An Unusual Situation

  The access road to the Four Corners Monument is in New Mexico. It is State Highway 597 and it is the second shortest state maintained highway in New Mexico. It is only half a mile long. At the end,  the highway circles around the Four Corners Monument, which creates an unusual situation. Since the highway circles around the monument, that means that little "pie slice" portions of the highway are in Colorado, Utah and Arizona. This means that, for a short distance, the New Mexico Department of Transportation maintains a road that is not in New Mexico! Driving towards the monument, a person arrives at the circle at the end of the highway. Then 1/4 of the way around the circle, the driver enters Colorado, then Utah, then Arizona and then re-enters New Mexico, but the whole time is on a New Mexico state highway. Weird, huh?
 The major highway that is in the area, U.S. Highway 160, is only in New Mexico for 9/10 of a mile. A driver coming out of Arizona, on Highway 160, heading in a northeast direction, will only be in New Mexico for slightly less the one mile before entering Colorado. This driver will just miss Utah if he or she continues through towards Cortez, Colorado. Halfway  across this brief trip through New Mexico is the  intersection with State Highway 597, leading to the Four Corners Monument.
  About halfway down highway 597 is a pay station at the entrance to Four Corners Navajo Tribal Park. I realize that the Navajo Tribe operates a tribal park that encompasses 3 sides of the Four Corners Monument, and they have the right to charge admission to their tribal parks so they will have the funds to maintain the parks, but having the pay booth in the middle of a state-maintained highway poses a bit of a problem with me. This pay station effectively renders State Highway 597 a toll road for half its length. Maybe they could relocate the pay booth to the entrance of the circle? Or they could put a coin-operated turnstile in the railing that runs around the monument. Also, since the Colorado side of the monument is part of the Ute Mountain Indian Reservation, I hope the Ute Tribe gets 1/4 of the proceeds from the entrance fees. I don't know if the Ute side is a tribally maintained park or not, but their portion of the monument is an integral part of the Four Corners because the monument marks the meeting point of 4 states and 1 of those states consists of a separate Indian Reservation occupied by a different tribe.