Brick roads. What is the history and areas they are found.

[diabeticman]

Here at least- in Western PA you come across a road that is made of bricks or had been brick at one time and they paved over them. My questions:

Did bricks roads exsist where you live?


Anyone know why Brick was used?


Does anyone know if a brick road is still maintained?

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

1. Probably an old WPA road construction job

possibly as far back as pre-WWII. The town's local Historical Society should have all the details.

[diabeticman]

2. Thanks. My wife will look into that... And she said she never saw the show but loves your name

[csziggy]

3. Tallahassee Florida used to have a lot of brick roads downtown

In the 70s and 80s they paved the most of them - but they pulled up the bricks and sold them. My husband bought one of them and it's around here somewhere. Adams Street just north of the state capitol building is still brick and there may be some other streets that have some brick left.

Thomasville Georgia just north of Tallahassee still has a lot of brick streets since their downtown residential areas remain undisturbed. If you want to see what their brick streets look like, go to 150 Broad Street, Thomasville, Georgia on Google Maps and take a look with street view.

I suspect they used brick around here since the area is known as the Red Hills for the red clay everywhere. So brick was a local product and easier to get than asphalt or cement which had to be brought in. The local brick plant that was in sight of Florida State University didn't close until the 1990s and bricks are still made within 100 miles of here from local clay.

[diabeticman]

5. Thanks for the info

[frogmarch]

4. I grew up in Alliance, Nebraska.

The main street, Box Butte Ave., was and still is paved with bricks. When I was a teenager, my friends and I drove up and down Box Butte to meet other friends, usually to go drink beer together somewhere. We called driving up and down Box Butte “cruising the Butte” or “breezing the bricks.” All I know about the history of Box Butte Ave. is that the bricks were laid in the 1920s.

[diabeticman]

6. It is awesome to see. They actually replace the brick... that is cool.

[ballardgirl]

7. City just north of Seattle

has a red brick road. Here's a link to the history and pictures: http://ofparamount.blogspot.com/2011/04/shorelines-town-center-and-red-brick.html

[diabeticman]

8. thanks for the link

[Kaleva]

9. Brick road laying machine video

[diabeticman]

10. thanks

[Kaleva]

11. A town not far from where I live recently repaved its main street with bricks

Houghton Michigan

[Archae]

12. Several here in Sheboygan...

12th street between Superior and Huron, is the only one I can think of.

[raccoon]

13. I saw some in Kansas when I was there a year ago. No, not yellow!

Red brick roads. Here and there, very small, low-traffic areas. Think it
was in Dodge City and/or Garden City.

[LeftInTX]

14. Saw them in Philadelphia when I was a kid

I assumed it was the work of the founding father's and didn't give it a second thought - LOL

(None that I know where I am now)

[cyberswede]

15. Our small town has brick streets

They repair and restore the brick, when needed.

[kwassa]

16. Here in Oz they are everywhere. One is made out of yellow brick.

I follow it from time to time.

[Brother Buzz]

17. Bricks were at a premium in my area but basalt cobblestones were often used

They were just a marginal improvement over gravel until asphalt, the final fix, was laid over the rough stones. We see them occasionally when roadwork is done in the 'older' parts of town, and to my delight, the workers toss them aside rather then reset them. I have a pile of them in my backyard and one face still has asphalt residue glued to it.

[olddots]

18. we had many brick roads in New England

In L.A. the streets are paved with broken dreams. ( there is a song here )

[hunter]

19. We have some newer developments in our California city...

...with concrete faux-brick streets.

Installed by hand over crushed stone, the old fashioned way.

We lived for a time in Urbana-Champaign Illinois on a brick street.

[yellowdogintexas]

20. Camp Bowie Boulevard in Fort Worth has a long brick segment

It is the oldest part of Camp Bowie, and this section is just called "The Bricks" Here is a little info about the brick section from a historical writeup. I looked for a good photo but had no luck at all.

Though the street was very busy, throughout the early 1920s it remained unpaved. That changed in the late 20s and early 30s, when many thousands of red bricks were laid to provide a more durable driving surface. These high-quality bricks were manufactured 70 miles west of Fort Worth in Thurber, Texas. Bricks from these same kilns also came to grace other splendid Texas streets, including Congress Avenue in Austin, Seawall Boulevard in Galveston and Exchange Avenue in the Fort Worth Stockyards.

[orleans]

21. outside of chicago--we still have some brick streets

they fix them up every now and then

i hate driving on them

[Jenoch]

22. I think the word you are looking for is 'cobblestone'.