What’s the old saying? Sometimes you can’t see the forest for the trees? Well, in West Virginia you’ll be seeing a whole lot of forest. How much? Well, apparently as much as 75 percent of West Virginia is covered in forested area. You’ll also find that West Virginia is famous for some of its roads and bridges. For instance, the world’s first brick street was laid in Charleston, on October 23, 1870 on Summers Street between Kanawha and Virginia Streets. Also, one of the first suspension bridges in the world was completed in Wheeling in November 1849. And the New River Gorge Bridge near Fayetteville is the second highest steel arch bridge in the United States. The bridge is also the longest steel arch bridge (1,700 feet) in the world. Every October on Bridge Day, the road is closed and individuals parachute and bungee cord jump 876 feet off the bridge. Its West Virginia's largest single day event and attracts about 100,000 people each year.
Those roads and bridges means lots of driving, which West Virginians do plenty of on their own to the tune of about 14,449 miles on average each year. There are more than a million cars on the West Virginia roads, too, 1,432,831 to be precise. Don’t have one of those 1.4 million cars? No problem. There are nearly 700 dealerships across the state with cars for sale who would be more than willing to get you on the road again. They certainly sell enough cars. In 2013 they sold about $3.68 billion worth of new cars, which is a pretty big boon for the 42,141 auto industry jobs found in West Virginia.
Oh, and if you happen to hit some unfortunate animal on your way home, it is legal to both scavenge for road kill and also to take it home for supper.
Just be sure that if you travel by train in West Virginia that you don’t fall asleep on it. That’s against the law.
