Fifty years ago, travelers on American roads used to watch for trucks parked by roadside diners. Most people believed that truckers knew the best places to eat, and that any restaurant with trucks parked in front of it would serve good food.
Truckers still set the standards on American highways, but the diner with a half-dozen trucks parked nearby is a thing of the past. The modern American truck stop is a huge commercial complex, often covering several hundred hectares of ground and employing 100 or more people.
And it, too, is a thing of the past, in a different sense. Most people think of the truck stop as an American development and it is, but it is also a re-invention of an old idea.