No idea, but apparently some of the important road bridges are still mined for detonation in case of invasion! Also, apparently many long stretches of straight motorway are also heated and serve as runways in case of war.
AFAIK heating was never used. The backup runway concept itself got dropped in the previous millenium. And yes, the last explosives were removed a couple or few years ago.
So, as you state yourself, these things did exist until very recently (the roadways-as-runways still exist, of course). Not urban legends, then, just partially no longer extant. In much the same way as Hitler, free love and the dinosaurs are not urban legends.
Thanks for bringing me up to date Urs I shall enjoy correcting people from now on!
However try to understand what an urban legend really is. If something was once fact, regardless whether still in existence or not, they can never become urban legend because these are made up of fictitious information and myths.
They're great in the rain, and give a lovely sci-fy feel late at night. Ireland has them as well, so Ireland probably will be the only country to have them in the EU soon enough.
I do not remember the highways in England being lit and I usually travelled to England at night several times a year. But only from Denver to Maidstone (not through the whole country) and a long time ago.
The description you give of all the colors of cat-eyes ..... if I wanna join a party I won't do it on the highway
I have no idea, I don't rely/expect to be lucky when I hit any bridge by car in winter
All not a bad idea, is it
There is also this story that when the Swiss demonstrated their air-force, they just circled around the mountains to make the fleet appear bigger than it was. No idea if that is an other myth but again ..... not a bad idea.
If you can't convince them, confuse them. I'm all for that.
I spotted cat's eyes in the Vesennaz tunnel outside Geneva, on the side of the road! So about 300m of them! But they're so posh in Vesennaz that I think they're only using them to remind motorists how expensive to build the tunnel was (the people of Vesennaz did not want frontaliers (cross border commuters) to cross their commune, so got them to go underground, out of sight! )
I'm sure I'm not the only one who has noticed that the white posts at the side of unlit roads have two dots on the Left, and a vertical bar on the right.