The “Singing” Highway in South Korea

By Alex in Auto & Transportation, Travel on Nov 30, 2007 at 3:31 am

Driving down the highway in South Korea can be a musical experience (just enough to get your attention, in case you’re sleepy or not paying attention):

The road is carved into thousands of grooves. When the car tire hits the grooves, the vibrations turn into a sound source. It makes different tunes depending on the size of the grooves … The rhythm is controlled by the lengh of the groove. For example to get one second of the "do" note, the groove is stretched 28 meters.

Link [ABC World News Webcast by Joo Hee Choo]

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Aeris
Nov 30th, 2007 at 6:35 am
Don’t get me wrong, but don’t nice tunes make it actually easier to fall asleep?
MoonCake
Nov 30th, 2007 at 7:43 am
THAT IS SO COOL sorry didn’t mean to yell.. but yea– that is neat. very worthy of blog attention.
Catherine
Nov 30th, 2007 at 10:28 am
If you read Jasper Fford’s “the big over easy” there is a character whose drive way plays a song in the same way… weird.
Dave
Nov 30th, 2007 at 10:31 am
True enough, Aeris; but the one they picked — Mary Had A Little Lamb — is annoying enough that it’d keep me awake. Dang; now it’s stuck in my head. Time to crank up iTunes.
astrodex
Nov 30th, 2007 at 4:54 pm
Walt Disney World experimented with this back in the early nineties. Different roads around the property played bits of different Disney tunes as you drove over.

Does this mean we have to think it’s evil now?
Dogrun81
Nov 30th, 2007 at 6:08 pm
Maybe we can get musicians/advertisers to pay for road jingles.
Oomi
Nov 30th, 2007 at 7:58 pm
how neat
Carl Huber
Nov 30th, 2007 at 8:02 pm
That’s asinine – it increases wear on tires.
Chris W
Dec 1st, 2007 at 4:18 pm
pretty clever idea with the whole tune thing, but does it increase the stopping distance if a driver has to make an emergency stop? since the road isn’t continuous it’s got grooves in, wont that mean there is less resistance if the car brakes suddenly?
L
Dec 2nd, 2007 at 3:24 am
Neat. I’ve hit patches of road that play a single note. Cool that someone got the idea to do it on purpose and make a song!

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