Twelve Mile Circle – An Appreciation of Unusual Places

Category: Roads

  • Reversible

    It dawned on me recently, as I drove around the Washington, DC area, that there seemed to be an inordinate number of reversible road lanes that switched directions on regular schedules. The example that got me thinking about this was a one-block section of Washington Boulevard (map) on the western edge of Arlington’s Clarendon neighborhood.…

  • 81 on 81

    I’m planning a quick trip down to southwestern Virginia and neighboring West Virginia. Naturally I intend to count some new counties along the way although with other purposes too. I wish I could say it was entirely about the counties so I could finally finish Virginia. But that will have to wait for another day.…

  • Woonerf

    In some places they’re called complete streets, home zones or shared spaces. However, I preferred the original Dutch term “woonerf” (pronounced VONE-erf). It described a concept as old as urban civilization itself although applied within a new context. It follows a very simple idea, a notion of streets shared by everyone. That concept took a…

  • Schwebefähre

    Twelve Mile Circle received a wonderful suggestion from loyal reader “Joshua D” probably six months ago. He mentioned the schwebefähre (“suspension ferry“) in Rendsburg, Germany. These structures went by various names in different languages including “transporter bridge” in English. They were so odd, so whimsical, so amazingly impractical that I found them difficult to comprehend,…

  • Revisiting Street View Extremes

    Time moves forward, an unstoppable force. We all must face that awful truth as we age. On a happier thought, that allowed me to revisit a Twelve Mile Circle article from nearly five years ago. Maybe the conditions changed, or maybe not. Let’s find out. In February 2010 I wrote Streetview Beats a Deadhorse. Back…

  • Canadian Landmark

    I found a genuine Canadian landmark in the form of Landmark, Manitoba (map). This was a village of about a thousand people in the Rural Municipality of Taché, southeast of Winnipeg. Sure I found other Landmarks in Canada including mountains in British Columbia and Yukon plus a point in Newfoundland and Labrador. However, only one…

  • More Geo-BREWities

    My geography and brewery interests collided a few months ago. The happy result produced Geo-Brewities. Apparently Google says I own that term now, a pseudo-portmanteau of geography + brewery + oddities. I don’t expect it to become part of the popular lexicon. It’s not that catchy. Developing the List I took a different approach on…

  • Mapillary

    I noticed a tweet from a Twelve Mile Circle reader a few months ago that mentioned Mapillary. I can’t recall who that was although he or she deserves my appreciation. Since then I’ve been watching Mapillary from a distance and I’ve become increasingly intrigued by its possibilities. 12MC almost never features individual websites. This is…

  • Ireland, Part 6 (Obscure Geography)

    Don’t worry, this will be the final installment of the Ireland odyssey. I appreciated everyone wading through my personal indulgences so I saved the best for last, the Irish adventures that came closest to standard 12MC content. A couple of them are genuine geo-oddities. Inch Beach I mentioned Inch Beach (map) a few weeks ago…

  • Ireland, Part 3 (Wild Atlantic Way)

    Ireland designated a tourist route along its western edge between Donegal and Cork as the “Wild Atlantic Way.” Distinctive signs including a logo of what appeared to be something like ww — although stretched out farther like waves — marking the path. We didn’t follow the route on purpose although we encountered its road signs…