In road and highway construction, a gore (US) or nose (UK)[1] is a triangular plot of land, not to be driven on, where a road forks at the intersection with a second road, or merges on and off from a larger one. Gores at exit ramps occasionally have impact attenuators, especially when an obstruction such as a bridge abutment follows the gore.
The US term "gore" (describing a space) historical, representing a characteristically triangular piece of land, often designated incidentally when two surveys failed to meet. Etymologically, it is derived from gār, meaning spear.[2]
A "virtual" (or theoretical) gore is a triangular-shaped paved space, which may lead to the unpaved area of a larger physical gore. A theoretical gore is commonly marked with transverse or chevron painted lines to discourage being driven on.
In the US, at the "theoretical gore point", a dotted white line becomes a wide, solid-white channelizing line and another wide, solid-white line angles off along the edge of the diverging road, forming an elongated white triangle in front of the gore. This as a "neutral area" with white chevron markings optionally added.[3]
A very old example of a gore surviving as a street name in London is Kensington Gore, long completely built over and reshaped, where now stands the Albert Hall.
See also
References
- ^ "Design Manual for Roads and Bridges" (PDF). Feb 2006. p. 1/2, 1.25. Archived from the original (PDF) on November 23, 2018.
Nose: A paved area, approximately triangular in shape, between a connector road and the mainline at a merge or diverge, suitably marked to discourage drivers from crossing it
- ^ Skeat, Walter William (1901). A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. Oxford: Clarendon Press. p. 218.
- ^ "Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices". Apr 2022.
External links
Media related to Gore (road) at Wikimedia Commons
