Once they named the isosceles triangle, they should have stopped with anything that hearkened to geometrical shapes.

That goes for the Luxor pyramid in Las Vegas, the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., the Research Triangle in North Carolina and “The Octagon,” a dreadful Chuck Norris movie from the 1980s.

Yet in an astonishing stretch of name ingenuity, residents of India punished a major highway construction project with the tag Golden Quadrilateral. Or, GQ as a blessing of abbreviation.

In reality, the project has the substance to bear its name. An article in a recent National Geographic explained the Golden Quadrilateral is a planned 3,633-mile expressway that will link India’s four largest cities.

The British created a highway system in the 19th century. For much of the time after that, the roads didn’t improve.

Deterioration continued to such an extent that one pothole-dodging motorist told a National Geographic writer, “Driving in India is not about skill. It’s about reflexes.”

In 1998, the Indian government committed $30 billion to the GQ. It was a marvel of national engineering with a bit of social engineering attached.

Like the Dwight Eisenhower-inspired interstate system juiced up the mobility of Americans, the GQ alters the culture of India by putting far-flung cities into closer reach.

New car sales have escalated from 500,000 a year in 1998 to about 1.5 million annually last year.

But commerce stands as the primary reason for the improvements. Goods needing to get to the metropolitan corners of the nation, from Delhi to Mumbai, from Chennai and Kolkata, now have an easier course to travel. And the highway features the sorts of high technology that makes the tracking of shipments more efficient.

In the United States, highways aren’t getting a lot of love in the current political climate. You can’t really blame the office seekers. They’re having enough problems talking to people who think their stock portfolios are permanently stuck on the Timber Wolf at Worlds of Fun.

With all the other things on America’s plate, the condition of roadways around the United States means plenty.

Not much more than a year ago, an interstate bridge collapsed in a major city. The Congressional Research Service says about 74,000 U.S. bridges are structurally deficient.

There are four million miles of public roads in the nation. About 1 percent of those roads, the interstate system, bears 25 percent of the vehicle miles traveled. Most drivers have had their teeth rattled on those highways.

Just last month, Congress had to transfer $8 billion into the federal Highway Trust Fund or face the prospect of the account going dry. The fund fills up with payments through the 18.4 cents a gallon gasoline tax. With pump prices so high, motorists began driving less.

In Missouri, 50-year-old Interstate 70 has exceeded its designed life by decades, and its traffic will double by 2030. The $3 billion needed to make the necessary fixes is not in sight.

India learned late the business benefits of good highways, perhaps modeling its efforts after the United States.

The United States, its roads and bridges needing attention, might have to re-learn the lessons from India.

Ken Newton’s column runs on Tuesday and Sunday.