Today I learned (from the podcast 99% Invisible) that the reason basic street right of way widths are 66 feet is because that was the length of surveyors' chains, at least in the 19th century when a lot of places in the U.S. Midwest were being platted.
This was a very minor point in a new episode called Roman Mars Describes Chicago as It Is.
Saint Paul also has 66-foot rights-of-way on most of its streets as well, though, so I know it's not just Chicago.
So that's today's cool but in some ways stupid fact.
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