Drumheller & the Tyrell Museum (7897901734)

A roadside attraction is a feature along the side of a road meant to attract

tourist Tourism is travel for pleasure or business; also the theory and practice of touring, the business of attracting, accommodating, and entertaining tourists, and the business of operating tours. The World Tourism Organization defines tourism ...

s. In general, these are places one might stop on the way to somewhere, rather than actually being a destination. They are frequently advertised with billboards. The modern tourist-oriented highway attraction originated as a U.S. and Canadian phenomenon in the 1940s to 1960s, and subsequently caught on in

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

History

When long-distance road travel became practical and popular in the 1920s, entrepreneurs began building restaurants, motels, coffee shops, cafes and more unusual businesses to attract travelers. Many of the buildings were attractions in themselves in the form of novelty architecture, depicting common objects of enormous size, typically relating to the items sold there. Some other types of roadside attractions include monuments and fictionalised-paranormal/illusionary amusements such as the Mystery Spot near Santa Cruz, California, or curiosities such as The Thing? along

Interstate 10 Interstate 10 (I-10) is the southernmost cross-country highway in the American Interstate Highway System. I-10 is the fourth-longest Interstate in the United States at , following I-90, I-80, and I-40. This freeway is part of the originally p ...

in Arizona. With the construction of the U.S.

Interstate Highway System The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, commonly known as the Interstate Highway System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Highway System in the United States. T ...

in the mid-1950s, many roadside attractions were bypassed and quickly went out of business. Some remained attractive enough to divert travelers from the interstate for a brief respite and thus remain in business. The best example of this change is along

US Route 66 U.S. Route 66 or U.S. Highway 66 (US 66 or Route 66) was one of the original highways in the United States Numbered Highway System. It was established on November 11, 1926, with road signs erected the following year. The h ...

, where in the southwest, Interstate 40 provided for non-stop travel. In 2017, the publication Best Life listed 33 top roadside attractions in the U.S. Among those listed were

Lucy the Elephant Lucy the Elephant is a six-story elephant-shaped example of novelty architecture, constructed of wood and tin sheeting in 1881 by James V. Lafferty in Margate City, New Jersey, Margate City, New Jersey, approximately five miles (8 km) south ...

, Margate, NJ;

Cabazon Dinosaurs Cabazon Dinosaurs, formerly Claude Bell's Dinosaurs, is a roadside attraction in Cabazon, California, featuring two enormous, steel-and-concrete dinosaurs named Dinny the Dinosaur and Mr. Rex. Located just west of Palm Springs, the ''Brontosau ...

, Cabazon, CA;

Oregon Vortex The Oregon Vortex is a roadside attraction that opened to tourists in 1930, located on Sardine Creek in Gold Hill, Oregon, in the United States. It consists of a number of interesting effects, which are gravity hill optical illusions, but whic ...

, Gold Hill, OR; Jolly Green Giant, Blue Earth, MN; and Secret Caverns, Howes Cave, NY.

References

External links

Roadside America: The Decline Of Kitsch?
by '' NPR''
The American Roadside: Photos, news and updates on America's fading roadside attractions
* ttps://sca-roadside.org Society for Commercial Archeologybr>American highways and roadside attractions
(NPR) {{DEFAULTSORT:Roadside Attraction Road

History

See also

References

Further reading

External links