Talk:U.S. Route 54

U.S. Roads: U.S. Highways / Oklahoma Mid‑importance

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Locations	Oklahoma
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History notes

State highway numbers

NM: 3, 18
TX: 56
OK: 46
KS: 22, 36, 41, N/A (US 54 was to end in Dodge City via US 154)
MO: 26, 66, 15, 22
IL: ?

Auto trails

Atlantic and Pacific Highway, Vaughn to Jefferson City

Kellogg Avenue freeway versus "Kellogg Flyover"

Latest comment: 1 year ago2 comments2 people in discussion

A previous revision to this article (by Situveux, 2009) suggested that US 54-400 in Wichita is now known as "the Kellogg flyover." As a native Wichitan, I consider this usage poorly attested and have revised the article accordingly. I am dropping this note to explain my reasoning.

The Kellogg freeway is an upgrade of Kellogg Avenue, a surface arterial. Because Wichitans tend to omit street designations in ordinary conversation and on postal addresses (e.g. "13th" instead of "13th Street"), Kellogg Avenue has ordinarily been referred to just as "Kellogg," both as a surface arterial and as a freeway. However, it continues to be signed as "Kellogg Ave" at the I-235 cloverleaf, where it is a full freeway.

The term "flyover" used in reference to Kellogg tends to denote short lengths rather than the whole freeway. The most common use of "flyover" is in reference to a one-mile-long viaduct, running from the west bank of the Arkansas River to the east side of Washington Street, which includes interchanges for downtown Wichita ("Central Business District") and Washington Street. Part of this flyover was built around 1980, as an upgrade of a railroad grade separation which had been built in the mid-1950's, with the remainder being completed in 1996 when the entire length of Kellogg between I-235 and I-135 became fully access-controlled. A quick Google search shows instances of "flyover" being used in relation to west Kellogg (Maize/Tyler interchanges), where US 54-400 flies over Maize and Tyler, and to east Kellogg (Armour/Rock split diamond), where US 54-400 flies over Armour and under Rock.

There are two possible sources for "Kellogg Flyover" used in reference to the whole Kellogg Avenue freeway: a YouTube video showing a drive along the Kellogg freeway, and a Wichita City Council agenda packet referring to the Kellogg Flyover. For reasons which I explain below, I do not think either support the usage of "Kellogg Flyover" for the whole freeway.

The YouTube video is at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jaGKVwoJrCY

The title is actually ambiguous. It could be a reference to the entire freeway, or to the fact that the videographer used the downtown flyover as his entry point for Kellogg.

The City Council agenda packet is here:

http://www.wichita.gov/NR/rdonlyres/8F6CC394-4600-4860-9B1D-69572700C82F/0/FINALCityCouncilAgendaPacket201008030900.pdf

It contains the following text: "Kellogg Avenue (US54/400) is a vital east-west route through Wichita and Sedgwick County. Expansion of the Kellogg Avenue (US54/400) Corridor from a four lane expressway to the six lane freeway, known as the Kellogg Flyover, began in 1990 just west of Wichita’s Central Business District. Successive projects have extended the freeway section both east and west for a total 13 mile long six lane freeway from 111th Street on the west side to 1/2 mile east of Rock Road (Cypress Street) on the east side."

A casual reading of the second sentence could lead to the impression that the "Kellogg Flyover" label covers the entire freeway. However, the project which began in 1990 was just the downtown flyover. The same document subsequently uses the phrase "Kellogg Avenue freeway" (a usage which I have followed in my revision of this article) in relation to other lengths of Kellogg which either are freeway or are planned to be upgraded to that standard. Nowhere is it suggested that these are part of, or extensions of, a Kellogg Flyover.

A quick comparison of Google search results for the terms "Kellogg flyover" and "Kellogg freeway" (with quotes in both cases) shows that the latter turns up a higher percentage of results which are relevant (in most cases highly so) to the whole freeway, from a more diverse range of sources. While "Kellogg flyover" returns more hits overall (just over 4600 versus 766), many of the hits shown first are clearly derivative of the US 54-400 article with Situveux's contribution (they postdate it and use cut-and-pasted text). The material that is not derivative generally cannot be understood as referring unambiguously to the whole freeway rather than the downtown flyover.

In short, the Kellogg Avenue freeway in Wichita is not the Kellogg Flyover: it is a Kellogg freeway which has a flyover for part of its length. This is why I have revised the article accordingly. Argatlam (talk) 04:33, 15 May 2011 (UTC)Reply

Rt 54 ends in Onarga IL 50.82.223.133 (talk) 15:48, 14 October 2023 (UTC)Reply

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