How Did the Ancient Romans Manage to Build Perfectly Straight, Ultra Durable Roads?

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The ancient Romans were a people famed for their architectural prowess, something no better demonstrated than by their ability to build almost perfectly straight and incredibly durable roads spanning expansive distances. For example, in Britain alone, the Romans built well over 50,000 miles of roads with the longest ruler-straight stretch spanning over 50 miles. They did all of this in an era without modern surveying tools, construction equipment, or even very accurate maps of precisely where their destination was for many of the areas. So how did they do it?

Sources:

[Azula]

When Romans declared that Rome will last thousands of years, they took it to heart.

[Jasonrm]

These dudes built a footbridge like 5 mins from my house here in Scotland and it's still in perfect condition. Crazy.

[markbaker]

I was once on a job that got halted when we came across a roman road. To the untrained eye (like mine) it looked like a rocky strata. But once the guy pointed it out, you coukd see the camber on the road and the drainage ditches at each side. In fact one of the drainage ditches was still being used as a culvert that was running under the nearby A-road. Incredible.

[AngelRaivan-xhfr]

"Join the army" they said, "see the world" they said. All I've done is dug holes!

[Drew-Dastardly]

Anyone remember "NERO Burning ROM" as the best CD ripper of the 90's?

[MichaelHarrisIreland]

In Ireland, where the Roman's never reached, the Irish word for road is Bothar. Bo meaning cow and thar meaning west or sideways. Boreen means a small road, a cow facing head on or maybe just little. Driving cows on paths caused the name of what a road was. There are roads everywhere in Ireland but none are straight. We have a phrase "it's a long road without a turning" meaning life changes. I just thought some of you might enjoy that biteen of history.

[Jan-muvs]

I've been to Italy many times and I can tell you they have forgotten about road quality all together

[Balrog-tfbg]

The main reason our roads don’t last long is heavy vehicles constantly driving over it, and water seeping in and freezing, thus creating potholes due to the asphalt being typically one large solid substance. If you’re using cobblestones there’s more room for water to freeze and expand

[uweschroeder]

I grew up in a town founded by the Romans and over 2000 years old. Interestingly enough, the Romans weren't only good at building roads, they also built a sewer and water system in that town which is used to this day and has less leaks than modern sewer systems. It was just declared a world heritage site and I had the opportunity to go down into the "catacombs" which house the sewer channels (essentially open channels in an underground tunnel). Very impressive - if smelly :-)

[gweetus]

As someone that works in civil engineering, it’s surprising how many similarities there are between ancient construction and modern methods. Tech has improved, but some basics are very similar

[Raz.C]

I had a teacher back in primary school who once told us that you could tell the difference between roads that were laid down by the Romans, vs roads that were made by the British. She said if the road was straight, then it was built by the Romans. It's been maybe 40 years since that day, but I never forgot that anecdote, for some reason.

[dariusanderton]

Imagine if the Romans had developed steam train technology. The possibilities are immense.

[shananagans]

They clearly had the attitude of "Build it Right, Build it Once". Now the attitude is "That's Good Enough".

[gastropod]

"Take me Rome country roads."

[porkyfedwell]

Answer: by not allowing 80, 000 lb trucks on them.

[davidgray]

Back in the 1960s when a little boy at private school in England, the teacher emphasised the brilliance of Roman road building including an explanation of the different materials used. The implication was clear, worthwhile Great societies build well. The British used to and an Indian gentleman I recently met said how good the old British bridges are in India. Now we struggle to run things in the U.K, as a society we are going backwards, you can see and feel it happening.

[larryscott]

1-2 meters deep hand dug is deep. That’s a huge volume of material.

[iamzid]

as a road construction worker i can say with fair certainty that the Roman method is better than current methods. the main difference is that typically new roads consist of sand covered with gravel and paved. starting with larger stones that get smaller towards the top layers would provide a superior base.

[shonifari]

If you go in Italy you can find that the main highways of the cities have exits that are always called with a cardinal number. But given that these places names are so common I've never paid attention it. One example is Settimo Torinese which is in Turin and literally means Seventh From Turin and its because of the romans.
Another one is Sesto San Giovanni which is in Milan. There are towns named like that everywhere and people rarely know why

[wadeguidry]

"On a long and Roman highway,
East of Omaha"
"You can listen to the Nero,
Fiddle out as one long