Navajo Nation - What is a Scenic Byway?

The vision of the Federal Highway Administration’s National Scenic Byways Program is to create a distinctive collection of American roads, their stories and treasured places.

The U.S. Secretary of Transportation recognizes certain roads as National Scenic Byways or All-American Roads based on 6 intrinsic qualities: archaeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational and scenic qualities.

The evaluation process starts by identifying the intrinsic qualities along the byway and describing the resources contributing to these qualities. Next, these qualities are evaluated to determine which are of local, regional or national importance. The following is a brief summary of the six intrinsic qualities.

	Scenic — Beauty, whether natural or human-made. The quality of the features is measured by how memorable, distinctive, uninterrupted & unified they are.
	Natural — Minimal human disturbance of the natural ecological features that are associated with a region.
	Historic — Landscapes, buildings, structures, or other visual signs of the past. It has to be something that can still be seen – not just the site of something that used to be there.
	Cultural — Visual evidence of the unique customs, traditions, folklore, or rituals of a currently existing human group.
	Archaeological — Visual evidence of the unique customs, traditions, folklore, or rituals of a no-longer existing human group.
	Recreational — The road corridor itself is used for recreation like jogging, biking, roadside picnics, or direct access to recreational sites like campgrounds, lakes, ski lodges, sightseeing, etc.
	*A road may qualify as a scenic byway with one to six intrinsic quality classifications.