Why the road can stay straight for so long
The Eyre Highway crosses the Nullarbor, a vast, sparsely vegetated limestone plain in southern Australia. “Nullarbor” comes from Latin words meaning “no trees,” though the landscape is not literally treeless. Across this open country, there are few mountains, valleys, or dense forests that would force a road to bend around obstacles. The terrain gives the highway room to run almost ruler-straight.
The famous 90 Mile Straight lies between the small settlements of Balladonia and Caiguna in Western Australia. Its name is rounded: the stretch is about 146 kilometres, or roughly 91 miles. It is part of a much longer route connecting Western Australia with South Australia.
A straight road changes the driving task
On a winding road, curves continually prompt a driver to adjust steering and judge the next section. Here, the road offers little visual change for long periods. The horizon remains distant, and roadside features can be sparse, so it may be harder to sense how quickly the landscape is moving past. That can make it easier to lose concentration or misjudge distance, even though the road itself is comparatively simple to follow.
The straightness is therefore both an engineering advantage and a human challenge: the land makes a direct route possible, but the lack of turns can make the journey feel deceptively uneventful. A driver can travel for minutes with almost no steering correction—while still covering several kilometres.
