Google Maps recently added a new feature where you can create your own maps and needless to say it is pretty awesome. They are great for making a quick map for someone to show them how to get some place but they are also great for the type of stuff I do. After playing around with it I came up with three maps, all unbuilt highways for Albany NY, New York City, and Boston. Whats even better is that you can download these maps and view them in Google Earth by clicking on the KLM button on the top right.

The first map I made was the unbuilt highways in Albany, NY. These were based on information from Capital Highways, a web site about highways in upstate New York. There are a number of large interchanges with ramps to no-where in Albany and this explains what happened to them. The blue line represents the Mid-Crosstown Arterial which would have cut straight through the heart of Albany and Washington Park. I-678 which would have bypassed the interchange of I-87 and I-90 in Colonie and gone directly to Albany International Airport. This off ramp is all that was ever built of the highway, which now serves as a connection to an office park. Finally the red line represents what would have been a spur off of I-90 through Rensselaer and connected with the Dunn Memorial Bridge. You can see where the bridge stops in mid-air here, where it would have continued east to connect with I-90.

The next map was for Boston, MA. In the Future MBTA section for the Orange Line I talk about how the current Orange Line was built in land cleared for the extension of I-95 into Boston. Here you can see what I was talking about along with the other highways that were to plow through the city. This map was based on information from Boston’s Canceled Highways. The red line represents I-95, both the northern section that would have run through Lynn Woods and the southern section which would have run through Hyde Park and Roxbury. The green line represents I-695, or the Inner Belt which would have ripped through Cambridge and Roxbury, almost completely leveling Cambridgeport for a gigantic interchange at the Mass Pike. You can see the remnants of the highway here where there are dead off ramps off of I-93 (and there is also a road called Innerbelt Road) and here, which was turned into Melnea Cass Boulevard. The yellow line represents Route 2, which today ends abruptly at Alewife but was supposed to carry on further into Cambridge. The blue and purple line represent Route 3 and an elevated relocation of the Mystic Valley Parkway, respectively. You can see the unbuilt portion of Route 3 at the interchange at Route 128. Each would have destroyed the picturesque, tree lined parkway that exists today.

The last map I made was for New York, NY. These are based off of the unbuilt highways section of NYCRoads.com, which is a fantastic resource. Not all of these were Robert Moses highways but many, such as the bridges across Long Island Sound, were. Some were merely ideas for expanding roads rather than actually building new highways, of which Queens Boulevard is a good example. There are far too many for me to talk about here but if you click on the road you will see information about it and a link the it’s page on NYCRoads.com.

Edit: I have now added these maps to this site, check out the Unbuilt Highways section for these and more.