In Pixar’s Cars, what highway town is Radiator Springs said to be bypassed by?

In Pixar’s Cars, Radiator Springs is said to have been bypassed by Interstate 40.

The town’s decline is central to Cars. Radiator Springs once benefited from traffic along historic U.S. Route 66, but the construction of Interstate 40 redirected travelers away from the community. As businesses lost customers, the town became a quiet remnant of an earlier road-trip era.

The film’s fictional geography draws strongly on real communities along Route 66 in the American Southwest. The interstate’s bypass story is an invented narrative framework, but it reflects the broader historical effect that modern highways had on many older roadside towns.

Interstate 40 runs across the southern United States and replaced much of Route 66 as a major east-west travel route in the region. In the film, rediscovering Radiator Springs becomes part of McQueen’s emotional change from a self-centered racer into a character who values community and history.