The US & UK roads With The Biggest Gaps Between Toilets

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You have been there before. As you drive slowly on the highway, feeling the urge to use the restroom, a pass a sign: SERVICES 10 m.

You’re in luck, as our research has shown, that the average distance to a restroom on UK motorways is 22.7 miles (36.5 km). Sadly, you don’t feel lucky. You are experiencing a sense of desperation. Looking for a well-positioned tree won’t necessarily help, as stopping is not possible.

What is the solution? To prevent discomfort in their bladder, many choose to avoid drinking water before and during a journey. Unfortunately, not good. A study found that dehydrated drivers made over twice as many mistakes as well-hydrated drivers. Similar to drunk drivers’ scores. And driver mistake is the leading reason of road accidents by a long, long way.

In other words, if you feel tired, dizzy or light-headed, suffer cramps, lose concentration or experience headaches come on, it’s way pastime to take a sip.

We’ll explore other ways to manage hydration later. But first, QS Supplies wants to determine the U.S. highways and UK motorways with the longest gaps between toilets. So, we took a sip and headed out onto the information freeway.

Key Findings:

• There is an average of 60.3 miles (97.04 km) between toilet breaks on the M8 – the worst-served UK motorway for service stations.
• The worst road for toilet breaks in the United States is the-49, which runs from Lafayette, Louisiana, to Kansas City, Missouri, with services at an average distance of 264.0 miles (424.9 km).
• The longest stretch of UK motorway without a bathroom is on the M25 between South Mimms and Cobham (44.6 mils or 71.78 km).
• The longest stretch of American highway without facilities is the I-22 from Birmingham, Alabama, to Byhalia, Mississippi – a 202.22 mile (325.44 km) roadway with no stop.

The US Highways With the Biggest Average Gaps Between Service Stations

Following the interstate highway system’s establishment in 1956, safety rest areas sprung up across the country, and these rest areas became an integral part of the great American road trip. “The toilet facility was most often designed to be the architectural centerpiece of a rest area site,” according to RestAreaHistory.org. “Picnic and information shelters were typically created to complement the architectural quality of the toilet building.” As opposed to regular truck stops, these are funded by state transportation departments and are prohibited from selling gasoline, food, or hosting commercial businesses. Sadly, they have become a drain on state resources around the nation, and many have now closed – expanding the gap between toilet stops.

The Longest Stretches of U.S. Highways Without Rest Stops

The Interstate I-49 has two toilet stops along its 528 miles (849.8 km) length, giving a distance between facilities of 264.0 miles (424.9 km). One of these is near Boyce, and the other is near Washington, where the original part of I-49 first existed. The road also runs through Arkansas, but you will have to hold it in that state until you get the endpoint in Kansas City in Missouri. At some stage, the two sections of the Interstate I-49 will meet briefly in Texas when the last part is completed – and while public funding for the project is limited, it seems likely that private companies in Texas will take benefit of this major south-north thoroughfare by catering to motorists’ needs.

The UK Motorways With the Biggest Average Gaps Between Service Stations

QS Supplies team determinate 9 UK motorways with an average of more than 25 miles (40 km) between rest stops – plus the M60, which is 34.8 miles (56 km) long with no toilet at all to be met. The M8 motorway, linking Glasgow and Edinburgh in Scotland, has the most road to cover per service station, with just one stop on its 60.3 miles (97. km) route – Heart of Scotland Services, formerly known as Harthill Services, which was the first service station in Scotland and which featured a restaurant serving fresh fish and chips in the 1970s.

The Longest Stretches of UK Motorways Without Service Stops

With one station along its 60.3 miles (97 km) length, the M8 has the most roadway per station – but you get a distinctly better deal if voyaging from Edinburgh. Come in from the Glasgow end traveling east from the motorway’s start point near Langbank, and you’ll travel two-thirds of its length – 37.0 miles (56 km) -before making it to Harthill, where you can’t even get fish and chips any more.

What you should know about staying hydrated

Before you leave on your journey, it is a good idea to drink a glass of water – since you may forget or be too busy with your hands. Make sure you carry water with you and limit your use of the air conditioning, which dries the air, causing dehydration. You are especially likely to become dehydrated if you have diabetes, have been diarrhoea, vomiting or you have had a lot of sunshine, alcohol or workout.

The methodology behind the study

To discover the average distance between service stations on each interstate highway in the US and each motorway in the UK, the QS Supplies team gathered figures on the number of service stations placed along both types of roadway from interstaterestareas.com and motorwayservices.uk. These do not include alternative service stations that are situated on roadways that divert away from new roads.

After also gathering official figures on the road lengths of interstate highways (kilometres) and motorways (miles), the team evaluated each of their distances in isolation to estimate what the average distance was between each service station or rest stop under the premise that a driver is touring in one direction along the full route. They include some roads that pass through municipalities where unofficial rest stops may be reachable by diverting away onto a different route but which weren’t able to be counted in this study.

To define the longest stretches of U.S. highway and UK motorway without a service station, the QS Supplies team mapped the driving way for each highway using Google Maps. They applied this measurement individually for each direction to evade overestimated distances forced by having to use a return or detour to arrive at a service station on the other side of the road.

Their final rankings considered highways with a distance of 150 km or more in the US and motorways with a distance of 20 miles or more in the UK .

The data for this research was gathered in April 2023.