Line features are the natural next step after points, and Utah's 27 designated Scenic Byways are a good stress test for line symbology: every route needs to read as its own thing while still sitting together as one coherent statewide network, from the red rock of the Zion Park Scenic Byway to the alpine vistas of the Bear Lake Scenic Byway.
Giving each byway its own identity
Working from Utah DOT's byway data, a short ArcPy script handled the repetitive part — assigning each of the 27 routes its own color and building a legend entry to match — so the symbology setup didn't have to be done by hand 27 times over.
More than roads
A few routes carry more than scenery: the Bicentennial Highway — Trail of the Ancients Scenic Byway threads past ancient Puebloan cliff dwellings, and the Energy Loop (Huntington & Eccles Canyon) Scenic Byway runs straight through Utah's coal-mining country. Mapped together, the byways read less like a road list and more like a cross-section of the state.
Created for the “Line Features” theme of the 2024 #30DayMapChallenge, using Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT) byway data. The 1,893.84-mile total is the sum of the UDOT route lengths, calculated in ArcGIS Pro.