Main Roads in England & Wales 1725

This is a GIS shapefile mapping what are judged to be the main roads in England & Wales in 1725. These roads are judged to be usable by travelers from ca 1680 to 1750, though the mode of travel may determine the preferred route during this period. The file was created in ARC GIS Pro and refined through use in a project to map the journeys made by diarist in this period. The data is used to create maps and tables in the paper by Dan Bogart, Alan Rosevear, and Leigh Shaw-Taylor. “A Better Ride: New Evidence on Travel and the Quality of Roads in England and Wales, 1660-1820.” Explorations in Economic History, 2026.