While rising populations and industrialization had begun to transform the transportation infrastructure of northern Kentucky by the mid-nineteenth century, civic projects were hampered by dense forests and the rolling Eden Shale Hills of the Bluegrass region. According to Tenkotte and Claypool, “roads were so poor that a wagon loaded with goods could take as long as two days to travel roundtrip from Florence, Ky., to Covington, a distance of approximately 20 miles” (13). Although state highways, such as the Covington and Lexington Turnpike, began to appear in the 1830s, these few reliable courses immediately attracted heavy travel, offering little discretion to the self-emancipated traveler. The lesser roads of the region were of poor quality, with little signage, which in one case meant that a freedom seeker by the name of Peter Bruner repeatedly got lost and ended up farther south than he began (Lucas 66). As a general rule, transit infrastructure corresponded to the population density of slaveholders, which made Kentucky’s mean travelling conditions a harrowing prospect for any freedom seeker.