The pavement has been scored with vibration strips so that when your tires roll over them, the vibration plays music. I drove there last weekend and it was a fun little gimmick. To find it on the map search for Musical road Lancaster CA.
Link follows. It’s supposed to be the William Tell Overture, or the theme song for the old TV show The Lone Ranger.
Yet another reason to avoid Lancaster at all costs.
Stranger
I’d be tempted to go fast in an attempt to play the song at the correct tempo.
I was thinking the same thing; I like the idea, but the execution seems to be lacking.
It’s also possible that the car used in that video has a poorly calibrated speedometer.
Nothing to do with the speedo. As long as you drive at any constant speed, it should sound right, just in a different key. But they screwed up (twice!), and Tom Scott explains why: Why California's musical road sounds terrible - YouTube
There’s a rumble strip between Santa Fe and Albuquerque that plays “This Land is Your Land”
Cool. I think I found it:
Musical Highway, 310 U.S. Rt. 66, Albuquerque NM
Grid: 35.068628, -106.419764
I remember reading a news story about a “singing road” in the Netherlands:
heh wish i could most days …
Hungary has one, as well.
At least theirs is in tune (as opposed to the California one.)
We were recently on a trip in SW Utah and I saw odd stripes in the left lane of a two lane highway. It dawned on me that it might be “musical” and I went over and it was. We only caught the tail-end and didn’t get a chance to go back. It was somewhere around St. George. Wish I could’ve done the whole thing as I think this is a cool concept.
It’s out by the airport and not near any residences. It’s only the left lane. If someone doesn’t like it they can drive in the right lane.
That is a good one! From a search:
It is the main road connecting the city of Kaposvár and the M7 motorway. The road was installed in memoriam of the lead singer of the band Republic, László Bódi aka Cipő.
It sings America the Beautiful, and it is in tune. Sounds pretty good.
It sounds good the first few times. About the 10th time on, it’s just kind of annoying.
Agreed. But I have another problem with some implementations. Some rumble strips can be seen on the right side of the lane so that only your right tires hit them and play the tune. If the driver wants to avoid the music they’d have to veer left and drive in the left part of the lane. From the videos it looks like this is possible. The problem I see is that this puts the driver in a greater risk and nearer to the oncoming traffic. Why not put the rumble strips on the left tire, so that to avoid them you’re nearer to the shoulder and thus safer?