Cecille's Creativity

The Pan-American Highway extends from Alaska to Chile. In fact, it is not a single road, but a system of routes linking the countries of North and Central America and those of the west coast of South America.

The highway system remains incomplete. A stretch of swampy tropical forest, called the Darien Gap, separates Panama from Colombia and so cuts off the route between Central and South America.

American nations began planning a Pan-American road link in the 1920s. They had built most of the system by the early 1950s. South American countries paid for the parts of the highway within their own borders. The United States helped to pay for the section between Texas and Panama.