Old concrete was better

Not long ago I revisited some favorite places on the National Road in Putnam County, Indiana. One of them was this short stretch of concrete road east of Reelsville. This photo is eastbound, from the intersection with CR 800 W. Notice how the concrete appears to curve off to the right, and the road beyond is gravel. It’s a long story that I told here, but the concrete was removed past that curve and no road exists there anymore. Here’s the westbound road toward its dead end just ahead of modern US 40. This is private property now and serves as a driveway. Notice that there are no expansion joints in this road. I’ve seen a few other examples of what I call “continuous concrete” around Indiana, including another segment of former US 40 not too far away, a segment of former US 52 in Indianapolis, and a since-demolished segment of State Road 37 near Martinsville. My hypothesis is that Indiana built continuous concrete roads before figuring out that expansion joints reduced cracking and…