Tucked away in an obscure corner of the federal government’s massive, sprawling web presence is evidence that Washington, D.C. bureaucrats, have a human side—if perhaps a slightly OCD one.

This evidence comes in the form of a list of road songs compiled by one Richard F. Weingroff, an employee in the Federal Highway Administration’s Office of Infrastructure. The list, he writes, had its genesis in some projects he was working on in 1996 for the 40th anniversary of the Interstate System. Once that project was completed it took on a life of its own, with members of the public continuing to submit songs. The most recent update was in December.

There are the obvious contributors like AC/DC (“Highway to Hell”), Johnny Cash (“I’ve Been Everywhere”), and James Taylor (too many to list), of course. But the list also contains more obscure musicians as well. I never thought, for instance, that I’d stumble across Hamell on Trial, an acoustic punk-folk-rocker, on a government website—except perhaps as part of a grandstanding Senator’s crusade for decency standards. The existence of this list—along with its length, eclecticism, and yet simultaneous incompleteness—is one of only a handful of anecdotes I could’ve chosen to illustrate America’s love affair with the open road.

It’s not just music; among the other curious documents I found buried on the site was an article from the archives of Public Roads, the agency’s bi-monthly magazine, about road poetry that reaches back to Walt Whitman and his “Song of the Open Road.”

Roads are capable of enflaming the imagination to a degree unmatched by all but a few other physical artifacts.

That may be one reason why Governor Sean Parnell’s mention in last month’s State of the State Address of plans to move forward with some ambitious road-building projects has continued to reverberate through the state.

“We will provide better access to state lands for resources, recreation, and communities,” he said.

“We will build the road to Umiat. We will continue work on the road to Nome, and with money already in hand, we will improve the road to Cascade Point, here in Juneau.”

It was barely three sentences, and all but lacking in specifics. That’s the kind of vague political promise that might not even raise eyebrows if it weren’t for the sheer romance of the idea.

A decade into the 21st century and most of the planet—especially most of the developed world—has been criss-crossed with roads. After spending an hour or two with Google, I was able to find just one single town in the Lower 48 (Supai, on the Havasupai Indian Reservation on the floor of the Grand Canyon) that can’t be reached by road.

If a road were built to Nome, the 500-mile highway would be one of the last great engineering projects of its kind this nation might ever see, not to mention Alaska’s first mega-project in a generation.

So it’s easy to understand the appeal that a road to Nome would have.

What’s harder to understand is why after sober deliberation the idea is still being considered. Consider, after all, a report from the engineers at Dowl unearthed by the Anchorage Daily News that found building along the best route (starting from Manley Hot Springs, and following the Yukon) would cost around $5 million a mile.

Perhaps the best argument for it is the one made on behalf of the towns it would serve, both on the Seward Peninsula and on the way there. Donny Olson, a Democratic Senator from Nome, complained to the ADN about the cost of fuel in Nome, but he could’ve been talking about just about just about anything, since almost everything needs to be flown or shipped in at great expense.

A road would cut those costs to the tune of $19 million a year (less than half of the estimated $40 million annual operating cost), split about equally between the cost of cargo and the cost of U.S. Mail. “The impact on the air carriers that benefit from the bypass mail subsidies are not counted in those savings,’” notes Fairbanks Daily-News Miner columnist Dermot Cole. The study itself points out that the postal service—not rural residents—would benefit from those savings. Air cargo, an important industry in Alaska, seems likely to suffer.

Which brings us to another of the reasons Parnell gave for pursuing the roads campaign: resources. Umiat, of course, has petroleum. The extension of the Glacier Highway outside Juneau will enhance access for the Kensington Mine. The road to Nome? That’s a little less clear. Despite the possibility of a connection to the Donlin Creek mine, the prospect-to-cost ratio for the Nome road pales next to its counterparts. And even if there were large-scale resource extraction possibilities it’s not clear that they’d pay for the cost of building the road to them.

That leaves just one last consideration from Parnell’s list. Recreation.

And this is the most seductive, least rational consideration, I think—the one that gets us closest to that romance of the road. Who wouldn’t want to be behind the wheel, headed toward the one last bit of fresh road headed west?

Even though I can’t make a reasonable argument in favor of the state’s building this road, I’ll be one of the first lined up to drive it if it ever is built. If you’re like a lot of Alaskans I know, so will you.

I can point you toward some good road trip music, if you’re interested.

krestia.degeorge@anchoragepress.com