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BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, Aug. 27, 2008 – Members of the Australian Reconstruction Task Force and Task Force Castle’s 420th Engineer Brigade completed the emplacement of two Mabey Johnson bridges near Andar and Moqur in eastern Afghanistan. Army Spc. Corey Thompson, 420th Engineer Brigade, works with Australian combat engineers as they align two sections of a bridge. U.S. Army photo by Capt. James Reid, Combined Task Force Castle  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Insurgent attacks during the summer left the bridges impassible, forcing Afghans and coalition forces to use single-lane bypasses. Work progressed quickly once the Australian and American...

The national highway passing Kolar, 70km from Bangalore, has seen a lot of red on its surface for years now. The colour-coated stretch is the result of tomatoes dumped by farmers protesting a price crash. This week, too, the disgruntled lot threw their crop on the highway after the prices fell from Rs 80 per kilogram to Rs 15-25 a kg. An appeal had earlier been made to the government to pay a compensation of Rs 50,000 per acre to tomato growers. The farmers’ action blocked the highway for hours this week. After their unique protest ended, the crushed tomatoes...

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind., June 24 (UPI) -- Higher interstate speed limits on an Indiana highway haven't resulted in additional deaths or serious injuries, a study has determined. Purdue University researchers found that an increase from 65 to 70 mph on Interstate 65 was still safe, a result that adds to mix of research results nationwide since passage of the National Highway System Designation Act of 1995, which gave states freedom to set interstate speed limits. Study authors acknowledged the ongoing debate in a Purdue University news release. "These findings are important because the influence of speed limits on roadway safety...

A few miles off Interstate 270, in the heart of bustling Montgomery County, a once-thriving neighborhood has taken on the feel of a ghost town. Half the homes are vacant, their windows broken or boarded up. Driveways are strewed with debris. "No Trespassing" and "Beware of Dog" signs dot trees. Banging sounds come from empty houses where burglars pry copper pipes from the walls. The culprit is not foreclosure but the imminent arrival of the six-lane intercounty connector that will slice through the Derwood neighborhood. This week, highway workers demolished a brick house and will soon raze five more on...

BALAD, Iraq, May 13, 2008 – A continued partnership aimed at enhancing the skills of the local Iraqi highway patrol has benefited local security. Combat Outpost 9’s “Punisher 3” route security team, composed mostly of U.S. military police, conducted classroom training and practical exercises May 2-6 for more than 50 of the Iraqi highway patrol’s noncommissioned officers. The NCOs were trained in basic leadership principles, pre-combat inspections, operation orders, traffic control point operations, vehicle searches and personnel searches. “These are the skills they use every day, and seeing how much they have improved, I feel much more confident about being...

PHILADEPHIA: As gasoline prices hit records on almost a daily basis, an increasing number of motorists in US are following a radical driving technique designed to eke out every last mile from a tank of fuel. Known as 'hypermiling,' the methods can double gas mileage, even in gas-guzzling vehicles. Promoted on a growing number of websites, hypermiling includes pumping up tires to the maximum rating on their sidewalls, which may be higher than levels recommended in car manuals; using engine oil of a low viscosity, and the controversial practice of drafting behind other vehicles on the highway to reduce aerodynamic...

Nations agree S American highway The three leaders hailed the deal as a boost to trade The presidents of Brazil, Bolivia and Chile have agreed to build a highway by 2009 that will link the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of South America. Much of the route is already paved but the leaders agreed to invest a further $600m (£300m) to complete the road. The highway is to run from Santos in Brazil to Arica and Iquique in Chile. The meeting in the Bolivian city of La Paz was seen as a chance to improve strained ties between Bolivia and Chile...

HONG KONG — On a frontier where Vietnamese and Chinese soldiers exchanged bullets in a short but bloody war three decades ago, construction workers from the two countries will soon join forces to build a highway that promises to bring new wealth to their once heavily guarded border regions. Plans for a four-lane highway from Hanoi to Kunming are expected to clear the last hurdle on Friday, when the board of the Asian Development Bank gives the green light to a loan that will underwrite the Vietnamese side of the project. By 2012, when the highway is supposed to be...

LANCASTER, Calif. — A blinding sandstorm caught dozens of vehicles in a highway pileup Tuesday in the high desert north of Los Angeles, killing at least two people and injuring 16, authorities said.

A major road has collapsed, raw footage being shown on Foxnews.com

I was thinking of just taking Expressway 83 all the way. However, Google Earth is unclear on whether it's an expressway all the way. Is it like McAllen to Brownsville? Or, will I run through stop signs and traffic lights. Google Earth said to get off 83 at Rio Grande City, then 9. Turn right at FM-3167 10.4 mi 10 mins 10. Turn right at FM-649 37.3 mi 37 mins 11. Turn left at TX-16/TX-16 S 2.4 mi 3 mins 12. Turn right at FM-649 27.2 mi 28 mins 13. Turn left at TX-359 I need the FASTEST route. Thanks.

President Bush ordered the opening of all U.S. roads to Mexican trucks in 2002, but the dispute has been tied up in courts. The long fight, begun during the Clinton administration, had ground down to a last quarrel over an environmental assessment, or study, called an EA. Opponents of the truck expansion argued that a particular kind of study was required by law and that the Bush administration was ducking that requirement.

<p>Yesterday morning I found out that my home, along with more than 157 others in on the chopping block to make way for a major road. Imagine my dismay, when I found that the city in charge of the project has stated that the public comment time is over. I was never notified that there was any contemplation of such a project, and thus had no opportunity to voice my strenuous objection. Just wait, it gets much better...</p>

More than 80 vehicles stranded by subsidence on Tibet highway www.chinaview.cn 2007-07-20 21:52:07 Adjust font size: LHASA, July 20 (Xinhua) -- More than 80 vehicles have stranded on a highway by serious subsidence triggered by rainstorms in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region. The subsidence occurred at about 5:00 p.m. on Friday on nine kilometers of State Highway 318 that links Tibet with neighboring Sichuan Province, said sources with the traffic management arm of the People's Armed Police. More than 10,000 cubic meters of the highway bed had sunk in the Mangkam county in eastern Tibet's Qamdo prefecture. Repair work is...

In a month, August 20 and 21, the leaders of the United States, Canada, and Mexico will sit down together in Montebello, Quebec to discuss making the borders between these three nations disappear. They will discuss progress on a vast highway project passing through America to link Mexico with Canada. So far, no one has asked the citizens of these three nations whether they want to do this. It is not up for a vote in Congress and, indeed, Congress has no supervision over the gnomes in the U.S. Department of Commerce who are busily “harmonizing” the laws under the...

A death and injury lawsuit has prompted a U.S. tire importer and distributor to ask the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for help in recalling nearly half a million Chinese-made light truck tires. This is not a definitive list, but consumers should be on the lookout for steel-belted radial light truck tires sold under the names Westlake, Telluride, Compass and YKS in the following sizes: -- LT235/75R-15 -- LT225/75R-16 -- LT235/85R-16 -- LT245/75R-16 -- LT265/75R-16 -- LT3X10.5-15 These tires were sold by the following distributors: -- Tireco, Compton, California -- Strategic Import Supply, Wayzata, Minnesota -- Omni United USA, Inc.,...

FReep this Poll! "When driving on the freeway, do you most often move over to the right lane to allow faster drivers to pass or do you maintain your speed and lane?" Move over Maintain

Lefties launch 'Move over' campaign By: Dave Downey - Commentary Sunday, June 17, 2007 Look out, all you left-lane campers. Soon, you could be approached from behind by an impatient commuter with the words "move over" and a giant arrow pointed in the direction of the No. 2 lane pasted across his or her windshield. Those drivers who routinely get irritated when you create those mile-long backups now have a polite way of communicating with you. For $29, they can buy their very own "move over" windshield decals through the Web site leftlanedrivers.org. The site was set up earlier this...

MIAMI, Okla. - The Riviera Courts motel is crumbling away and nobody seems to care. Once a stop along Route 66, the 2,400-mile neon carnival that connected hundreds of communities from Chicago to Los Angeles, this late-1930s Mission Revival is just a weather-worn building on the side of a country road in far northeast Oklahoma. Next door, soybean farmers Richard and Rosemary Woolard watch the place deteriorate from their front porch. "Been a lot of changes in this old county," 77-year-old Richard Woolard says plainly. The Riviera Courts is among hundreds of mom-and-pop motels that met their demise along the...

Taiwanese Airforce is practicing a take-off/landing drill on a highway located in central Taiwain on May 15, 2007. Click the following picture to see more photos of the drill.

LEFT LANE DRIVERS of AMERICA “If you’re not a Left Lane Driver then get out of the Left Lane!” Traffic has become increasingly congested and tempers flare as slower drivers occupy what has been historically referred to as the “fast lane”. It’s time to get that Left Lane back! It is our considered opinion that not only will traffic move more smoothly and more quickly once the Left Lane is used in the way it has been designed but also headaches, frustration, bad tempers and road rage will all be greatly reduced when this pressure valve is released. It’s time...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency following the collapse of one of the San Francisco Bay area's most traveled sections of freeway, as workers began clearing debris from a fiery accident that destroyed an important commuter link.A freeway interchange that funnels traffic off the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge collapsed onto another highway ramp in Oakland, Calif., Sunday, April 29, 2007, after a gasoline tanker truck overturned and caught fire.

The transportation issues facing Texas Gov. Rick Perry earlier this decade were so severe that it was faster to take back roads from San Antonio to Dallas than Interstate 35. That's akin to taking Route 60 to Pittsburgh International Airport from Downtown to avoid the Parkway West. Perry pushed through a package of highway construction projects driven by public-private partnerships, similar to the long-term lease of the Pennsylvania Turnpike sought by Gov. Ed Rendell. Texas' decision to turn to private companies to build and maintain 4,000 miles of highways in key corridors was in response to a business and population...

Hungary's busiest highway, connecting Budapest with the Austrian capital Vienna, was closed early on Monday after a truck carrying rabbits crashed. Five-thousand of the animals were let loose on the road, police say.

(CBS) SHERMAN OAKS, Calif. A crane overturned on the San Diego (405) Freeway Friday, trapping the operator and snarling traffic, authorities said. Firefighters worked for about an hour to free the man, whom was airlifted to UCLA medical center. The crane overturned on the northbound side of the freeway, authorities said. All northbound lanes were closed area as a precaution, California Highway Patrol Officer Patrick Kimball said.

CHINA will complete a highway across the world's biggest sandy desert, near the ancient Silk Road, six months before schedule to tap oilfields in the west of the country and reduce reliance on imports. The road across the Taklamakan desert, near China's nuclear bomb test site in Xinjiang, would open in June after 22 months of construction, said Li Lixin, head of the highway project office. The journey for rigs and oil workers from Aksu city in the north to the Tarim Basin in the south, where a third of China's oil reserves are, would be halved. China's second highway...

The greatest transportation explosion since post-World War II America is now underway in China, with the construction of a comprehensive intercontinental transportation network designed to ensure Beijing’s role as the undisputed leader of Asia. No better example of this progress can be found than the recent maiden journey of the US$4 billion Beijing-Lhasa Express, or “Railway of the Skies.” The train’s 2,500 mile journey in June through the once-impenetrable Himalaya Mountains and across the vast Gobi Desert marked an important national victory for Beijing’s communist leadership and another step forward in the country’s much-touted “Great Leap West” campaign. At a...

and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP): The SPP is an initiative among the United States and the two nations it borders ¨C Canada and Mexico ¨C to increase security and to enhance prosperity among the three countries through greater cooperation. The SPP is based on the principle that our prosperity is dependent on our security and recognizes that our three great nations share a belief in freedom, economic opportunity, and strong democratic institutions. The SPP outlines a comprehensive agenda for cooperation among our three countries while respecting the sovereignty and unique cultural heritage of each nation. The SPP provides...

What do the federal interstate highway system, the Golden Gate Bridge and Dallas-Fort Worth Airport have in common? All are indispensable projects involved in safely transporting millions of families and tons of products every year. All three were also bitterly attacked and criticized during their planning and construction phases. Americans have a love-hate relationship with roads, rail and air infrastructure. We demand safe, reliable transportation and depend upon it for quality of life, jobs and commerce. But nearly every major transportation improvement generates early controversy. Today, our state transportation system is at a crossroads. Texas is the leading exporting state...

"Highway blogs" come, go quickly It takes only a bedsheet and 18-gauge wire for Bruce Macdonald to stir road rage in some motorists. For eight months the Cambridge lawyer has been stringing homemade banners from highway overpasses, including those crossing Interstate 93 and Route 128. His neatly painted messages usually take short jabs at the Bush administration or the war in Iraq. Like noxious fumes and traffic snarls, a well-placed road sign can't be ignored by a driver, he said. Tens of thousands of cars can stream beneath an ``Impeach" or ``U.S. Out of Iraq" banner before it is ripped...

Press Release: For Immediate Release Date: 6/19/06 Subject: Ride To Work Day 2006 National Motorcycle Ride to Work Day is Wednesday, July 19, 2006 This year's fifteenth annual motorcycle commuting demonstration will increase the number of riders on the road, according to Ride to Work, a non-profit advocacy organization. "Riding to work on this day shows the positive value of motorcycles and scooters for transportation. For many people, riding is an economical, efficient and socially responsible form of mobility that saves energy, helps the environment and provides a broad range of other public benefits," states Andy Goldfine, the event...

6/13/2006 12:00:00 PM State defends highway plan in court Mike Smith AP political writer INDIANAPOLIS — The planned lease of the Indiana Toll Road to a private partnership meets state constitutional muster and should not be scuttled by litigation from opponents, the state said in a brief to the Indiana Supreme Court. The opponents — which include seven individuals and the Citizens Action Coalition — want the justices to overturn a May 26 ruling by St. Joseph Superior Court Judge Michael Scopelitis. He indicated that he did not believe the plaintiffs had much of a case against the lease and...

CALGARY, ALBERTA--A newly detected stream of stars festoons the northern sky in a sweeping arc that cuts across the entire constellation of Ursa Major (through the Big Dipper), from just above the head of Leo the lion to the constellation Cancer the crab. Although it spans fully 63 degrees (one-third of the northern celestial hemisphere), the star stream escaped notice until now because its individual stars are far too faint to see with the naked eye. Also, they don't jump out as a readily discernible shape or pattern, like a cluster or constellation, amid the surrounding star fields. To snare...

THE temptation to write about "Cars" using automotive metaphors may be unwise, but it's also irresistible. You could say, for instance, that the film — the first directed by the Pixar guru John Lasseter since the company's 1999 hit "Toy Story 2" — tools along at an easy clip, rather like a Volvo station wagon en route to another family vacation. At no point does it spin out of control, much less venture off-road. Instead, the film just putt, putt, putts along, a shining model of technological progress and consumer safety. But, as Ed (Big Daddy) Roth might say, chrome...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger stopped by a Kern County highway junction Tuesday to promote what he called a "historic" $37 billion bond package for education, housing, levee repair and transportation. State Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter, left, joins in with California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Bakersfield Mayor Harvey Hall, right, along Highway 99 and Highway 65 gaining support for an infrastructure bond on the November ballot. The program calls for $1 billion in improvements to Highway 99. The bond package, passed by the state Legislature Friday, needs only to be signed by the governor to be put on the November 2006 ballot....

Students at the Al-Secuty secondary school in Obeid, Iraq eagerly wait to receive soccer balls from Iraqi highway patrolmen April 19. The IHP went to the school and held a "Career Day" to talk about their jobs, the children's future and hand out school supplies and soccer balls. U.S. Army photo by Cpl. Michael Molinaro Iraqi Highway Patrol Hold 'Career Day' Iraqi Highway Patrol members visit a secondary school and talk to students about the duties and responsibilities of their job and about the future of Iraq. By U.S. Army Cpl. Michael Molinaro 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry...

ORLANDO, Fla. - The cost of building roads has gotten so high, not even dirt is cheap anymore. As a result, many states are postponing scores of highway projects. The reconstruction work from the eight hurricanes that have hit the United States since 2004 has combined with a rise in population in some states to drive up the demand for labor, material and equipment. That, in turn, has pushed up wages and prices. Surging fuel prices, China's immense demand for concrete and steel and the reconstruction of Iraq are also pushing U.S. road construction costs higher. "We plan for cost...

Click here for updated storm photo galleries, computer simulations, NOAA website links and detailed information on the Kilauea flood as well as breaking information and event postponements... Recent Garden Island headlines... The Garden Island multi-media links...

The Flushing YMCA said four people were killed in an accident on the New York State Thruway at 7 a.m. en route to a swimming meet in Buffalo, N.Y. The victims included a 47-year-old woman, her two sons and a 14-year-old girl, who died when a tanker truck slammed into their minivan, New York 1 reported. Two other passengers in the vehicle were removed from the battered minivan and taken to a local area hospital, New York 1 reported. In addition, the driver of the tanker truck was taken to the hospital, according to New York 1. Neither the Flushing...

EMIDJI, Minn., March 14 (UPI) -- Babe, Paul Bunyan's blue ox companion, a concrete statue built in 1937 by the Bemidji, Minn., Rotary Club, will be getting $100,000 worth of repairs. Bunyan and Babe have been featured twice in Life magazine. Kodak has said they're the second-most-photographed statues in the United States, right behind Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. Babe developed a one-inch-wide crack from the neck to the hindquarters that city officials have annually fixed with caulking and blue paint, but the crack continued to widen, reported the Grand Forks Herald. The Rotary Club raised more than $53,000 and...

Honolulu (AP) -- A dam burst on the island of Kauai on Tuesday, and seven people were missing, the Coast Guard said.

Anyone who's familiar with private land development and public transportation construction knows that the two are intrinsically connected and their symbiosis creates greater potential for political chicanery. As California embarked on expansion of its highway system after World War II, it wisely maintained layers of political insulation on where and when the projects could be built. Gasoline taxes were held in a special, constitutionally created fund that could not be tapped for other purposes. While politicians could press for particular projects, final decisions on which were built were largely left to professional highway engineers and the State Highway Commission. As...

A memorial illustration for Trooper Steven R. Smith of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.

Ancient People Followed 'Kelp Highway' to America, Researcher Says Bjorn Carey LiveScience Staff Writer Sun Feb 19, 9:00 PM ET ST. LOUIS—Ancient humans from Asia may have entered the Americas following an ocean highway made of dense kelp. The new finding lends strength to the "coastal migration theory," whereby early maritime populations boated from one island to another, hunting the bountiful amounts of sea creatures that live in kelp forests. This research was presented here Sunday at the annual American Association for the Advancement of Science by anthropologist Jon Erlandson of the University of Oregon. Today, a nearly continuous "kelp...

Tuna's 25,000-mile swim down marine highway By Roger Highfield, Science Editor (Filed: 15/12/2005) The epic voyage of Terry the bluefin tuna - the equivalent to circumnavigating the Earth - has been witnessed by scientists using electronic tags to track fish. A few months ago a great white shark named Nicole completed the first known ocean crossing by a lone shark over a distance of more than 12,500 miles from South Africa to Australia and back in nine months, the fastest known return journey. Now another epic migration, this time of a 200lb bluefin tuna (Thunnus orientalis) nicknamed Terry, has been...

Baghdad's Highway of Death 'now safe' By Oliver Poole in Baghdad (Filed: 10/12/2005) The US military says it has secured the road linking Baghdad airport to the city - two and a half years after American troops first entered the capital. Attacks on the five-mile route have dropped from 142 between April and June to fewer than a dozen last month. The road had been a glaring symbol of the US failure to control Iraq. It became known as the Highway of Death since the journey meant risking shootings, suicide car bombs and booby traps. In April, 13 people were...

Workers are applying appropriately patriotic artwork this week to the Veterans Memorial Interchange overpass, one of the final tasks remaining on the South Palo Verde Road project. Work will continue throughout the week on the stars and stripes that now adorn the new overpass spanning the eastern portion of the Barraza-Aviation Parkway and nearby structures. The theme was chosen by members of the City of Tucson/Pima County Veterans Affairs Committee, said Carol Anton, county Transportation Department spokeswoman. Lester Potts, the committee's senior vice president, said its members chose artwork that would serve as a tribute to the veterans for whom...

SACRAMENTO - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed legislation Wednesday to remove funding roadblocks for a series of highway projects and for hospitals serving the state's neediest patients. The highway bill, by Assemblywoman Jenny Oropeza, D-Long Beach, preserves $822 million in funding for 29 projects, including expansion of the Caldecott Tunnel in Alameda County, a new car pool lane on Interstate 405 in Los Angeles County and a new six-lane freeway on Route 905 in San Diego County. "Local transportation agencies would not have been able to get their projects off the ground without this money," said Oropeza. "We thought it was...

WASHINGTON - Four communities will soon share $100 million in federal funds to develop bicycle and pedestrian trails aimed at enticing commuters to give up their cars to get to work, thanks to lawmakers involved in the final negotiations on the recently passed highway bill. The four pilot projects at $25 million each were the brainchild of Rep. Jim Oberstar of Minnesota, an avid cyclist and, more importantly, the senior Democrat on the House Transportation Committee. "A lot of trails have been built for recreational purposes," said Keith Laughlin, president of the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, an advocacy for turning abandoned railroad...

Big rig spills beer all over freeway in north Houston An 18-wheeler loaded with beer landed on its side late Monday night after the driver goes around a curve a little too fast. Investigators say the driver apparently took a curve too fast, causing the semi to flip on its side on the Northwest Freeway right outside the North Loop. A load full of Heineken beer spilled everywhere. The driver of the 18-wheeler was not hurt. It's taken most of the morning to clean up the mess, which is still underway at this hour.