Should an Interstate Highway be labeled as such if the road is only in one state, like I-4?

K.J. wrote in this week, asking:

With all the news surrounding the expansion of I-4, it dawned on me that it shouldn't even be called I-4! It should be State Road 4!

"I" stands for INTERstate, not INTRAstate! I only see it going from Tampa to Daytona, not even close to Georgia.

It does seem odd to call it "Interstate" 4 when it doesn't enter any other states besides Florida. I-4 is an "intrastate" highway in that it only spans one state.

But I-4 is still part of the Interstate Highway system, so you could even call it an "intrastate Interstate."

It's been that way since 1959, when the first section of the road opened three years after President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Federal Highway Act of 1956.

"I believe that we are at least $50 billion behind in our networks, in our road networks," Eisenhower said. "We are suffering from it in losses of life. We are suffering from it every day in terms of any efficient operation of all of our transportation throughout the country."

Eisenhower mainly saw the Interstate Highway System as a means for defense. He thought it would provide key ground transport routes for military supplies and troop deployments in case of foreign invasion. The system is even formally named for him: It's the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways.

The bottom line: I-4 is funded by federal money as part of the Interstate Highway System, so it's titled as such.

I-4 is one of more than a dozen intrastate routes in that system. Some have more than one intrastate Interstate — Arizona and New York each have two, and there are three in Texas.

There are also Interstate Highways in Alaska (labeled Interstate A1–A4), Hawaii (H1–H3) and Puerto Rico (PR1–PR3).

The entirety of I-4 also runs concurrently with most of what's designated as Florida State Road 400. But you just won't see signs for "SR-400" until you drive east of I-95 in Daytona Beach.

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