Today, I was sent this link to a video produced by Webster High School students in Tulsa and broadcast on a local TV station. The film is about the Red Fork Main Street revitalization program, and Route 66 plays  a prominent part in those plans for Tulsa’s west side.

The fledgling program is giving Red Fork a shot of optimism and a chance for a rebirth after years of decline.

It’s been reported for a while that Hualapai Indian tribe is constructing a Plexiglass-rimmed Skywalk that juts out 70 feet into the Grand Canyon, over the Colorado River. The fantastical project sounds like a scenery-lover’s dream (or a nightmare if you have problems with vertigo).

Anyway, the Skywalk seems so improbable that Snopes.com, a site that debunks urban legends and e-mail rumors, has devoted a chapter to it. And, yes, Snopes reports that the reports about Skywalk are definitely true, and has construction photos from the project to buttress the evidence.

In addition, Grand Canyon Skywalk has its own Web site. According to the site, the official opening date of Skywalk will be March 28.

This thing is going to be a monster tourist attraction.

For years, I’ve told my friends that if I were an automobile executive with a new vehicle model, I’d take it down Route 66.

First, a cross-country trip would expose any weaknesses of the vehicle so they be corrected before hitting the showroom floor. Second, driving the model down America’s most famous highway would generate buzz.

Well, it turns out that an automaker already has done that. And it wasn’t an American company. It was Toyota in 2001 when it was about to roll out its wildly popular Prius hybrid model.

According to BusinessWeek Online:

The group also held a cross-country trek along Route 66, hitting towns and cities from Chicago to Los Angeles. The drive-and-tell seemed to work wonders. Says Becker: “Someone at Toyota told me that a phenomenal percentage of people who tested the car bought one.” By 2004, Toyota had passed Honda and had the greenest image. “They just blew past us in the surveys,” said John German, manager for environment and energy analysis for American Honda Motor Co. “They’re in first place now.”

This helps show why Toyota has gone from 6 percent of the retail market share to over 17 percent in less than 25 years.