Control city

This sign in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma lists control cities of Wichita, Kansas and Ft. Smith, Arkansas for Interstate 35 and Interstate 40 respectively.

A control city is a city or locality posted on a traffic sign indicating forward destinations on a certain route. These destinations aid motorists using the highway system to reach destinations along the various routes.^[1] Such cities appear on signs at highway junctions to indicate where the intersecting road goes, or on mileage signs on longer routes.

United States

The determination of major destinations or control cities is important to the quality of service provided by the freeway. Control cities on freeway guide signs are selected by the States and are contained in the "List of Control Cities for Use in Guide Signs on Interstate Highways," published and available from American Association of State and Highway Transportation Officials.

—Federal Highway Administration, Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, 2003 Edition, Chapter 2E^[2]

The MUTCD states that control cities should be used:

1. At interchanges between freeways (example US-1 in gallery)
2. At separation points of overlapping freeway routes (example US-2 in gallery)
3. On directional signs on intersecting routes, to guide traffic entering the freeway (example US-3 in gallery)
4. On pull-through signs (example US-4 in gallery)
5. On the bottom line of post-interchange distance signs (example US-5 in gallery)

The individual states ultimately have the authority to decide which cities can be control cities,^[3] but the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials retains the authority to approve the official list and standardizes all control cities used on the Interstate Highway system in the United States. The published standard is not always followed, for a few reasons – major destinations have since appeared that were not on the original list, new roads have been built that provide new routes, or because of state highway departments' hesitancy to sign destinations in other states. Some examples:

I-76 (Pennsylvania Turnpike) uses "Ohio" to guide motorists west.

North of Baltimore in Maryland, New York is used instead of closer Philadelphia.

This sign in Petersburg, Virginia aids long-distance travelers, by listing the cities of Miami, Florida and Atlanta, Georgia.

• On eastbound Interstate 10 near Palm Springs, California, Caltrans uses the small city of Indio, California, and "other Desert Cities", though Phoenix, Arizona is the nearest major forward destination.[1]
• Sometimes, the opposite is true. In Washington state, Vancouver, British Columbia is the control city for northbound Interstate 5 north of Seattle, which is reached via British Columbia Highway 99.[2]
• On Interstate 85 in North Carolina, NCDOT uses Richmond, Virginia as the control city even though it terminates at I-95 in Petersburg, Virginia, 20 miles (30 km) south of Richmond. VDOT uses Petersburg.[3]
• On Interstate 65 in Indiana, INDOT uses Chicago as the control city though I-65 terminates at Gary, Indiana, 17 miles (30 km) south of Chicago.
• On Interstate 515 in Las Vegas, the Nevada Department of Transportation (NDOT) uses Phoenix as the control city, though I-515 terminates in southeast suburban Henderson. I-515 runs concurrently with US 93 and US 95 along its entire length; traffic continues into the state of Arizona on non-Interstate-standard alignments of US 93 (with the US 93 portion crossing the Arizona state line over Hoover Dam, while the US 95 portion splits off just outside Henderson and Boulder City and heads south towards Searchlight and Cal-Nev-Ari, entering the state of California near Needles, where it merges with I-40). US 93 does not reach all the way to Phoenix, its southern terminus coming at a junction with US 60 in the town of Wickenburg, about 50 miles northwest of Phoenix; southbound traffic into the Phoenix area continues on US 60 east.

A control city is not always a major city. For instance:

• Interstate 10 heading eastbound out of New Orleans uses Slidell, a small city near I-12 and I-59's terminus.
• Interstate 10 heading eastbound out of Slidell uses Bay St. Louis, a small city west of Gulfport, Mississippi.
• Interstate 12 uses Hammond where it crosses I-55 and Slidell a small city at the highway's terminus at I-10 and I-59's southern terminus.
• Interstate 35 heading south out of the Twin Cities uses Albert Lea, the last town before the Iowa border, and where I-35 intersects with I-90.
• Interstate 55 heading northbound out of LaPlace uses Hammond, where it crosses I-12.
• Interstate 66 heading westbound out of Washington, D.C. uses Front Royal, a small city near the highway's terminus of Strasburg, Virginia.
• Interstate 76 heading westbound out of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, uses Valley Forge, a historic but minor locality where I-76 joins the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
• Interstate 76 westbound in the Pittsburgh area uses "Ohio and West" on overhead signs. I-76 (The Pennsylvania Turnpike) continues into Ohio as the Ohio Turnpike, where it meets I-80 and leaves the Turnpike while I-80 joins the Turnpike. This means that Youngstown, Ohio, Akron, Ohio, Cleveland, Ohio, and Toledo, Ohio (all control cities) are appropriate for I-76 westbound. Cleveland is used once in Pennsylvania as a control city for the Ohio Turnpike, as is Columbus, Ohio (for Interstate 70).[4]
• Interstate 80 in Illinois uses Iowa as the westbound destination and Indiana as the eastbound destination, even though the Quad Cities could be used for westbound traffic and Gary, Indiana could be used for eastbound traffic.
• Interstate 81 heading north from Syracuse, New York uses Canada as its control city. Interstate 81 is connected directly to Highway 401 in Ontario, from which point both the major cities of Toronto and Montreal can be reached.
• Interstate 94 heading west out of the Twin Cities uses St. Cloud and then Moorhead, instead of the larger and more well-known neighbor, Fargo, North Dakota.
• Interstate H3 westbound in Hawaii uses Pearl Harbor, a physical feature and major naval base at its western terminus, instead of a city along Interstate H1. (example US-4 in gallery)

Occasionally, a closer large city is not a control city because a larger city is located farther along a highway. For example:

• Highway signs in Maryland on Interstate 95 northbound between the Interstate 395 junction in Baltimore and the Delaware border use New York City as their control city, even though I-95 directly passes through the closer Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
• At the interchange between Interstate 95 and Interstate 85 south of Richmond, the city of Miami, Florida (920 miles away) is indicated as a long-distance control city for I-95 south, and Atlanta, Georgia (500 miles away) is indicated as a long-distance control city for I-85 south, as well as including the next control cities of Rocky Mount, North Carolina and Durham, North Carolina, respectively.
• At the interchange of Interstate 70 and Interstate 81 in Hagerstown, Maryland, the control city for I-81 south is Roanoke, Virginia, over 200 miles (300 km) away, with the control cities of Martinsburg, West Virginia and Winchester, Virginia overlooked.[5]

Canada

The A20 can be used to reach the Mercier Bridge and Toronto from here in Montreal.

Control cities are particularly necessary for highways that do not follow strict linear directions. Ontario's Queen Elizabeth Way, for example, wraps around the western end of Lake Ontario, with segments proceeding both east and west at different points. Compass directions are not used at all in its central sections, and the control cities of Toronto and (for the opposite direction) Hamilton/Niagara Falls/Fort Erie are the only bearings provided.

Highway directions in Montréal, Québec indicate control cities as far as Toronto and Ottawa on major Autoroutes 20 and 40 respectively.

Europe

Continental Europe

Unlike in the United States and Canada, roads in Continental Europe are not signed with directional banners (east, west, north, and south), so the direction of the route is indicated by a major city or destination (directly or indirectly) reached by the route (example FR-1 below). While not called "control cities", the function is the same.

Britain and Ireland

On UK motorways, directional banners are often used, usually followed by the next largest city on the route. In the Republic of Ireland, directional banners are used on the M50.

Gallery

US-1: I-95 and I-16 intersect.	US-2: I-40 and I-85 split. I-40 goes through Greensboro to Winston-Salem, while I-85 heads south to Charlotte.	US-3: Durham and Greensboro are used to aid motorists to decide which direction to go.	US-4: I-H3 westbound uses "Pearl Harbor".
US-5: Baltimore is the major control city on I-70 eastbound through Maryland. Washington, DC is a major city of interest.	FR-1: Following the A1 leads to Lille and Calais, and the A2 leads to Belgium- the E19 directly to Brussels and via other routes to Liège.

Notes

External links

• List of Control Cities for Use in Guide Signs on Interstate Highways