Route information | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
Maintained by VDOT | ||||
Length | 69.01 mi[1] (111.06 km) | |||
Existed | 1928–present | |||
Major junctions | ||||
South end | NC 49 / NC 96 in Virgilina | |||
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North end | US 360 near Burkeville | |||
Location | ||||
Country | United States | |||
State | Virginia | |||
Counties | Halifax, Mecklenburg, Lunenburg, Nottoway | |||
Highway system | ||||
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State Route 49 (SR 49) is a primary state highway in the U.S. state of Virginia. The state highway runs 69.01 miles (111.06 km) from the North Carolina state line in Virgilina, Virginia in Halifax County, where the highway continues south as North Carolina Highway 49 (NC 49), north to U.S. Route 360 (US 360) near Burkeville in Nottoway County. SR 49 passes through Southside Virginia, connecting Virgilina and Burkeville with Clarksville and Chase City in Mecklenburg County, Victoria in Lunenburg County, and Crewe in Nottoway County. Via US 360, the state highway connects Richmond with the John H. Kerr Reservoir.
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Canada & The United States's Bizarre Border
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Transcription
Canada and the United States share the longest, straightest, possibly boringest border in the world. But, look closer, and there's plenty of bizarreness to be found. While these sister nations get along fairly well, they both want to make it really clear whose side of the continent is whose. And they've done this by carving a 20-foot wide space along the border. All five and a half thousand miles of it. With the exception of the rare New England town that predates national borders or the odd airport that needed extending, this space is the no-touching-zone between the countries and they're super serious about keeping it clear. It matters not if the no-touching-zone runs through hundreds of miles of virtually uninhabited Alaskan / Yukon wilderness. Those border trees, will not stand. Which might make you think this must be the longest, straightest deforested place in the world, but it isn't. Deforested: yes, but straight? Not at all. Sure it looks straight and on a map, and the treaties establishing the line *say* it's straight... but in the real world the official border is 900 lines that zig-zags from the horizontal by as much as several hundred feet. How did this happen? Well, imagine you're back in North America in the 1800s -- The 49th parallel (one of those horizontal lines you see on a globe) has just been set as the national boundary and it's your job to make it real. You're handed a compass and a ball of string and told to carefully mark off the next 2/3rds of a continent. Don't mind that uncharted wilderness in the way: just keep the line straight. Yeah. Good luck. With that. The men who surveyed the land did the best they could and built over 900 monuments. They're in about as straight as you could expect a pre-GPS civilization to make, but it's not the kind of spherical / planar intersection that would bring a mathematician joy. Nonetheless these monuments define the border and the no-touching-zone plays connect-the-dots with them. Oh, and while there are about 900 markers along this section of the border, there are about 8,000 in total that define the shape of the nations. Despite this massive project Canada and the United States still have disputed territory. There is a series of islands in the Atlantic that the United States claims are part of Maine and Canada claims are part of New Brunswick. Canada, assuming the islands are hers built a lighthouse on one of them, and the United States, assuming the islands are hers pretends the lighthouse doesn't exist. It's not a huge problem as the argument is mostly over tourists who want to see puffins and fishermen who want to catch lobsters, but let's hope the disagreement gets resolved before someone finds oil under that lighthouse. Even the non-disputed territory has a few notably weird spots: such as this tick of the border upward into Canada. Zoom in and it gets stranger as the border isn't over solid land but runs through a lake to cut off a bit of Canada before diving back down to the US. This spot is home to about 100 Americans and is a perfect example of how border irregularities are born: Back in 1783 when the victorious Americans were negotiating with the British who controlled what would one day be Canada, they needed a map, and this map was the best available at the time. While the East Coast looks pretty good, the wester it goes the sparser it gets. Under negotiation was the edge of what would one day be Minnesota and Manitoba. But unfortunately, that area was hidden underneath an inset on the map, so the Americans and British were bordering blind. Seriously. They guessed that the border should start from the northwestern part of this lake and go in a horizontal line until it crossed the Mississippi... somewhere. But somewhere, turned out to be nowhere as the mighty Mississippi stops short of that line, which left the border vague until 35 years later when a second round of negotiations established the aforementioned 49th parallel. But there was still a problem as the lake mentioned earlier was both higher, and less circular than first though, putting its northwesterly point here so the existing border had to jump up to meet it and then drop straight down to the 49th, awkwardly cutting off a bit of Canada, before heading west across the remainder of the continent. Turns out you just can't draw a straight(-ish) line for hundreds of miles without causing a few more problems. One of which was luckily spotted in advance: Vancouver Island, which the 49th would have sliced through, but both sides agreed that would be dumb so the border swoops around the island. However, next door to Vancouver Island is Point Roberts which went unnoticed as so today the border blithey cuts across. It's a nice little town, home to over 1,000 Americans, but has only a primary school so its older kids have to cross international borders four times a day to go to school in their own state. In a pleasing symetry, the East cost has the exact opposite situation with a Canadian Island whose only land route is a bridge to the United States. And these two aren't the only places where each country contains a bit of the other: there are several more, easily spotted in sattelite photos by the no-touching zone. Regardless of if the land in question is just an uninhabited strip, in the middle of a lake, in the middle of nowhere, the border between these sister nations must remain clearly marked.
Route description
SR 49 begins at the North Carolina state line in the town of Virgilina in southeastern Halifax County. The state highway is concurrent with SR 96 on two-lane undivided Florence Avenue. The two highways continue into North Carolina as NC 49 and NC 96, which then split and head toward Roxboro and Oxford, respectively. The two highways cross over the old railroad grade of the Norfolk, Franklin and Danville Railway then intersect Seventh Street. SR 96 turns west toward US 501, which leads to South Boston and Halifax, the county seat of Halifax County. SR 49 turns east onto Seventh Street, leaving the town and becoming Clarksville Road, which closely parallels the state line for a short distance before veering northeast and entering Mecklenburg County after crossing Aarons Creek, which flows north into the Dan River. The state highway passes through the hamlets of Nelson and Buffalo Junction before reaching US 58.[2]
SR 49 joins US 58, a four-lane divided highway, in a concurrency to just west of Clarksville. SR 49 heads northeast along Virginia Avenue, which also carried US 58 prior to the completion of US 58's Clarksville bypass. Virginia Avenue is a four-lane divided highway from US 58 into the town of Clarksville until just after it passes under the Virginia Southern Railroad, where the highway reduces to a two-lane undivided road and intersects US 15 (College Avenue). SR 49 and US 15 continue east concurrent into downtown Clarksville, where the highway passes through the Clarksville Historic District. After passing through the downtown area, SR 49 and US 15 leave the town of Clarksville by crossing the John H. Kerr Reservoir, an impoundment of the Roanoke River that is also known as Buggs Island Lake, on the Phillip Saint Julian Wilson Bridge and a causeway. The bridge, which contains lights underneath used for nighttime fishing, includes a brief passage through Halifax County due to the thalwegs of the Roanoke and Dan Rivers, which were used to set the county boundaries, converging just south of Clarksville. At the east end of the causeway, access to US 58 is provided at a four-way intersection. Ramps to US 58 west and US 58 east form the southern and eastern legs of the intersection, which mainline US 58 avoids via a pair of flyover ramps just east of its bridge over the reservoir. SR 49 and US 15 turn north, cross over the Virginia Southern rail line, and parallel the eastern shore of the lake until the two highways split at the hamlet of Dortch Store.[2]
SR 49 heads northeast, crossing Goodell Creek, Little Bluestone Creek, and Woodpecker Creek and passing through the hamlet of Jones Store before reaching Chase City. Just inside the town limits, SR 49 joins SR 92 in a concurrency on Second Street while crossing Little Bluestone Creek again. In the center of town, the two highways cross over the Virginia Southern rail line and intersect Main Street. SR 92 heads south toward Boydton on Main Street, SR 47 heads east on Second Street toward South Hill, and SR 49 turns north onto Main Street to join SR 47 in a concurrency. At the north end of town, SR 47 splits to the northwest while SR 49 veers northeast, where the highway crosses the Meherrin River on the Tucker Mill Bridge into Lunenburg County. The state highway gains the name Courthouse Road, which it carries as it bridges the Middle Meherrin River and North Meherrin River and passes through the county seat of Lunenburg, where SR 40 (Lunenburg County Road) joins the highway in a concurrency northeast to the town of Victoria. SR 49 and SR 40 enter the town as Court Street, crossing the former right-of-way of the Norfolk, Franklin and Danville Railway before reaching Main Street. SR 40 turns south toward Kenbridge while SR 49 turns north then veers northeast onto Nottoway Boulevard.[2]
SR 49 leaves Victoria as The Falls Road, named for the cataract where the state highway crosses the Nottoway River into Nottoway County. The state highway is also named Earle Davis Gregory Highway, named for Earle Davis Gregory, a World War I Medal of Honor recipient. At the river, SR 49 turns north, crossing Whetstone Creek and the Little Nottoway River before reaching the town of Crewe. The state highway crosses over Norfolk Southern Railway's Norfolk District just east of a rail yard. SR 49 turns northwest onto Virginia Avenue, where the highway joins US 460 in a concurrency. The two highways become West Virginia Avenue outside of the downtown area and parallel the rail yard to the west end of town, where SR 49 turns north onto Watsons Wood Road. SR 49 crosses Deep Creek before reaching its northern terminus at US 360 (Patrick Henry Highway) northeast of Burkeville.[2]
History
Prior to 1940, SR 49 continued west from Virgilina to US 501 and north from Burkeville all the way to Flint Hill. Most of SR 49 north of Burkeville became US 522 in the 1940 renumbering.
Major intersections
County | Location | mi[1] | km | Destinations | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Halifax | Virgilina | 0.00 | 0.00 | NC 49 south / NC 96 south – Roxboro, Oxford | North Carolina state line; southern terminus; southern end of SR 96 concurrency |
0.13 | 0.21 | SR 96 west (Seventh Street) / SR 734 (Florence Avenue) to US 501 – South Boston | Northern end of SR 96 concurrency | ||
Mecklenburg | Sandy Fork | 11.29 | 18.17 | US 58 west – South Boston | Southern end of US 58 concurrency |
Puryear Corner | 345.64 | 556.25 | US 58 Bus. east – Clarksville, Town of Clarksville Historic District | ||
Clarksville | 347.10 | 558.60 | US 15 – Clarksville, Oxford, NC | interchange | |
15.79 | 25.41 | US 58 east / US 58 Bus. west – Clarksville, Boydton, South Hill, Occoneechee State Park | interchange; north end of US 58 overlap | ||
| 17.39 | 27.99 | US 15 north – Farmville | Northern end of US 15 concurrency | |
Chase City | 29.50 | 47.48 | SR 92 west – Charlotte CH | Southern end of SR 92 concurrency | |
30.25 | 48.68 | SR 47 south / SR 92 east – South Hill, Boydton | Northern end of SR 92 concurrency; southern end of SR 47 concurrency | ||
31.51 | 50.71 | SR 47 west to US 360 – Charlotte CH, Pamplin City | Northern end of SR 47 concurrency | ||
Lunenburg | Lunenburg | 46.74 | 75.22 | SR 40 west (Lunenburg County Road) – Keysville | Southern end of SR 40 concurrency |
Victoria | SR 40 Truck east / SR 49 Truck north / SR 1024 (Tidewater Avenue) | ||||
50.13 | 80.68 | SR 40 east / SR 49 Truck south (Main Street) / SR 1002 (8th Street) – Kenbridge, trucks to SR 40 west | Northern end of SR 40 concurrency | ||
| SR 723 (Burkeville Road) – Burkeville | former SR 49 north | |||
Nottoway | Crewe | 65.32 | 105.12 | US 460 east (East Virginia Avenue) – Blackstone, Petersburg | Southern end of US 460 concurrency |
67.12 | 108.02 | US 460 west (West Virginia Avenue) – Burkeville | Northern end of US 460 concurrency | ||
| 69.01 | 111.06 | US 360 (Patrick Henry Highway) – Burkeville, Danville, Amelia, Richmond | Northern terminus | |
1.000 mi = 1.609 km; 1.000 km = 0.621 mi
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SR 49 Truck
Virginia State Truck Route 49 in Victoria, Virginia starts out overlapped with Virginia State Route 40 Truck, following Tidewater Avenue from Court Street to West 6th Street, Railroad Avenue from Tidewater Avenue and West 6th Street to Main Street, and First Avenue. From there it turns north onto Main Street in another overlap, this time with Virginia State Route 40, and terminates at the east end of the VA 40/49 overlap.
References
- ^ a b "2009 Traffic Data". Virginia Department of Transportation. 2009. Retrieved December 21, 2010.
- Halifax County (PDF)
- Mecklenburg County (PDF)
- Lunenburg County (PDF)
- Nottoway County (PDF)
- ^ a b c d Google (2010-12-21). "Virginia State Route 49" (Map). Google Maps. Google. Retrieved 2010-12-21.