99
By noderel:
It’s like this, see. If you are from the far left coast and you are talking about going anywhere, you use the highway numbers. I-405 for an interstate, for instance, and State 49 for a major state “Surface” road. Back when I was younger and more virile, in California we said 66 and 40 for east-west links, and 1 or 99 for north-south. Unless you planned to take two weeks to go from LA to the Oregon border, you never ever used Hwy l. Even now you might consider it only as a “dash over and look at the ocean” kind of drive. Or to maybe avoid the tule fog in San Joquin Valley. That left you with Hwy 99, which like US 66, is now something of a legend.
The stretch of Highway 99 of most interest runs from just at the northern edge of San Fernando Valley, up and over the infamous Grapevine (the Ridge Route), down through Bakersfield, thence to Fresno and Stockton and Sacramento and on through Redding to Oregon.
During and just after WWII, I got to know this long stretch of macadam very well indeed. Along with a number of arterials that bisect Callifornia.