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Treating infrastructure as an industry doesn't really work. Also tolling is ideally suited for things that have specific constraints so you can shape traffic e.g. how the bridges around NYC have substantially different truck tolls depending on time of day in order to balance loads; while it's not appropriate for random roads.
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Apr 16, 2013 17:53
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Yeah, I agree, basic services like transport/infastructure/power/water/education/healthcare seem to lose a huge amount of their effectiveness when run like an "industry" with direct user fees. Those things work best as a pooled resource for the whole society to benefit from.
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Apr 16, 2013 17:57
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There's also issues like how collection of actual appropriate user fees for someone driving a regular car for 15 miles on a freeway and 5 miles on city streets would likely result in attempting to charge them for small fractions of a cent each trip, which just isn't practical to collect.
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Apr 16, 2013 18:01
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Baronjutter posted:Yeah, I agree, basic services like transport/infastructure/power/water/education/healthcare seem to lose a huge amount of their effectiveness when run like an "industry" with direct user fees. Those things work best as a pooled resource for the whole society to benefit from. Gee nothing wrong with throwing out a giant free-rider problem and begging to get funding screwed up! "Pooled resource for the whole society" is not a functional model, in any industry, and pretending that works is the source of most of our funding problems in the industries you named. Install Gentoo posted:There's also issues like how collection of actual appropriate user fees for someone driving a regular car for 15 miles on a freeway and 5 miles on city streets would likely result in attempting to charge them for small fractions of a cent each trip, which just isn't practical to collect. So, kind of like it's "not practical" for your cellular provider to provide you with cellular service because the cost of providing each individual call is only a few pennies, so it just doesn't make sense to try to collect that? Or how each individual web page is only a couple kbs or mbs and so it's "not practical" for your ISP to charge you a fee for internet service? Or how a beer from Budweiser only costs them a vanishing fraction of their operating costs so it's "not practical" to charge each person who buys a beer for that beer? Seriously guys, take a long hard look at the economics of each of these situations, and realize that "pooled resources" do not work in any industry or any economy. (And I swear to God if you try to bring up "Canada / UK healthcare", which is a whole other conversation, I will probably have an aneurysm.) edit: The average road costs $75K - $150K per year per lane-mile to maintain, with a smooth amortization over its lifetime. The average road also carries about 30K AADT. That is about 11M annual lane miles of traffic, divided by $112,500 average cost per lane mile, for a cost of about $0.01 per driver per lane mile. It's not hard to collect that money if you actually want your infrastructure to be funded directly and forever, and in a way that the State Congress cowboys can't steal away to use for pet projects. It's not hard! The hardest part is admit that existing infrastructure funding systems are failures, and if they weren't, we wouldn't have $2.2T in unfunded infrastructure projects! Chaos Motor fucked around with this message at 18:19 on Apr 16, 2013 |
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Apr 16, 2013 18:15
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Chaos Motor posted:So, kind of like it's "not practical" for your cellular provider to provide you with cellular service because the cost of providing each individual call is only a few pennies, so it just doesn't make sense to try to collect that? Or how each individual web page is only a couple kbs or mbs and so it's "not practical" for your ISP to charge you a fee for internet service? Yeah I don't know if you noticed but in the year of our lord 2013 my ISP just charges me a flat fee for service and my mobile carrier has a limit but it's also a flat fee. I don't pay a use fee as I use it. It would be flat out retarded to pay per individual data usage these days And also no, that's healthcare goddamn globally bro. Infrastructure is the literal definition of a pooled resource. Pooled resources work in every industry because every industry relies on pooled resources of one kind or another to function. Chaos Motor posted:edit: The average road costs $75K - $150K per year per lane-mile to maintain, with a smooth amortization over its lifetime. The average road also carries about 30K AADT. That is about 11M annual lane miles of traffic, divided by $112,500 average cost per lane mile, for a cost of about $0.01 per driver per lane mile. It's not hard to collect that money if you actually want your infrastructure to be funded directly and forever, and in a way that the State Congress cowboys can't steal away to use for pet projects. It's not hard! The hardest part is admit that existing infrastructure funding systems are failures, and if they weren't, we wouldn't have $2.2T in unfunded infrastructure projects! Except a truck causes way more than $0.01 per driver per mile in costs and regular cars cause well under that...
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Apr 16, 2013 18:19
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Because I believe in user fees, I sometimes go out of my way to use the I-110 HOT (tolled) roads here in Los Angeles. Despite the fact that public opinion is against it and the local Orange County private tolling authority has needed public sector bailouts 
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Apr 16, 2013 18:20
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Install Gentoo posted:Yeah I don't know if you noticed but in the year of our lord 2013 my ISP just charges me a flat fee for service and my mobile carrier has a limit but it's also a flat fee. I don't pay a use fee as I use it. It would be flat out retarded to pay per individual data usage these days You are paying for your USE, that is the point. Taxes do not reflect usage. quote:Infrastructure is the literal definition of a pooled resource. Pooled resources work in every industry because every industry relies on pooled resources of one kind or another to function. Except for, you know, every industry that is financially stable and not tax dependent? quote:Except a truck causes way more than $0.01 per driver per mile in costs and regular cars cause well under that... So you think we're too dumb to institute differential tolling based on vehicle weight classes? Seriously? Mandalay posted:Because I believe in user fees, I sometimes go out of my way to use the I-110 HOT (tolled) roads here in Los Angeles. Despite the fact that public opinion is against it and the local Orange County private tolling authority has needed public sector bailouts People of low intelligence seem to think "paid by taxes" means "free", and so they object to implementation of user fees on a discrete basis. If user fees were systemic, people wouldn't complain, since they would see how dramatically cheaper it is when your transportation funding isn't being siphoned off to pay for the Sheriff's softball league and tax breaks for local developers.
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Apr 16, 2013 18:24
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Chaos Motor posted:You are paying for your USE, that is the point. Taxes do not reflect usage. Yes, and? Define your list of financially stable industries then. I'd love to see which ones you think. The tolling would necessarily work shittily in handling everyone on all the roads, especially when dealing with small amounts due to transaction fees. People with low intelligence are morons, so who cares? Attempting to implement tolls as a solution to all road funding is just setting up a whole new way to run corruption if your politicians are already paying for softball fields with road money now. I don't think you realize this. Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 18:31 on Apr 16, 2013 |
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Apr 16, 2013 18:28
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Chaos Motor posted:People of low intelligence seem to think "paid by taxes" means "free", and so they object to implementation of user fees on a discrete basis. If user fees were systemic, people wouldn't complain, since they would see how dramatically cheaper it is when your transportation funding isn't being siphoned off to pay for the Sheriff's softball league and tax breaks for local developers. If you can't find a way to make this appeal to the lowest common denominator, then I don't see how you're going to get elected officials behind this poo poo. I assure you that it's not just people of low intelligence who think Freeways Should Be Free (as in beer). While it has been well documented that the gas tax is a decreasingly useful way of taxing VMT, I think we should really be increasing it due to the (lack of) implementation costs. Hell, call it the Operation Iraqi Liberation surcharge.
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Apr 16, 2013 18:42
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Install Gentoo posted:Define your list of financially stable industries then. I'd love to see which ones you think. Industries not funded by taxes, who have to match their expenditures to their revenues, and support their own existence or go out of business. Sure, individual businesses may come and go, but the industries that don't depend on taxes are fluid in their response because they participate in markets, not centrally planned malfunction. quote:The tolling would necessarily work shittily in handling everyone on all the roads, especially when dealing with small amounts due to transaction fees. Just like the cellular industry doesn't work at all because the expense of any given phone call is so small? C'mon. quote:Attempting to implement tolls as a solution to all road funding is just setting up a whole new way to run corruption if your politicians are already paying for softball fields with road money now. I don't think you realize this. I don't think you've bothered to inquire exactly how this would work, and are throwing out a ton of useless objections that wouldn't even exist if you were more inquisitive than assumptive. Mandalay posted:I assure you that it's not just people of low intelligence who think Freeways Should Be Free (as in beer). So you've got a bunch of volunteers out there supplying free labor and free materials for roads now? In what fantasy land? quote:While it has been well documented that the gas tax is a decreasingly useful way of taxing VMT, I think we should really be increasing it due to the (lack of) implementation costs. Hey, it didn't work last time, or any time before it, but this time, this time, we can do central planning "right", right?
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Apr 16, 2013 19:01
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And of course it'll be just great to watch as every remotely busy freeway becomes a playground of the rich, commutes for anyone else become hell and unemployment gets even worse. There's other reasons things are paid for through taxes than just being a pooled resource.
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Apr 16, 2013 19:03
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Chaos Motor posted:Industries not funded by taxes, who have to match their expenditures to their revenues, and support their own existence or go out of business. Sure, individual businesses may come and go, but the industries that don't depend on taxes are fluid in their response because they participate in markets, not centrally planned malfunction. All industries are funded by taxes, due to relying on the modern state and government to function, including infrastructure in order to transact business. The cellular industry doesn't charge the true cost and they don't do it at use time. They charge way over the true cost, and most customers are paying at an entirely different time then the service is rendered with either prepayment or postpayment. I don't think you've bothered to learn that it's absolutely impractical. And also WAY more prone to corruption then taxing is. It's not like road tolls are a new idea, they're literally hundreds of years older than cars themselves. They don't work out for funding everything, they work best for funding specific things like crossings of specific areas (e.g. mountain tunnels and water bridges or tunnels), or for handling specific bypass routes (toll expressways and such). They don't work if you're trying to also pay for everything else, like average city streets and surface non-controlled highways.
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Apr 16, 2013 19:17
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Jonnty posted:And of course it'll be just great to watch as every remotely busy freeway becomes a playground of the rich, commutes for anyone else become hell and unemployment gets even worse. There's other reasons things are paid for through taxes than just being a pooled resource. What complete nonsense, are you guys simply ignorant of basic economics, or violently opposed to financial responsibility? Because the Tragedy of the Commons / Free Rider problem isn't massively exacerbated by the concept of "pooled resources". Pooled resources are the fundamental creator of the tragedy of the commons! When a nebulous "everyone" is responsible for paying for something, nobody treats their usage of that resource responsibly because there's no incentive to!. Pooled resources are the definition of dis-incentivizing responsible use. Install Gentoo posted:All industries are funded by taxes, due to relying on the modern state and government to function, including infrastructure in order to transact business. Oh for Christ's sake. "It is, therefore it must be." Nevermind the demonstrated failure that public allocation for infrastructure is. You're completely ignoring that the USA has TWO POINT TWO TRILLION IN UNFUNDED INFRASTRUCTURE LIABILITIES exactly BECAUSE things aren't paid for individually and don't generate their own revenue. Hell, why not just have the government pay for everything, eliminate the concept of money, and watch how nobody works and everyone starves to death, because central planning is a failure, cannot possibly allocate resources effectively, and dis-incentivizes individual productivity because there's no impetus to be productive. quote:The cellular industry doesn't charge the true cost and they don't do it at use time. They charge way over the true cost, and most customers are paying at an entirely different time then the service is rendered with either prepayment or postpayment. I'm sorry, do you happen to think taxes reflect the "true cost" of anything? quote:I don't think you've bothered to learn that it's absolutely impractical "Based purely on assumptions, without asking a single goddamn question, and knowing nothing about what you're suggesting, I must conclude it's an impossible failure." quote:And also WAY more prone to corruption then taxing is. How, again, is paying for what you use "WAY more prone to corruption than taxing"? quote:It's not like road tolls are a new idea, they're literally hundreds of years older than cars themselves. They don't work out for funding everything, they work best for funding specific things like crossings of specific areas (e.g. mountain tunnels and water bridges or tunnels), or for handling specific bypass routes (toll expressways and such). So what you're telling me is that tolling works wonderfully, when the tolls pay for exactly what you're using? Isn't that what I've been trying to beat into your thick head? quote:They don't work if you're trying to also pay for everything else, like average city streets and surface non-controlled highways. "Based purely on assumptions, without asking a single goddamn question, and knowing nothing about what you're suggesting, I must conclude it's an impossible failure." Chaos Motor fucked around with this message at 19:25 on Apr 16, 2013 |
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Apr 16, 2013 19:18
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Chaos Motor posted:What complete nonsense, are you guys simply ignorant of basic economics, or violently opposed to financial responsibility? Because the Tragedy of the Commons / Free Rider problem isn't massively exacerbated by the concept of "pooled resources". Pooled resources are the fundamental creator of the tragedy of the commons! When a nebulous "everyone" is responsible for paying for something, nobody treats their usage of that resource responsibly because there's no incentive to!. Pooled resources are the definition of dis-incentivizing responsible use. You know basic economics, we know intermediate and advanced economics. It's as simple as that.
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Apr 16, 2013 19:20
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Jonnty posted:And of course it'll be just great to watch as every remotely busy freeway becomes a playground of the rich, commutes for anyone else become hell and unemployment gets even worse. There's other reasons things are paid for through taxes than just being a pooled resource. The alternative is ever-increasing demand for freeway space and everybody loses here in Los Angeles. Is it fair to price buses and rail but not roads? (the gas tax is not a true user fee) Conversely, I think that in an ultimate road tolling scenario, neighborhood-severing freeways are limited in scope, people live closer together, and commutes are shorter. The freeway model encourages and supports a wasteful long but fast commute pattern. I should know, I live in Los Angeles and make the commute from the suburbs two or four times a week.
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Apr 16, 2013 19:21
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Can you stupids take this to DnD before the thread gets locked.
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Apr 16, 2013 19:22
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Install Gentoo posted:You know basic economics, we know intermediate and advanced economics. It's as simple as that. Yes, complete ignorance of, or utter disregard for, Free Riders and the Tragedy of the Commons demonstrates an incredible understanding of Advanced Krugmanomics (also known as "La la la, I can't hear you"). Notice you can't respond to any of my comments so instead you try to undermine me as a person. Terminal Entropy posted:Can you stupids take this to DnD before the thread gets locked. Because transportation funding is somehow magically not a part of infrastructure management & transportation engineering? Mandalay posted:The alternative is ever-increasing demand for freeway space and everybody loses here in Los Angeles. Is it fair to price buses and rail but not roads? (the gas tax is not a true user fee) Exactly! If user fees are so impossible, why do they work so well for other forms of transit?
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Apr 16, 2013 19:28
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Chaos Motor posted:Yes, complete ignorance of, or utter disregard for, Free Riders and the Tragedy of the Commons demonstrates an incredible understanding of Advanced Krugmanomics (also known as "La la la, I can't hear you"). Notice you can't respond to any of my comments so instead you try to undermine me as a person. Free riders are not in and of themselves a problem when we're talking about public infrastructure. In fact they are encouraged, because we recognize that there are some people who can't afford things and others who can afford a lot. You're arguing from a fundamentally uninformed position. Like I'm sorry but you sound like someone who just doesn't understand how things work beyond the very basics taught in intro-level courses. Other forms of transit do not charge their actual costs. Public train and bus fares rarely come anywhere close to the actual cost because they're run based on tax revenue providing substantial funding. Meanwhile private bus and plane fares can be quite in excess of the actual price. edit: Infrastructure is a basic public good. It is needed for any business to operate at all. It's extremely stupid to claim that there's industries operating in the US right now that don't rely on taxes, due to the fact the government supports significant infrastructure and enforces all kinds of laws and contracts that are necessary for those business to function as they do. Chaos Motor posted:
I guess you've never paid attention to any tolling agency that's ever arisen then. You're advocating for tolls everywhere to replace taxes. It simply doesn't work. Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Apr 16, 2013 |
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Apr 16, 2013 19:34
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Chaos Motor, forgive me if I don't quite understand the thrust of your argument here, but if one of the issues is that increased fuel economy and alternative energy vehicles are depleting the Highway Trust Fund and other road infrastructure programs by reducing gasoline consumption and thereby reducing the amount of money we take in from gas taxes... Why not just increase gas taxes? Better idea, actually: Let's index gasoline taxes to your income level, thereby making it a system of progressive taxation. We wouldn't even have to modify the existing pumps, people could just record their fuel consumption annually and receive a credit or a bill based on their usage. Hey, almost like a usage fee! Even better! Hell, we're not even getting into modifying things like 'military spending' in order to direct more revenue to infrastructure repair and maintenance.
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Apr 16, 2013 19:57
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Chaos Motor posted:Because transportation funding is somehow magically not a part of infrastructure management & transportation engineering? Are you a traffic engineer? This isn't the place for you to argue with everyone else about how we should pay for roads. Could you please make a separate thread?
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Apr 16, 2013 20:21
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edit: Remove because of derail.
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Apr 16, 2013 21:00
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Jonnty posted:And of course it'll be just great to watch as every remotely busy freeway becomes a playground of the rich, commutes for anyone else become hell and unemployment gets even worse. There's other reasons things are paid for through taxes than just being a pooled resource. Case in point (in the UK at least) the M6 Toll! Originally planned to be a free bypass of the M6 running through Birmingham and the West Midlands the project was contracted out to a local consortium to be built as a toll road. Of course the prices have rocketed so high that only professional footballers and MP's claiming on expenses use it now! In fact the traffic on the existing 'free' M6 got so bad that they are doing cheap dutch style fake widening on it by allowing the emergency lanes to be used as running lanes. It does work but can get very interesting! Basically road tolls are evil but that's because I'm British and don't want to have to pay for something I already pay for with road tax and fuel tax etc.  
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Apr 16, 2013 21:03
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The gas tax is the most direct way to charge people for their use of roads, but the American public is very hostile towards the idea of raising the tax right now, so no politician's going to go for it. Traffic engineering is at the opposite end of the political system from the funding, so they end up just having to use what gets allocated to them, which is the same mess every government department providing a service is in.
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Apr 16, 2013 21:19
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MyFaceBeHi posted:Case in point (in the UK at least) the M6 Toll! Originally planned to be a free bypass of the M6 running through Birmingham and the West Midlands the project was contracted out to a local consortium to be built as a toll road. Of course the prices have rocketed so high that only professional footballers and MP's claiming on expenses use it now! In fact the traffic on the existing 'free' M6 got so bad that they are doing cheap dutch style fake widening on it by allowing the emergency lanes to be used as running lanes. It does work but can get very interesting! That is a serious fuckin' rip for the distance too. If they had tolls more in line with typical American toll roads, it'd be about £1.25 for the length of it for cars and £2.80 for trucks. And that'd be cash rates, not even counting electronic toll collection discounts.
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Apr 16, 2013 21:27
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We just had a toll fiasco around here. There's a bridge that connects Evansville, Indiana with Illinois (via Mount Vernon) that had a toll booth with people stationed in it. The state decided that was a waste of money so they have a new automated system that uses license plates to charge you (I guess they mail a bill to your house the car is registered to?). Everything was fine and good until people were charged twice in mere seconds for crossing the bridge. http://www.14news.com/story/21848806/have-drivers-been-charged-more-than-once-to-cross-ilin-state-lines The state doesn't really give a poo poo though and is suing people in court to pay their tolls anyway. Edit: And there's also a toll road up in northern Indiana that was sold to a private company. Basically toll roads are a ripoff 9 times out of 10.
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Apr 16, 2013 21:32
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Chaos Motor posted:Uhhh, people are paying the full price, just through a mechanism that obscures costs. I'm sorry for bringing this subject up, and I should have known better. Going back to traffic engineering... Why are people so bad at adapting their speed to the road conditions? (And why the compulsion to post it on the Internet?) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eem0ScklhjU Edit: Just saw this piece about the Tesla "super charging" stations. They only installed two of them yet, I guess? Are there other options for charging an electric car on the road in the eastern U.S? http://money.cnn.com/2013/02/15/autos/tesla-model-s/ Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 22:15 on Apr 16, 2013 |
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Apr 16, 2013 22:00
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Terminal Entropy posted:Can you stupids take this to DnD before the thread gets locked. Seriously, this. It's not fun to watch Chaos Motors go Full Libertarian, and usage fees aren't a foolproof way to allocate funding. Please go to DnD if you feel this strongly.
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Apr 16, 2013 22:35
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I believe this man is advocating charging people living in poverty for the use of sidewalks. I suppose they should all stay indoors and starve to death, rather than look for work and contribute to the economy. I suppose they could take out loans! Assuming anyone was willing to extend credit. FUGM.
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Apr 17, 2013 01:09
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Please don't respond to Chaos Motor. He's done in here.
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Apr 17, 2013 01:15
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I have a question specifically about stoplight cycles. When I'm biking I know where to position my bike to trigger the induction loop at most lights but sometimes they have low sensitivity and won't trip. I've noticed two general categories of lights in this case: some I have to have someone behind me to get a green to come up but a car on the other side isn't enough because they will get a green (and green left hand turn signal) then the cross traffic will get a green; while other lights a car on the other side will get a green and turn signal, and then the light will cycle so that I get a green as well. Is the second behavior intentional for bikes (all of the lights are on city-designated bike routes) or just coincidental?
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Apr 17, 2013 01:22
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Shifty Pony posted:I have a question specifically about stoplight cycles. When I'm biking I know where to position my bike to trigger the induction loop at most lights but sometimes they have low sensitivity and won't trip. It's not something that's based on bike routes, but rather on the way the phases are put into the controller. The details are a bit complicated, but to put it simply, there's a parameter called Dual Entry. If your phase has Dual Entry enabled, a call on the opposing approach will also call your phase. If not, one side of the road can go without the other. Have you tried putting a strong neodymium magnet on your bike frame? I've heard from some bikers that that will help make loops more sensitive to them, but it could just be confirmation bias. And I know you know where to position yourself, but for anyone else who's wondering, the most sensitive spot on a normal (square) loop is right at the edge. ----- While I was out in the field today, I found a little pile of glass beads that were left behind after some painting. This photo helps you get a scale of how small they are, and how brightly they shine. You can also see a rainbow effect from refraction. They look even brighter when they're embedded in paint, since they have some bright white behind them instead of pale pink flesh. 
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Apr 17, 2013 02:08
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Cichlidae posted:It's not something that's based on bike routes, but rather on the way the phases are put into the controller. The details are a bit complicated, but to put it simply, there's a parameter called Dual Entry. If your phase has Dual Entry enabled, a call on the opposing approach will also call your phase. If not, one side of the road can go without the other. It is all about the wheel positioning. If you put the wheels along cut holding the center wires that goes a bunch further in triggering the induction loop than anything attached to the frame would because the metal in the wheels is only 4cm above the road surface. However some of the lights have been re-wired or re-paved so that you can no longer tell where the actual active loop is. Some bike lanes now have their own specially designed for bikes at-an-angle mini-induction loop setup in them at lights. That is very nice to see. Also retroreflection is just such a cool effect.
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Apr 17, 2013 03:15
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Shifty Pony posted:It is all about the wheel positioning. If you put the wheels along cut holding the center wires that goes a bunch further in triggering the induction loop than anything attached to the frame would because the metal in the wheels is only 4cm above the road surface. However some of the lights have been re-wired or re-paved so that you can no longer tell where the actual active loop is. Ah, you've got quadrupole loops if they have a "center" wire. Those are meant specifically to be more sensitive to bicycles, but they're also a pain to maintain. Maintenance is also the reason why we've been burying most of our loops under the top course of asphalt when possible. Those top couple inches of asphalt get shoved around so much that they often end up shearing several inches over their lifespan, which severs the loop. It is a big pain in the rear end, though, when we're trying to figure out where the heck a loop is. Some places with heavy bike traffic will put paint markings on the road over the most sensitive spots, but I don't even know if the painting subcontractor would be able to do that if the loop were buried. The nationwide trend seems to be moving toward video detection, now that vehicle recognition software is getting pretty powerful. Video detectors should be able to pick up a bicycle pretty easily, and they're even being used for pedestrian detection in some locations. It's possible to get a single fisheye camera mounted above the center of the intersection to monitor all approaches at once, which should make video detection very attractive compared to loops.
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Apr 17, 2013 03:28
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Someone linked this thread over at AI, didn't know it was here happy to see someone who actually is on the inside of the highway system in CT. I've always been fascinated with started but unfinished bits of highways here like the carved out but not paved bit off Rt 11 and the never used i-291 ramps north of the "stacks" in Farmington, or that so obvious "this was supposed to keep going" exit on Governor Street in EH. Are there any other remnants lurking elsewhere in the state? And what the heck was that ramp stub off the Sisson Ave exit in Hartford supposed to connect to?
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Apr 17, 2013 03:34
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Cichlidae posted:Ah, you've got quadrupole loops if they have a "center" wire. Those are meant specifically to be more sensitive to bicycles, but they're also a pain to maintain. Maintenance is also the reason why we've been burying most of our loops under the top course of asphalt when possible. Those top couple inches of asphalt get shoved around so much that they often end up shearing several inches over their lifespan, which severs the loop. I don't blame you. In Austin, land of 100 straight days of 100+ highs during the summer, the asphalt will migrate pretty rapidly. Nearly everything is chip-seal pavement too so I bet that cuts the wires quite easily. The video detectors are very good at picking up bikes. They also freak out the local  Alex Jones crowd so that's just another great side effect.
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Apr 17, 2013 03:44
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Chaos Motor posted:Irrelevant, the officer was not a witness and is unable to verify any information. His testimony is hearsay and hearsay is not admissible.
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Apr 17, 2013 03:51
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This is a loving massive post, because I started reading at the very start of the thread... awesome thread by the way. I stopped around page 18-19 because I simply don't have the time to read 200+ pages.Cichlidae posted:Oh god, I don't even want to touch Worcester. I stay away from it on principle. I'm so glad that the 146 expressway got finished, so even if I ever have to go there, I can stay off the local roads. (Also because it means Rhode Island will get a new interstate once I-190 takes over 146.) Since this is my thread, though... Here's Kelley Square: http://goo.gl/maps/1GpRr Exit and entrance ramps for an interstate, two confusingly named state routes (122 and 122A in one intersection? Hope you have an IQ over room temperature and remember which you wanted!), four one way streets, a bazillion crosswalks and a few islands, NO LIGHTS AT ALL. NONE. I have seen people leave this intersection via handicap ramps into parking lots before. The name of the game getting through it is take the right of way by the neck and never let go or stop moving until you are out the other side. Show no fear, take no quarter for you shall be given none. I saw it got mentioned on page 18 or so of the thread. You said you'd have to knock down a variety of historic buildings... be my guest. There's really nothing too historic around Kelley Square, just a bunch of shitheap apartment buildings, crappy little shops, and a couple dive bars and gas stations. You could flatten basically everything from there to the railyard and I doubt anyone would really give a rat's rear end. Here's i290/i190, I bitched about it in AI and someone sent me to this thread: http://goo.gl/maps/HwgdB (pay special attention to i290W as 190 splits off and rejoins. 3 lanes, then a double wide exit with no lane separator that turns into a double lane exit, then it merges down to 2 lanes, then an entrance ramp makes it 3 again, then a double lane entrance from 190 makes it 5, then a merge to 4, then an exit ramp, then a merge to 3. Guaranteed to gently caress up my commute EVERY SINGLE EVENING from '08 through '11.) Myself, I would make the 3 lane fork into two 2 lanes (290W, 190N) with the middle lane forking. Then bring in the entrance ramp, making it 3 lanes. Then bring in 190S and merge one lane, making 4 lanes. Right lane forms an exit-only for exit 18, and we're down to 3 lanes with only one exit-only and one merge. I think it'd be possible to do with only some repainting and signage changes, but they haven't changed it and it's been a horrible loving mess 5 nights a week since forever as a result. Cichlidae posted:State routes, though, are more flexible. RI 138 (the only state route that goes through CT, RI, and MA, if you want a horribly obscure bar wager) switches from going east-west to north-south in Newport, and the signs there change to reflect it. Unfortunately, that leads to confusion as well. Another fun one: Rt2 going through Fitchburg, specifically the exits and entrances from MA-13, MA-12, and the "death curve" for the next few miles to the west. It's all compounded by incredibly tight radius entrance and exit ramps, stop signs at the ends of entrance ramps, blind corners, jersey barriers, it ices up amazingly in the winter, during some seasons it has HORRIBLE sun glare issues going east in the morning and west at night right during rush hour, and to add to the fun, they made sure almost every single storm drain (in the left lane, no less) has a grating about 4-6" below grade. It's fun, I tell you. And by fun I mean it feels like you're piloting a loving podracer. I'd drive it with this or this blasting, nothing else. Bonus: it has a couple at-grade intersections, with traffic lights and all, in the middle of a 50+ mph zone, with all the aforementioned hazards. Cichlidae posted:We use far side only in CT whenever possible. Signal heads should be between 40 and 120 feet in front of the stop bar (150 in a pinch), and it's hard to get that kind of spacing on near-side spans. Of course, we have a lot of plows, so it's generally obvious where the stop bars are. Just for you, though, here's a rarity: a partial stop bar. hahahaha, I know this intersection, a buddy of mine (also a goon) used to have an auto shop down on Pane Road a couple miles from there. We have an "always green" on MA-20W at the MA-12 interchange in Auburn MA as well for the same reason, dumbass drivers. http://goo.gl/maps/LZuZf Another fun interchange you should take a peek at: interstate route 3 & MA-4 in Chelmsford MA. It's a sort of a giant-rotary-traffic-lights-on-some-bridges-over-an-interstate-with-multiple-exits abortion. Actually flows pretty well, though. I guess it'd be considered a split diamond crossed with a rotary and two cross roads instead of just one. http://goo.gl/maps/sL30L Cichlidae posted:Now, the big question is, what's the solution? We could post a higher limit, but the first time a trucker tries to run a curve posted at 75 and slides off the road because we haven't repaved it in 20 years, the DOT gets sued. We could fix the roads, but that'd require a few trillion bucks. We could enforce the speed limit more stringently, but that really doesn't fix anything. It's not something we can just solve by saying "Oh, you can drive as fast as you want." I dislike a lot of things NY/NYC does, but I think they have it right here. They do stuff like posting interstates as 50mph for trucks and 65 for everyone else. It creates a legal speed differential, which probably causes some accidents, but if you can't see and avoid something as big as a fuckin' 18 wheeler that's only going 15-20mph slower than you, I'm not sure how much sympathy I'm supposed to have for you. Cichlidae posted:Boston is so messed up that there was an entire thread about this a couple years ago. I don't have archives, but if someone could dredge it up, that would be excellent. Glad you touched on this - especially the fun about traveling north on one road and south on another at the same time. IIRC, you are actually traveling east-west at that point. Check out the I290/I495 interchange; I290 was also originally supposed to go further in. I forget if it was supposed to go to I95 or even further. e: after some research, it was supposed to go as far as i95/128. The Intel/Compaq/DEC plant that I worked at from '08 through '11 is in fact built on a portion of the ROW that was originally planned for 290. kastein fucked around with this message at 04:11 on Apr 17, 2013 |
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Apr 17, 2013 03:55
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Oh here's a question: Late at night I often see pedestrian signals do the countdown with flashing "don't walk", then when they hit zero they just go back to "walk". Obviously this is in the direction of the major street (which stays green until it's triggered), but why wouldn't it just stay on "don't walk" until someone hits the button?
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Apr 17, 2013 03:59
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Socket Ryanist posted:Oh here's a question: Late at night I often see pedestrian signals do the countdown with flashing "don't walk", then when they hit zero they just go back to "walk". Obviously this is in the direction of the major street (which stays green until it's triggered), but why wouldn't it just stay on "don't walk" until someone hits the button?
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Apr 17, 2013 06:26
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Cichlidae posted:Ah, you've got quadrupole loops if they have a "center" wire. Those are meant specifically to be more sensitive to bicycles, but they're also a pain to maintain. Maintenance is also the reason why we've been burying most of our loops under the top course of asphalt when possible. Those top couple inches of asphalt get shoved around so much that they often end up shearing several inches over their lifespan, which severs the loop. Are there any other detection systems being tested /tried? And what kind cost and implantation difference is there for video compared to induction and is there any kind of fallback system in case the camera goes out?
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Apr 17, 2013 08:56
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