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I doubt anyone will really care about this, but I found this interesting. Feel free to skip this if you want.
Since my location has been public since I signed up for CS, I'm not worried about sharing that I used to live in Billerica, MA. We moved when I was 4.
For work, I occasionally have to drive through Billerica, and last winter I noticed that where the Middlesex Turnpike ends - currently a T-interserction - is actually a 4-way intersection. It's just that one of the four ways has been blocked off with those really heavy duty barricades.
Well I noticed recently that it's still blocked, but that all of the signage for that road is still there, including a "left lane must turn left" sign that the barricades make impossible to obey.
I was curious to know what was beyond the barricades but the road dropped down a bit of a hill so I couldn't see anything from the main road.
I finally remembered to look at the satellite view of Google Maps, and to my surprise I found that the road just ENDS about 25 yards from the main road, just beyond where it drops out of view.
And it's been gone long enough that some of the right-of-way has been grown over with grass, and a company has moved in and built the corner of there building and part of their parking lot there it looks like the right-of-way USED to be.
Hmm....
Following where I thought the road must've gone, I got to the river, and on the far bank was what looked like an empty space of cleared land where a bridge abutement used to be, followed by more overgrown area, then finally.....a road called "Old Middlesex Turnpike."
Well, now that's just weird. Obviously this road has been out of service a LONG time, and yet it's still blocked by temporary barricades, and there's still signage in place.
So I asked my parents about it. Not only did we used to live near there, but before I was born they lived in an apartment AT this very intersection, so if anyone would know, they would.
They told me that as long as they've remembered Middlesex Turnpike ALWAYS ended at that intersection, and never continued over the river. I can't imagine what would've prompted them to just abandon a section of the road and take the bridge down.
They got married in 1977 and moved into that apartment right after. Quite a long time to leave temporary barricades in place. Not only that, but the signage was in far too shape to date from before 1977. I wonder why they never just connected the sidewalks on either side of this street and took down the old signs?
Oh, there's also a couple of bars on the Turnpike not far from this intersection, and my mother said that more than once they heard the screech of brakes as a drunk driver come up to the T-intersection too fast and either got creamed by cross-traffic or plowed into those barricades.
Remember how I said we moved when I was 4? We moved into a house on a very quiet dirt road. You could almost play in the road here. heck, during the summer when it was hot and the road was dry I'd stand at the end of the driveway and use my R/C car to do donuts and and kick up clouds of dust on the road.
My parents had always said when they were looking for a new house, they didn't want one on a busy street, but they never told me that it was because they didn't want me or my brothers to be creamed by a drunk driver.
So not only does this road have a really odd quirk, but it directly influenced where my family moved to and where I still live!
Since my location has been public since I signed up for CS, I'm not worried about sharing that I used to live in Billerica, MA. We moved when I was 4.
For work, I occasionally have to drive through Billerica, and last winter I noticed that where the Middlesex Turnpike ends - currently a T-interserction - is actually a 4-way intersection. It's just that one of the four ways has been blocked off with those really heavy duty barricades.
Well I noticed recently that it's still blocked, but that all of the signage for that road is still there, including a "left lane must turn left" sign that the barricades make impossible to obey.
I was curious to know what was beyond the barricades but the road dropped down a bit of a hill so I couldn't see anything from the main road.
I finally remembered to look at the satellite view of Google Maps, and to my surprise I found that the road just ENDS about 25 yards from the main road, just beyond where it drops out of view.
And it's been gone long enough that some of the right-of-way has been grown over with grass, and a company has moved in and built the corner of there building and part of their parking lot there it looks like the right-of-way USED to be.
Hmm....
Following where I thought the road must've gone, I got to the river, and on the far bank was what looked like an empty space of cleared land where a bridge abutement used to be, followed by more overgrown area, then finally.....a road called "Old Middlesex Turnpike."
Well, now that's just weird. Obviously this road has been out of service a LONG time, and yet it's still blocked by temporary barricades, and there's still signage in place.
So I asked my parents about it. Not only did we used to live near there, but before I was born they lived in an apartment AT this very intersection, so if anyone would know, they would.
They told me that as long as they've remembered Middlesex Turnpike ALWAYS ended at that intersection, and never continued over the river. I can't imagine what would've prompted them to just abandon a section of the road and take the bridge down.
They got married in 1977 and moved into that apartment right after. Quite a long time to leave temporary barricades in place. Not only that, but the signage was in far too shape to date from before 1977. I wonder why they never just connected the sidewalks on either side of this street and took down the old signs?
Oh, there's also a couple of bars on the Turnpike not far from this intersection, and my mother said that more than once they heard the screech of brakes as a drunk driver come up to the T-intersection too fast and either got creamed by cross-traffic or plowed into those barricades.
Remember how I said we moved when I was 4? We moved into a house on a very quiet dirt road. You could almost play in the road here. heck, during the summer when it was hot and the road was dry I'd stand at the end of the driveway and use my R/C car to do donuts and and kick up clouds of dust on the road.
My parents had always said when they were looking for a new house, they didn't want one on a busy street, but they never told me that it was because they didn't want me or my brothers to be creamed by a drunk driver.
So not only does this road have a really odd quirk, but it directly influenced where my family moved to and where I still live!
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