There's a curious one lane bridge[1] over I-40 outside of Raleigh that leads to a gravel road that serves about 4 houses, and then leads into the back side of U

There's a curious one lane bridge[1] over I-40 outside of Raleigh that leads to a gravel road that serves about 4 houses, and then leads into the back side of Umstead State Park. We always joke about it being the "bridge to nowhere" and ponder "who had the political connections to make that happen?" But I imagine it's something like you were saying: probably when I-40 was built, the land acquisition process resulted in those homes being cut off from everywhere else, unless that bridge was built. And probably it was cheaper / easier / more politically viable to build the bridge than buy out the remaining land-owners. Or maybe there was more to it. This area is also adjacent to RDU airport: a lot of the land you can see near "Old Reedy Creek Road" on the map, north of I-40, belongs to the airport, even though it is undeveloped (aside from bandit MTB trails). I suppose the argument for the bridge might have involved providing better access to the airport, then or in the future, for emergency crews or something of that nature. The additional access to Umstead Park I wouldn't expect to be a big factor, because the next exit down on I-40 is already one of the two major entrances to the park. Anyway it's always interesting to look at stuff like this and wonder how/why certain decisions were made. [1]: https://www.google.com/maps/@35.8400772,-78.7819125,75m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/@35.8400772,-78.7819125,75m/data...