Talk:U.S. Route 36

What is a notable city?
Estes Park (in Colorado) is a notable city even though it is not very large, being a major tourist resort for more than 100 years.

In eastern Colorado and Northern Kansas, U.S. Route 36 covers roughly 600 miles without encountering any city or town of 5000 or more people. Are we therefore to regard this piece of highway as being utterly featureless?

I think not. For that reason the list of cities includes the two largest towns in this stretch -- Hiawatha and Norton, both in Kansas -- which are outstanding examples of midwestern county-seat towns serving farm country, even though their popluations are only about 3000-4000. I also included one town with a nostalgic tourist attraction: Lebanon, Kansas, with the monument indicating the geographical center of the "lower 48" states of the USA.

Similarly, U.S. Route 36 in eastern Indiana runs about 80 miles without encountering any town of more than 1500 people (except for some rather unremarkable Indianapolis suburbs). It is my opinion that this portion of the road can be appropriately represented by the town of Lynn, the boyhood home of the notorious Rev. Jim "Kool-aid" Jones, population about 1100. To mention additional hamlets between Indianapolis and the Ohio border would be superfluous.

Paul 14 November 2006