I moved to Bismarck/Mandan in 2001. Anytime you move to a new town you run across many a lost adventure. I'd find myself on River Road trying to figure out how to get on one of the bridges. Or on one fateful day, I was heading to Prairie Knights Casino for some radio business. I decided to take a short cut off Bismarck Expressway and onto McKenzie Drive and then just shoot over to Highway 1806 and then off to the casino!

Well, that was optimistic. Y'see, my dad was a lifelong engineer with the State Highway Department so I reckon the idea that "roads take you places" was a seed planted in my brain at a young age.  I'm from a generation that doesn't need GPS; just get me a compass and as long as I know the general area there's going to be a road that will take me there.

McKenzie Drive is not that road.

Scott McGowan
Scott McGowan
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This is what you see at the west end of McKenzie Drive.  You can also see all the traffic driving on Highway 1806 probably less than a mile away.  Okay...so then I drove a little farther south thinking the next road would get me there.  No luck, only a sewage lagoon.  So, now in a rush, I had to go to Memorial Highway take a long trip down The Strip take a left on third at McDonalds, meander through businesses and trailer parks. Finally getting to 1806 and driving south a mile or so- I realize I'm just west of the dead end of McKenzie Road. It would have taken me only a minute to have gotten here.

Let's peek at a map.

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See right above the "E" in Edgewood is where McKenzie Drive comes to a rather clumsy close.

Seems to me we're just two bridges away from connecting South Mandan to South Bismarck without all the extra mileage.

I know I started this whole thing with a question, so let me end it with what I think is the answer.

Maintaining traffic numbers for retail development on The Strip.  Which probably makes sense.

I just like my roads to go places.

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