalt in America, National Asphalt Pavement Association, 2005. (Readable, well-illustrated history of asphalt in the context of road paving from Ancient Rome to the Interstate System.)
McPhee, John, Annals of the Former World, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1998. (Compilation of four books by McPhee, who uses a journey along I-80, and observations of its road cuts, to describe the geology of a continent, plate-tectonics, and geologic time. The four books are: Basin and Range (1980), In Suspect Terrain (1982), Rising From The Plains (1986), and Assembling California.(1986). Assembling California contains a tour de force reconstruction of the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake.)
McPhee, John, Uncommon Carriers, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006. (A compilation of articles from The New Yorker, McPhee recounts his cross-country travels in a tractor trailer as well as his adventures in other modes of freight shipment, including UPS and coal trains.)
Montoya, Carina Monica, Pacific Coast Highway in California, Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2018. (A photographic study in the Images of America format of the historic scenic highway.)
Morgan, James, The Distance to the Moon: A Road Trip into the American Dream, Riverhead Books, 1999. (A road trip helps the author describe America's love affair with the car and the open road--"the epic entanglement that's defined this century and reshaped the face of America." Along the way, he interviews former Federal Highway Administrator Frank Turner, one of the Founding Fathers of the Interstate System.)
Marks, Christine, Interstate 75 and the 401, The Boston Mill Press, 2nd Edition, 2002. (A travel guide from Toronto to Miami.)
Muller, Karin, Along the Inca Road: A Woman's Journey Into an Ancient Empire, Adventure Press, National Geographic Society, 2000.
The Next Exit: The Most Complete Interstate Highway Guide Ever Printed, The Next Exit, 11th Edition, 2002.
Nall, Clayton, The Road to Inequality: How the Federal Highway Program Polarized America and Undermined Cities, Cambridge University Press, 2018. (Describes how the Federal-aid highway program has polarized cities by changing the geographic distribution of partisans; how this change affects development of transportation policy; and how partisan geographic polarization interacts with policy federalism to worsen spatial inequality, leading to transportation policies that disadvantage urbanized area and the transit-dependent.)
Norell, Mark; Leidy, Denise Patry, and the American Museum of Natural History with Rose, Laura, Traveling the Silk Road: Ancient Pathway to the Modern World, Sterling Signature, 2011.
Olmsted, Gerald, Fielding's Lewis and Clark Trail, Fielding Travel Book, 1986.
O'Neill, Thomas, Hitting the Roads, Great American Journeys, National Geographic Society, 1989.
Norton, Peter D., Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City, The MIT Press, 2008. (According to the book jacket, it "... offers a new look at both the origins of the automotive city in America and how social groups shape technological change.")
Patton, Phil, Made in USA: The Secret Histories of the Things That Made America, Grove Weidenfeld, 1992. (Essays on a range of topics, including chapters about bridges, automobiles, and aviation.)
Patton, Phil, Open Road: A Celebration of the American Highway, Simon and Schuster, 1986. (As the title suggestions, this is a "celebration" of a wide range of highway-related topics, from the history of highways to the pleasures of the open road.)
Paving the Way to Prosperity: American Road and Transportation Builders Association 1902-2002, American Road and Transportation Builders Association, 2002. (A decade-by-decade history of ARTBA.)
Paumgarten, Nick, "Getting There," The New Yorker, April 24, 2006. (Traces early road mapping history as a frame for a discussion of the use of GPS navigation devices.)
Pierre, Francis, The History of Road Building Equipment, A KHL Group Publication, 1998. (Illustrated review of road building equipment from ancient to modern times.)
Perrier, Dianne, Onramps and Overpasses: A Cultural History of Interstate Travel, University Press of Florida, 2009. (Perrier uses the Interstates as a window into the past.)
Petroski, Henry, Engineers of Dreams: Great Bridge Builders and the Spanning of America, Alfred A. Knopf, 1995. (From the Golden Gate Bridge to the George Washington Bridge, Petoski discusses some of America's greatest bridges and the men who designed them.)
Petroski, Henry, Pushing the Limits: New Adventures in Engineering, Knopf, 2004. (A collection of essays on engineering topics, including many on bridges.)
Posner, Stan, and Phillips-Posner, Sandra, Drive I-95, Travelsmart, 2007. (Inspired by Dave Hunter's Along the I-75, the Posners prepared this exit-by-exit guide to I-95 from Boston to Miami. Includes travel data, plus history and trivia.)
Plowden, David, Bridges: Spans of North America, W. W. Norton and Company, 1974. (Revised edition, November 2002.)
Prentzas, G.S., The Brooklyn Bridge, Building America Then and Now, Chelsea House Publishers, 2009.
Primeau, Ronald, Romance of the Road: The Literature of the American Highway, Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1996. (Through a review of road literature, this book "captures America's love affair with roads, cars, travel, speed, and the lure of open spaces.")
Rae, John B., The Road and the Car in American Life, The MIT Press, 1971.
Ramsey, Alice, Alice's Drive, The Patrice Press, 2005. (This a reprint on Alice Huyler Ramsey's 1961 book Veil, Duster, and Tire Iron, which recounted her adventures in 1909 as the first woman to drive an automobile across the United States. This well-done paperback includes annotation, an index, and other new material by publisher Gregory M. Franzwa.)
Ramsey, Alice Huyler, Veil, Duster, and Tire Iron, Castle Press, 1961. (Memoir by the first woman to complete a transcontinental journey by automobile-in 1909.)
Rasenberger, Jim, America 1908, Scribner, 2007. (Narrative of a year in which Henry Ford unveiled the Model T, the Wright Brothers demonstrated that flight was here to stay, automobilists competed in the New York to Paris race, the Navy sailed around the world to demonstrate America's new role in world affairs, and President Teddy Roosevelt summoned the Nation's Governors to the White House for a 3-day meeting on conservation - among many other fascinating events.)
Rastorfer, Darl, Six Bridges: The Legacy of Othmar H. Ammann, Yale University Press, 2000. (The story of the George Washington, Bayonne, Triborough, Bronx-Whitestone, Throgs Neck, and Verrazano-Narrows Bridges.)
Ratigan, William, Highways Over Broad Waters: The Life and Times of David B. Steinman, Bridgebuilder, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1959. (Biography of the great bridge builder.)
Richter, William L., The ABC-Clio Companion to Transportation in America, ABC-CLIO, Inc., 1995. (A one-volume transportation encyclopedia, with events, legislation, people, and places arranged alphabetically.)
Rose, Albert C., Historic American Roads: From Frontier Trails to Superhighways, Crown Publishers, Inc., 1976. (A series of vignettes in the history of U.S. road development illustrated by reproductions of paintings by Carl Rakeman.)
Rose, Mark H., "Reframing American Highway Politics, 1956-1995," Journal of Planning History, August 2003. (Mark Rose, author of the outstanding Interstate Express Highway Politics 1941-1989, focuses on the evolution of metropolitan planning organizations and how Federal officials "framed the institutional relationship that guided transportation politics and subsequent land uses.")
Rose, Mark H., and Mohl, Raymond A., Interstate Highway Politics and Policy Since 1939, Third Edition, The University of Tennessee Press, 2012. (The classic history expanded to describe the urban freeway revolts and the impacts on cities, especially on minority communities.)
Rose, Mark, Seely, Bruce E., and Barrett, Paul, The Best Transportation System in the World, Ohio State University Press, 2006. (A look at deregulation of trucking, railroads, and airlines in the 20th century, including the separate evolution of the modes that led to different operational and regulatory structures.)
Rugh, Susan Sessions, Are We There Yet? The Golden Age of American Family Vacations, University Press of Kansas, 2008. (The rise and fall of the family vacation in the post-World War II era to the early 1970s.)
Scharff, Virginia, Taking the Wheel: Women and the Coming of the Motor Age, The Free Press (A Division of Macmillan, Inc.), 1991.
Schreier, Konrad F., Jr., Brand Book Seventeen, The Los Angeles Corral of the Westerners, 1986. (Collection of essays by western writers on such topics as "Testing California's Highways", 1919-1923 (Abraham Hoffman), "Before the Wheel-Indian Transportation B.C." (Richard W. Cunningham), and "The Development of Public Transportation in Los Angeles" (Donald Torguson).)
Schwantes, Carlos Arnaldo, Going Places: Transportation Redefines the Twentieth-Century West, Indiana University Press, 2003. (How planes, trains, and the automobile shaped the western landscape.)
Scott, Quinta, and Miller, Howard S., The Eads Bridge , Missouri Historical Society Press, 1999. (Combines a photograph essay by Quinta Scott and an historical appraisal by Howard S. Miller, the book tells the story of this landmark of American architecture and engineering.)
Seely, Bruce E., Building the American Highway System: Engineers as Policy Makers, Temple University Press, 1987. (Outstanding scholarly history of the FHWA, from its origins as the Office of Road Inquiry to the 1980's.)
Seiler, Cotton, Republic of Driving: A Cultural History of Automobility in America, The University of Chicago press, 2008. (The book jacket says it "... looks back at the period between 1895 and 1961 - from the founding of the first automobile company in America to the creation of the Interstate Highway System - to find out how driving evolved into a crucial symbol of freedom ...")
Sessions, Gordon M., Traffic Devices: Historical Aspects Thereof, The Institute of Traffic Engineers, 1971.
Shaffer, Marquerite, See America First: Tourism and National Identify, 1880-1940, Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001. (The birth of modern American tourism and the growth of a national transportation system.)
Shugaar, Antony; Donzel, Catherine; and Walter, Marc, Coast to Coast: Vintage Travel in North America, The Vendome Press, 2009. (Heavily illustrated chronicle of travel - via canal barge, rail, steamboat, automobile, and horseback.)
Simmons, Marc, Following the Santa Fe Trail: A Guide for Modern Travelers, Ancient City Press, 1986.
Sitler, Kevin D., and Sitler, Richard N., The Sunshine Skyway Bridge Spanning Tampa Bay, The History Press, 2013. (This book tells the story of the bridges that have spanned Tampa Bay.)
Slotboom, Erik, Houston Freeways: A Historical and Visual Journey, Published by Oscar F. Slotboom, 2003. (A thorough, well illustrated book on the subject.)
Smith, Nicol, Burma Road: The Story of the World's Most Romantic Highway, Garden City Publishing, Inc., 1942. (A journey along a road out of history.)
Sorin, Gretchen, Driving While Black: African American Travel and the Road to Civil Rights, Liveright Publishing Corporation, a Division of W. W. Norton & Company, 2020. [Accompanying a major PBS documentary by Ric Burns, the book tells the story of the African American experience with the automobile, including during the Jim Crow 20th century, and how the interaction transformed Black life in ways that were far-reaching and unexpected.)
Stager, Claudette, and Carver, Martha A. (editors), Looking Beyond the Highway: Dixie Roads and Culture, University of Tennessee Press, 2006. (This collection of articles uses the Dixie Highway - a 1910s/1920s named trail from Michigan to Florida - as a jumping off point for narrating the history and culture of roads, roadside attractions, motels, signs, and other aspects of Southern culture.)
Standiford, Les, Last Train to Paradise: Henry Flagler and the Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Railroad That Crossed an Ocean, Crown Publishers 2002. (The story of the Overseas Railroad to Key West, Florida, that preceded the U.S. 1/Overseas Highway.)
Starr, Kevin, Golden Gate: The Life and Times of America's Greatest Bridge, Bloomsbury Press, 2010. (Professor Starr, author of a highly regarded seven-volume history of California, turns his attention to the Golden Gate Bridge. According to the book jacket, "Starr reveals the hidden-in-plain-sight meaning of the Golden Gate, putting it in its place among the monuments of American history-and the wonders of the modern world.")
Stephens, Roger, Down That Pan American Highway, Roger Stephens, Publisher, 1946. (Includes an introduction by E. W. James, Chief, Inter-American Regional Office, U.S. Public Roads Administration.)
Stewart, George R., N. A. 1: Looking North and Looking South, The Riverside Press, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1957. (Two volumes, comparable to Stewart's classic book on U.S. 40. North covers from the Canadian Border to Circle, Alaska, while South covers from the Mexican Border to Costa Rica.)
Sutter, Paul S., Driven Wild: How the Fight Against the Automobile Launched the Modern Wilderness Movement, University of Washington Press, 2002.
Sweet, James Stouder, The Federal Gasoline Tax at a Glance: A History, Bybee House, 1993. (A short history of the gas tax, available for $5.95 from Bybee House, 116 East Glendale Drive, Boone, NC 28607.)
Talese, Gay (Author); Davidson, Bruce (Photographer); Rethi, Lili (Illustrator), The Bridge: The Building of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, Walker and Company, 2002. (Paperback edition of his 1970 book, with a new preface and afterword by Talese.)
Taylor, Candacy, Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America, Abrams Press, 2020. (The history of the Green Book allows the author to explain how the segregation of travel was a routine part of American life through the 1960s, and how African-American travelers had to adjust to it. Available in adult and young reader editions.)
Tent, M.B.W, A 1928 Road Trip: From the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts to the National Parks of the American West, lulu.com, 2011. (Ms. Tent's narrative reconstructs a family trip by her grandparents and their four children in 1928, from Massachusetts to California, partly on U.S. 20, and from Los Angeles home, partly on U.S. 66. Provides an interesting impression of what such a road trip was like for a family that had never taken such a vacation: 36 days, 8,084 miles, total cost: $776.)
Tomasi, Peter J., The Bridge: How the Roeblings Connected Brooklyn to New York, Abrams ComicArts, 2018. (A graphic novel version of the story of construction of the Brooklyn Bridge.)
The Trailblazers, Federal Highway Administration, 1976. (Recollections by the "men who located, design, and built the initial highways in the Federal domain" while working for the FHWA and its predecessor agencies.)
Tyler, Poyntz, American Highways Today, The Reference Shelf Vol. 29, No. 1, The H. W. Wilson Company, 1957. (A collection of articles about 1950's road issues, including the struggle for the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956.)
Vance, James E., Jr., Capturing the Horizon: The Historical Geography of Transportation Since the Transportation Revolution of the Sixteenth Century, Harper and Row, 1986.
Van Der Zee, John, The Gate: The True Story of the Design and Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, A Touchstone Book by Simon and Schuster, 1986.
Von Hagen, Victor W., Highway of the Sun, Suell, Sloan and Pearce/Little, Brown and Company, 1955. (Along the Royal Road of the Inca Empire.)
Von Hagen, Victor W., Roman Roads, The World Publishing Company, 1966.
Waggoner, Holly, Skyway to the Sun, Omnigraphis Publishers, 1988. (The story of the Sunshine Skyway, "a proclamation of man's ingenuity, perseverance, and vision.")
Wallis, Allan D., Wheel Estate: The Rise and Decline of Mobile Homes, Oxford University Press, 1991.
Weiner, Edward, Urban Transportation Planning in the United States: An Historical Overview, U.S. Department of Transportation, Fifth Edition, 1997. (Available on line at http://ntl.bts.gov/DOCS/UTP.html)
White, E. B., Farewell to Model T/From Sea to Shining Sea, The Little Bookroom, 2003. Two essays (totaling 34 pages of big print on small pages) from The New Yorker by prose stylist White, one about the eccentricities of the Model T (1936) and the other about the back roads and streets of America (1953).
Wibberly, Leonard, Voyage by Bus: Seeing America by Land Yacht, William Mortrow and Company, Inc., 1971.
Winegardner, Mark, Elvis Presley Boulevard: From Sea to Shining Sea, Almost, The Atlantic Monthly Press, 1987.
Witzel, Michael Karl and Steil, Tim, Americana: Roadside Memories, Lowe and B. Hould Publishers, 2003. (The road is a pavement. Just beyond the road is life--the gas stations, drive-ins, restaurants and Historic Route 66 that are among the subjects of this book.)
Wollen, Peter, and Kerr, Joe, Editors, Autopia: Cars and Culture, Reaktion Books, 2002. (Collection of new and reprinted essays on the consequences of a century of driving. Topics include cars and architecture, advertising, art, cities, music, national identity, semiotics, and traffic jams.)
Wonning, Paulk R., Short History of Roads and Highways: From Ridgeways to Interstate Superhighways, Indiana Edition, Mossy Feet Books, Inc., 2020.
Yow, John, Are We There Yet? Building America's Transportation Infrastructure Network, American Road and Transportation Builders Association, 2002. (Celebrating the 100th anniversary of ARTBA, this book is a survey of 100 years of highway development in the United States.)
Zeller, Thomas, Driving Germany: The Landscape of the German Autobahn, Berghahn Books, 2007. (A history of the autobahn, not only in the 1930s, but in later years, with emphasis on its relationship to the landscape.)
Zheutlin, Peter, Around the World on Two Wheels: Annie Londonderry's Extraordinary Ride, Citadel Press, 2007. (Around the world by bicycle in 1894).