I was researching the new railroad that is leasing the tracks near my home and stumbled upon information on North Carolina’s first road improvement project, the plank road. It is what it sounds like, a road paved with wooden planks ranging from 8 to 30 feet wide. Plank roads were an affordable alternative to building railroads, if not as long lasting.

Below is a good summary of plank roads from RootsWeb. I’ll also reformat the text from the North Carolina Historical Commission’s 1939 story on plank roads and post it.

The Greenville and Raleigh Plank Road

Many people have noticed the historical marker for the Greenville and Raleigh Plank Road on Dickinson Avenue and wondered what it was all about. With the increased commerce and agricultural interests in North Carolina in the 1840’s, transportation became a problem. The use of plank roads in northern states had proved successful and they began to be introduced in North Carolina as the answer to its transportation difficulties.
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