Shopping on line can be easy, simple and save you lots of money. It can also take a lot of your time, frustrate you, and result in unwanted purchases. Now the same can be said for regular high street shopping, but with the vast opportunity presented by the Internet it will pay you to spend a few minutes reading this and understanding how to better optimize your Pan American Highway shopping experience:
1. Compare - without doubt the biggest advantage that the Pan American Highway offers shoppers today is the ability to compare thousands of Pan American Highway at a time. This is a great thing, but not necessarily all the time! Too much can be daunting at times so take advantage of the great comparison sites and where possible let them do the hard work for you.
2. Research - if it has been said it will be on the internet. Ignorance is no longer a justifiable reason for buying the wrong thing. Take the time to research in detail everything that you could possible want to know about
3. Testimonials - don't know anybody that has bought a Pan American Highway? Wrong! If the Pan American Highway is good the internet will let you know. Use the Internet as a friend and get testimonials before you buy.
4. Questions - Got a question about Pan American Highway then search the Forums, FAQ's, Blogs etc. Don't be afraid to ask .....
5. Reputation - Never heard of the company selling Pan American Highway? Don't worry, no reason why you should know every company in the world, but you know someone that does! Use the internet to find out what people are saying about Pan American Highway and build up a picture of their reputation for sales, returns, customer service, delivery etc.
6. Returns - still worried that even after all of the above your Pan American Highway wont be what you want? Check out the returns policy. There is so much competition now that someone, somewhere is bound to offer the terms that you are comfortable with.
7. Feedback - happy with your Pan American Highway then let people know, after all you are depending on others people input in your buying decision, so why not give a little back.
8. Security - check for the yellow padlock on the Pan American Highway site before you buy, and the s after http:/ /i.e. https:// = a secure site
9. Contact - got a question about Pan American Highway, or want to leave a comment then check out the sites contact page. Reputable companies have them and respond.
10. Payment - ready to pay for your Pan American Highway, then use your credit card or PayPal! Be aware of companies that don't accept them, there may be genuine reasons but given the huge amount of choice you have when buying online there is no reason at all not to buy via credit card or PayPal.
The
Pan-American Highway (see #Names for its name in all languages) is a network of
roads nearly 48,000 kilometres (29,800 miles) in total length. Except for an 87 kilometre (54 mi) rainforest gap, the road links the mainland nations of the
Americas in a connected highway system. According to The Guinness Book of World Records, the Pan-American Highway is the world's longest "motorable road".
The Pan-American Highway system is mostly complete and extends from Fairbanks, Alaska in
North America to the lower reaches of
South America. Several highway termini are claimed to exist, including the cities of
Puerto Montt and Quellón in
Chile and Ushuaia in
Argentina. No comprehensive route is officially defined in Canada and the
United States, though several highways there are called "Pan-American".
The Pan-American Highway passes through many diverse climates and ecological types, from dense jungles to cold mountain passes. Since the highway passes through many countries, it is far from uniform. Some stretches of the highway are passable only during the dry season, and in many regions driving is occasionally hazardous.
Famous sections of the Pan-American Highway include the Alaska Highway and the
Inter-American Highway (the section between the United States and the Panama Canal). Both of these sections were built during World War II as a means of supply of remote areas without danger of attack by U-boats.
Jake Silverstein, writing in 2006, described the Pan-American Highway as "a system so vast, so incomplete, and so incomprehensible it is not so much a road as it is the idea of Pan-Americanism itself…" (Silverstein, p. 71)
Pan-American Highway system overview
The Pan-American Highway travels through the following 15 countries:
Important spurs also lead into
Bolivia,
Brazil, Paraguay,
Uruguay and Venezuela.
For
tourism purposes, the Pan-American Highway north of Central America is sometimes assumed to use the
Alaska Highway and then run down the west coast of Canada and the United States, running east from San Diego, California and picking up the branch to Nogales, Arizona.
The Darién Gap
The notable stretch that keeps the highway from being completely connected is a section of land between the Panama Canal in Panama and the
Colombian border called the
Darién Gap, which is a 87 km (54 mile) stretch of rainforest. The gap has been crossed by adventurers on
bicycle (first bicycle crossing by Chris Bechard and Scott Kiekhaefer, January 1981),
motorbike, all-terrain vehicle, and foot, dealing with jungle,
quicksand,
swamp, insects, and other hazards.
There are many people, groups, indigenous populations and governments that are opposed to completing the Darién portion of the highway, with reasons as varied as the desire to protect the rain forest, containing the spread of tropical diseases, protecting the livelihood of indigenous peoples in the area, and preventing foot and mouth disease from entering North America. Experience with the extension as far as
Yaviza included severe deforestation within a decade alongside the highway route. The Darién area is disputed by the Colombian paramilitary group
AUC and its Marxist anti-government rivals FARC and ELN, a state of affairs which could disrupt construction works and driving through the highway afterwards.
One option proposed, in a study by
Bio-Pacifico, is a short ferry link from Colombia to a new ferry port in Panama, with an extension of the existing Panama highway that would complete the highway without violating these environmental concerns. The ferry would cross the Gulf of Urabá from
Turbo, Colombia, to a new Panamanian port (possibly Carreto) connected to a Caribbean coast extension of the highway. Efficient routing would probably dictate that the existing route to Yaviza be relegated to secondary road status.
Development and completion
The concept of a route from one tip of the Americas to the other was originally proposed at the First Pan-American Conference in
1889 as a railroad; however, nothing ever came of this proposal. The idea of the Pan-American Highway emerged at the
Fifth International Conference of American States in 1923, where it was originally conceived as a single route. The first Pan-American highway conference convened
October 5, 1925 in
Buenos Aires. Mexico was the first Latin American country to complete its portion of the highway, in 1950. (Silverstein, p. 71)
The Northern Section of the Pan-American Highway
No road in the U.S. or Canada has been officially designated as the Pan-American Highway, and thus the primary road officially starts at the
U.S.-Mexico border. The original route began at the border at Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas (opposite
Laredo, Texas) and went south through Mexico City. Later branches were built to the border at Nogales, Sonora (Nogales, Arizona),
Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua (El Paso, Texas), Piedras Negras, Coahuila (
Eagle Pass, Texas), Reynosa, Tamaulipas (Pharr, Texas), and Matamoros, Tamaulipas (Brownsville, Texas).
On the other hand, several roads in the U.S. were locally named after the Pan-American Highway. When the section of Interstate 35 in San Antonio, Texas was built, it was named the
Pan Am Expressway, as an extension of the original route from Laredo.
Interstate 25 in Albuquerque, New Mexico has been named the
Pan-American Freeway, as an extension of the route to El Paso. U.S. Route 85, which goes north from El Paso, is designated the CanAm Highway, which continues into Canada in the province of
Saskatchewan, before terminating at La Ronge, Saskatchewan.
The original route to Laredo travels up
Mexican Federal Highway 85 from Mexico City. The various spurs follow:
- Nogales spur - Mexican Federal Highway 15 from Mexico City
- El Paso spur - Mexican Federal Highway 45 from Mexico City
- Eagle Pass spur - unknown, possibly Mexican Federal Highway 57 from Mexico City
- Pharr spur - Mexican Federal Highway 40 from Monterrey, Mexico
- Brownsville spur - Mexican Federal Highway 101 from Ciudad Victoria, Mexico
From Mexico City to the border with Guatemala, the Highway follows Mexican Federal Highway 190. Through the Central American countries, it follows Central American Highway 1, ending at
Yaviza, Panama at the edge of the Darién Gap. The road had formerly ended at Cañita, Panama, 110 miles (178 km) north of its current end. United States government funding was particularly significant to complete a high-level bridge over the
Panama Canal, during the years when the canal was administered by the United States.
The Southern Section of the Pan-American Highway
, Colombia over the PanAm HighwayThe southern part of the highway begins in northwestern Colombia, from where it follows
Colombia Highway 52 to Medellín. At Medellín,
Colombia Highway 54 leads to Bogotá, but Colombia Highway 11 turns south for a more direct route.
Colombia Highway 72 is routed southwest from Bogotá to join Highway 11 at
Murillo, Colombia. Highway 11 continues all the way to the border with Ecuador.
Ecuador Highway 35 runs the whole length of that country.
Peru Highway 1 carries the Pan-American Highway all the way through Peru to the border with Chile.
In
Chile, the highway follows Chile Highway 5 south to a point north of Santiago, Chile. The highway turns east there on
Chile Highway 60, which becomes
National Route 7 (Argentina) to Buenos Aires, the end of the main highway. On-line Encarta Encyclopedia The highway network also continues south of Buenos Aires along
National Route 3 (Argentina) towards the city of Ushuaia and
Cape Horn.
One branch, known as the Simón Bolívar Highway, runs from
Bogotá (Colombia) to Guiria (Venezuela). It begins by using
Colombia Highway 71 all the way to the border with Venezuela. From there it uses Venezuela Highway 1 to
Caracas and Venezuela Highway 9 to its end at Guiria.
A continuation of the Pan-American Highway to the
Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro uses a ferry from Buenos Aires to
Colonia, Uruguay in
Uruguay and Uruguay Highway 1 to Montevideo. Uruguay Highway 9 and Brazil Highway 471 route to near
Pelotas, Brazil, from where
Brazil Highway 116 leads to Rio de Janeiro.
Another branch, from Buenos Aires to
Asunción in Paraguay, heads out of Buenos Aires on National Route 9 (Argentina). It switches to National Route 11 (Argentina) at Rosario, which crosses the border with Paraguay right at Asunción. Other branches probably exist across the center of South America.
The highway does not have official segments to Belize, Guyana,
Suriname and French Guiana, nor to the assorted islands in the Caribbean region. However, highways from Venezuela link to Brazilian
Trans-Amazonian highway that provide a southwest entrance to Guyana, route to the coast, and follow a coastal route through Suriname to French Guiana.
See also Pan-American Highway (North America)
and Pan-American Highway (South America)
for a detailed description of the highway route.
Names
- Carretera Panamericana, Autopista Panamericana, or Vía Panamericana
- Estrada Panamericana
- Panamericana
- Pan-Amerikaanse Snelweg
- Autoroute Panaméricaine
- Autostrada Panamericana
In art and culture
The Pan-American highway is the subject of a recent (as of
2006) conceptual art piece,
The School of Panamerican Unrest, where Mexican-born artist
Pablo Helguera is attempting to drive a portable schoolhouse for the length of the entire route.
The travel writer
Tim Cahill (writer) wrote a book,
Road Fever, about his record-setting 24-day drive from
Ushuaia in the Argentine province of Tierra del Fuego, Antarctica, and South Atlantic Islands Province to Prudhoe Bay in the U.S. state of Alaska with professional long-distance driver Garry Sowerby, much of their route following the Pan-American Highway.
Sources
- Microsoft Encarta - Pan-American Highway
- Plan Federal Highway System, New York Times May 15, 1932 page XX7
- Reported from the Motor World, New York Times January 26, 1936 page XX6
- Hemisphere Road is Nearer Reality, New York Times January 7, 1953 page 58
- 1997-98 American Automobile Association Caribbean, Central America and South America map
- Jake Silverstein, "Highway Run", Harper's, July 2006, p.70–80.
References
The
Pan-American Highway (see #Names for its name in all languages) is a network of
roads nearly 48,000 kilometres (29,800 miles) in total length. Except for an 87 kilometre (54 mi) rainforest gap, the road links the mainland nations of the Americas in a connected highway system. According to The Guinness Book of World Records, the Pan-American Highway is the world's longest "motorable road".
The Pan-American Highway system is mostly complete and extends from Fairbanks, Alaska in
North America to the lower reaches of
South America. Several highway termini are claimed to exist, including the cities of Puerto Montt and Quellón in Chile and Ushuaia in
Argentina. No comprehensive route is officially defined in Canada and the United States, though several highways there are called "Pan-American".
The Pan-American Highway passes through many diverse climates and ecological types, from dense jungles to cold mountain passes. Since the highway passes through many countries, it is far from uniform. Some stretches of the highway are passable only during the dry season, and in many regions driving is occasionally hazardous.
Famous sections of the Pan-American Highway include the
Alaska Highway and the Inter-American Highway (the section between the United States and the Panama Canal). Both of these sections were built during World War II as a means of supply of remote areas without danger of attack by U-boats.
Jake Silverstein, writing in 2006, described the Pan-American Highway as "a system so vast, so incomplete, and so incomprehensible it is not so much a road as it is the idea of Pan-Americanism itself…" (Silverstein, p. 71)
Pan-American Highway system overview
The Pan-American Highway travels through the following 15 countries:
Important spurs also lead into Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay,
Uruguay and
Venezuela.
For
tourism purposes, the Pan-American Highway north of Central America is sometimes assumed to use the Alaska Highway and then run down the west coast of Canada and the United States, running east from
San Diego, California and picking up the branch to Nogales, Arizona.
The Darién Gap
The notable stretch that keeps the highway from being completely connected is a section of land between the
Panama Canal in Panama and the
Colombian border called the
Darién Gap, which is a 87 km (54 mile) stretch of rainforest. The gap has been crossed by adventurers on bicycle (first bicycle crossing by Chris Bechard and Scott Kiekhaefer, January 1981),
motorbike,
all-terrain vehicle, and foot, dealing with
jungle, quicksand, swamp, insects, and other hazards.
There are many people, groups, indigenous populations and governments that are opposed to completing the Darién portion of the highway, with reasons as varied as the desire to protect the rain forest, containing the spread of tropical diseases, protecting the livelihood of indigenous peoples in the area, and preventing foot and mouth disease from entering North America. Experience with the extension as far as
Yaviza included severe deforestation within a decade alongside the highway route. The Darién area is disputed by the Colombian paramilitary group
AUC and its Marxist anti-government rivals
FARC and
ELN, a state of affairs which could disrupt construction works and driving through the highway afterwards.
One option proposed, in a study by Bio-Pacifico, is a short ferry link from Colombia to a new ferry port in Panama, with an extension of the existing Panama highway that would complete the highway without violating these environmental concerns. The ferry would cross the
Gulf of Urabá from
Turbo, Colombia, to a new Panamanian port (possibly Carreto) connected to a Caribbean coast extension of the highway. Efficient routing would probably dictate that the existing route to Yaviza be relegated to secondary road status.
Development and completion
The concept of a route from one tip of the Americas to the other was originally proposed at the
First Pan-American Conference in
1889 as a railroad; however, nothing ever came of this proposal. The idea of the Pan-American Highway emerged at the Fifth International Conference of American States in
1923, where it was originally conceived as a single route. The first Pan-American highway conference convened
October 5, 1925 in Buenos Aires. Mexico was the first Latin American country to complete its portion of the highway, in
1950. (Silverstein, p. 71)
The Northern Section of the Pan-American Highway
No road in the U.S. or Canada has been officially designated as the Pan-American Highway, and thus the primary road officially starts at the U.S.-Mexico border. The original route began at the border at
Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas (opposite
Laredo, Texas) and went south through
Mexico City. Later branches were built to the border at
Nogales, Sonora (Nogales, Arizona), Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua (El Paso, Texas),
Piedras Negras, Coahuila (Eagle Pass, Texas),
Reynosa, Tamaulipas (Pharr, Texas), and
Matamoros, Tamaulipas (
Brownsville, Texas).
On the other hand, several roads in the U.S. were locally named after the Pan-American Highway. When the section of Interstate 35 in
San Antonio, Texas was built, it was named the Pan Am Expressway, as an extension of the original route from Laredo. Interstate 25 in
Albuquerque, New Mexico has been named the Pan-American Freeway, as an extension of the route to El Paso.
U.S. Route 85, which goes north from El Paso, is designated the CanAm Highway, which continues into Canada in the province of Saskatchewan, before terminating at La Ronge, Saskatchewan.
The original route to Laredo travels up Mexican Federal Highway 85 from Mexico City. The various spurs follow:
- Nogales spur - Mexican Federal Highway 15 from Mexico City
- El Paso spur - Mexican Federal Highway 45 from Mexico City
- Eagle Pass spur - unknown, possibly Mexican Federal Highway 57 from Mexico City
- Pharr spur - Mexican Federal Highway 40 from Monterrey, Mexico
- Brownsville spur - Mexican Federal Highway 101 from Ciudad Victoria, Mexico
From Mexico City to the border with
Guatemala, the Highway follows Mexican Federal Highway 190. Through the Central American countries, it follows Central American Highway 1, ending at
Yaviza, Panama at the edge of the
Darién Gap. The road had formerly ended at
Cañita, Panama, 110 miles (178 km) north of its current end. United States government funding was particularly significant to complete a high-level bridge over the Panama Canal, during the years when the canal was administered by the United States.
The Southern Section of the Pan-American Highway
,
Colombia over the PanAm HighwayThe southern part of the highway begins in northwestern Colombia, from where it follows Colombia Highway 52 to
Medellín. At Medellín,
Colombia Highway 54 leads to
Bogotá, but
Colombia Highway 11 turns south for a more direct route. Colombia Highway 72 is routed southwest from Bogotá to join Highway 11 at
Murillo, Colombia. Highway 11 continues all the way to the border with Ecuador.
Ecuador Highway 35 runs the whole length of that country. Peru Highway 1 carries the Pan-American Highway all the way through Peru to the border with Chile.
In Chile, the highway follows
Chile Highway 5 south to a point north of Santiago, Chile. The highway turns east there on
Chile Highway 60, which becomes National Route 7 (Argentina) to Buenos Aires, the end of the main highway. On-line Encarta Encyclopedia The highway network also continues south of Buenos Aires along
National Route 3 (Argentina) towards the city of Ushuaia and Cape Horn.
One branch, known as the Simón Bolívar Highway, runs from
Bogotá (Colombia) to
Guiria (Venezuela). It begins by using
Colombia Highway 71 all the way to the border with Venezuela. From there it uses Venezuela Highway 1 to Caracas and
Venezuela Highway 9 to its end at Guiria.
A continuation of the Pan-American Highway to the
Brazilian city of
Rio de Janeiro uses a ferry from Buenos Aires to
Colonia, Uruguay in
Uruguay and
Uruguay Highway 1 to
Montevideo. Uruguay Highway 9 and Brazil Highway 471 route to near Pelotas, Brazil, from where Brazil Highway 116 leads to Rio de Janeiro.
Another branch, from Buenos Aires to
Asunción in
Paraguay, heads out of Buenos Aires on
National Route 9 (Argentina). It switches to National Route 11 (Argentina) at
Rosario, which crosses the border with Paraguay right at Asunción. Other branches probably exist across the center of South America.
The highway does not have official segments to Belize,
Guyana,
Suriname and French Guiana, nor to the assorted islands in the Caribbean region. However, highways from Venezuela link to Brazilian Trans-Amazonian highway that provide a southwest entrance to Guyana, route to the coast, and follow a coastal route through Suriname to French Guiana.
See also Pan-American Highway (North America) and Pan-American Highway (South America) for a detailed description of the highway route.
Names
- Carretera Panamericana, Autopista Panamericana, or Vía Panamericana
- Estrada Panamericana
- Panamericana
- Pan-Amerikaanse Snelweg
- Autoroute Panaméricaine
- Autostrada Panamericana
In art and culture
The Pan-American highway is the subject of a recent (as of 2006) conceptual art piece,
The School of Panamerican Unrest, where Mexican-born artist Pablo Helguera is attempting to drive a portable schoolhouse for the length of the entire route.
The travel writer
Tim Cahill (writer) wrote a book,
Road Fever, about his record-setting 24-day drive from Ushuaia in the Argentine province of
Tierra del Fuego, Antarctica, and South Atlantic Islands Province to Prudhoe Bay in the U.S. state of Alaska with professional long-distance driver Garry Sowerby, much of their route following the Pan-American Highway.
Sources
- Microsoft Encarta - Pan-American Highway
- Plan Federal Highway System, New York Times May 15, 1932 page XX7
- Reported from the Motor World, New York Times January 26, 1936 page XX6
- Hemisphere Road is Nearer Reality, New York Times January 7, 1953 page 58
- 1997-98 American Automobile Association Caribbean, Central America and South America map
- Jake Silverstein, "Highway Run", Harper's, July 2006, p.70–80.
References
Pan-American Highway - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Pan-American Highway (see below for its name in other Western European languages) is a network of roads nearly 48,000 kilometres (29,800 miles) in total length.
Pan-American Highway (North America) - Wikipedia, the free ...
The Pan-American Highway route in North America is the portion of a network of roads nearly 48,000 km in length which travels through the mainland nations of the Americas.
Pan American Highway
United We Stand. The Pan American Highway Association is a group of interested people working to promote tourism along Highway 81 from McPherson, Kansas to Watertown, South ...
Pan-American Highway
Pan-American Highway and the Environment (PANAM) CASE NUMBER: 143 CASE MNEMONIC: PANAM CASE NAME: PAN-AMERICAN HIGHWAY A.
Lonely Planet | Theme Guides | Roadtrips | Pan-American Highway ...
Pan-American Highway, Alaska to Chile. Since the Conference of American States in 1923 there have been plans to build a Pan-American Highway - a continuous roadway running the full ...
John Moore: Pan-American Highway - Digital Journalist
Dirck Halstead presents The Digital Journalist: A Multimedia Magazine for Photojournalism in the Digital Age
Pan-American Highway - Hutchinson encyclopedia article about Pan ...
Road linking the USA with Central and South America; length 25,300 km/15,700 mi. Starting from the US-Canadian frontier (where it links with the Alaska Highway), it runs through ...
The Pan-American Highway - Americas, Travel - The Independent
For Salvador Dali, Perpignan railway station, in southern France, was ... The Pan-American Highway. At a whopping 15,000 miles, the Pan-American Highway is the world's longest ...
Pan-American Highway - definition of Pan-American Highway by the Free ...
A system of roadways, about 25,744 km (16,000 mi) long, extending from Alaska to Chile and linking the nations of the Western Hemisphere.?
Pan-American Highway definition of Pan-American Highway in the Free ...
Pan-American Highway, system of roads, c.16,000 mi (25,750 km) long, linking the nations of the Western Hemisphere. It was suggested at the Fifth International Conference of ...
