The fellows at Carpix.net tested a 2007 Ford Shelby Mustang by flooring it for a 9.5-mile stretch of Route 66 from the the ruins of the Roadrunner restaurant to Roy’s in Amboy, Calif.

Reported average speed was 141 mph. See for yourself:

I wouldn’t have tried it. The Mother Road out in the Mojave Desert is notoriously bumpy, especially since the rainy spring of 2005. One chuckhole could spell disaster at 140 mph.

And the girl in the video probably said at one point: “Can I take these damned heels off now?”

Despite a fire nearly destroying the Standin’ on a Corner mural in Winslow, Ariz., the Route 66 town will continue to have its Standin’ on a Corner festival today and Saturday, reports the East Valley Tribune.

The gala and mural are inspired by the Eagles‘ hit song, “Take It Easy,” which contains these famed lyrics written by Jackson Browne: “Well, I’m a’standin’ on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, such a fine sight to see / It’s a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford slowin’ down to take a look at me.”

The main draw is the Standin’ on the Corner Park, which is anchored by two pieces of art: A mural depicting the girl in the flatbed Ford by trompe l’oeil artist John Pugh and a bronze statue by sculptor Ron Adamson of a man in 1970s garb standing on the corner.

Pugh’s mural was nearly destroyed in an Oct. 18, 2004, fire, which gutted the interior of the building the mural is painted on. For safety reasons the park was kept cordoned off by a chain-link fence as the landlord and the city debated who was responsible for cleaning up the mess.

Hackler says the park will be open this weekend, and visitors will be able to pose with the bronze statue for photographs. Hotel California, an Eagles cover band, and Mogollon will perform. There will also be a kids zone featuring games.

Just in time for the Halloween season, Kathy Weiser’s massive Legends of America site is touting its large collection of ghost stories and other unexplained phenomena along Route 66, according to a recent press release.

The list includes the haunted Lemp Mansion in St. Louis, the haunted Oatman Hotel, and the notorious Spook Light. They’re all well-researched and worth a read.

UltimateDisney.com has posted a bunch of screen shots from the upcoming Disney-Pixar “Cars” DVD, including a scene from the “Mater and the Ghostlight” short (shown above). Check ‘em out.

The Ghostlight, incidentally, is based on the real-life Spooklight near Route 66 at the Missouri-Oklahoma-Kansas border.

The street date for the DVD version of the hit summer movie that takes place on Route 66 is Nov. 7.

(Hat tip to the Pixar Planet forum.) 

Nearly five months after its groundbreaking ceremony, Pops — an unusual gas station that will lure tourists with a 66-foot-tall soda bottle lit with LEDs out front, a collection of 12,000 soda bottles inside, and an elaborate, futuristic canopy cantilevered over the gas pumps — is beginning to rise from the red Oklahoma dirt in a field near Arcadia.

I popped these shots of the building’s skeleton last Saturday evening.

The gas station, which will also include a soda fountain (of course!) and a grill, is scheduled to open next year. We’ll post occasional updates on its progress as we get them.

– Red Fork Hippie Chick