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Interesting, Helsinki has those exact same car-shaped bicycle stands. Wouldn't have expected them to spread so widely.
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May 31, 2021 13:01
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Jasper Tin Neck posted:There is a fairly easy and cheap solution to streetcars (or buses) stuck in traffic jams, though. It just requires going against such widely held misconceptions about how traffic works, that Class B right of way is a non-starter in US cities. Seattle has significant amounts of Class B for buses around town, especially in the urban core. However, do not ask what the streetcars’ ROW is like. zero grade separation anywhere except at the termini However, Seattle is certainly the exception rather than the rule here!
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May 31, 2021 15:46
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Carbon dioxide posted:Just when I needed an example of a place in the US getting it right. the problem is that Carmel is a rich suburb, not a real city, its like saying "wow this mall is really well built for pedestrians"
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Jun 1, 2021 07:06
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Peanut President posted:the problem is that Carmel is a rich suburb, not a real city, its like saying "wow this mall is really well built for pedestrians" thats a bit of a tautology, like yeah the rich suburb will have a tax base stout enough to self-fund nice infrastructure
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Jun 1, 2021 13:48
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a patagonian cavy posted:Seattle has significant amounts of Class B for buses around town, especially in the urban core. However, do not ask what the streetcars’ ROW is like. zero grade separation anywhere except at the termini Salt Lake City's street running territory is almost entirely Class B, with the exception of a 6 block stretch of Class C between Ballpark and 900 South. Just about everything south of Ballpark and the stretch around SLC International is 55-65 MPH in a commuter-style rail corridor. The mixed traffic hellstretch along 200 West, 25 MPH:  Downtown SLC, separated using rumble strips, 25 MPH:  University line along 400 South, in the median with embedded track, 25-35 MPH:  Suburban areas, in the median with ballast track, 35-40 MPH:  Outer Suburban/Exurban areas, built like a commuter rail line, 50-65 MPH:  ... It's also going to be a long, long time before SLC builds any new rail outside of a streetcar extension. New agency policy that came out literally today: If you want a rail line or a new stop on an existing line, you have to pay UTA for the right of way acquisition and infrastrucuture costs, in full. Also, your new station or extension may not slow the line down or stretch the fleet thin. In the former case, UTA tells you to go away unless you're adding thousands of boardings a day. In the latter case, you have to pay for any vehicles needed to maintain the new level of service without stretching the fleet thin, AND wait for them to arrive in 3-4 years. You *also* have to contribute toward the maintenance and operating costs, using a stable funding source (basically prevents tech companies like Amazon, Adobe or Micron from pushing for their own personal rail extension). This policy basically restricts all new lines to BRT, due to how much rail costs these days. UTA Executive Director Carolyn Gonot's going away present, as she heads off to do the same thing in San Jose as their new CEO. Varance fucked around with this message at 07:57 on Jun 2, 2021 |
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Jun 2, 2021 07:19
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:thats a bit of a tautology, like yeah the rich suburb will have a tax base stout enough to self-fund nice infrastructure ok?
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Jun 2, 2021 07:40
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Nah the rich suburbs have got people with the spare time, the connections, and the knowledge to organise and lobby local government to get that sort of thing.
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Jun 2, 2021 09:35
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Peanut President posted:the problem is that Carmel is a rich suburb, not a real city, its like saying "wow this mall is really well built for pedestrians" I think it's fine to point out successful cities as examples to others, without necessarily concluding that "no one else can have this because it costs money". If a suburb is large enough to be a city proper, and govern its own tax base, fund its own infrastructure, etc, which I guess is what you're saying Carmel does, I guess we can still call it a successful 15-minute city? Seen through that lens, the question you raise becomes "how can we as a country/state enable other cities to prosper in a similar way". There are many ways to approach that problem, and most of them are about economics and not traffic planning/engineering.
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Jun 2, 2021 10:57
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Hippie Hedgehog posted:I think it's fine to point out successful cities as examples to others, without necessarily concluding that "no one else can have this because it costs money". the reason american cities are so lovely is because all their tax money is siphoned off into suburbs so rich white people can have nice things without having to share with poor black people. Indianapolis (the city Carmel is a suburb of) doesn't even have a streetcar or a train system or anything lmao. Like I'm from Atlanta, the worst example of this poo poo, I think I know what I'm talking about
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Jun 2, 2021 22:17
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you want to post about how good of a job Amsterdam or Tokyo does or whatever fine cool but don't post some dipshit rich white flight republican suburb in a state that's dirt poor because the same people that have the nice infrastructure make it their political mission to ensure no one else has it
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Jun 2, 2021 22:21
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Carbon dioxide posted:Just when I needed an example of a place in the US getting it right. This looks like an office park.
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Jun 2, 2021 22:48
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Peanut President posted:the reason american cities are so lovely is because all their tax money is siphoned off into suburbs so rich white people can have nice things without having to share with poor black people. Indianapolis (the city Carmel is a suburb of) doesn't even have a streetcar or a train system or anything lmao. Quite literally too, in all the places with no residency requirements for cops. All those bloated police budgets come out of city revenue to pay salaries that go toward suburban property taxes to resolutely ensure segregation of schools and physical infrastructure. Indy does have a BRT line (Red Line) that actually reasonably lives up to being called BRT, although with a bidirectional single dedicated lane in places.
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Jun 3, 2021 00:01
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Peanut President posted:the reason american cities are so lovely is because all their tax money is siphoned off into suburbs so rich white people can have nice things without having to share with poor black people. Indianapolis (the city Carmel is a suburb of) doesn't even have a streetcar or a train system or anything lmao. That's some serious shade to throw at MARTA, which at least passes the bar of "exists".
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Jun 3, 2021 00:28
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Magic Hate Ball posted:This looks like an office park. Are you saying the only place you recognize typical European livable suburbs from are office areas? Like, don't get me wrong, having bike access to your office is great. But why would you put more effort in making office areas livable than suburbs where people actually live?
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Jun 3, 2021 07:22
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Magic Hate Ball posted:This looks like an office park. Look at the satellite pictures from the neighborhood, though, looks like they mix residential and commercial a lot. So, people could hypothetically live within walking distance from their office. That's the part they're getting right. Peanut President posted:you want to post about how good of a job Amsterdam or Tokyo does or whatever fine cool but don't post some dipshit rich white flight republican suburb in a state that's dirt poor because the same people that have the nice infrastructure make it their political mission to ensure no one else has it I think you missed my point. We seem to agree that the infrastructure in Carmel is fine, right? That it's a good way to lay out "a place for humans, not cars". You make the point that it's unfair and stupid that only rich white-flight communities get to have nice things, and I couldn't agree more. But it's kind of outside the point of the traffic engineering thread, which is what I was trying to say in my last post. We should be allowed to talk about good examples as targets for future design work, but you (and others) keep interjecting "but that's not possible in this country because <reasons>", which invariably devolves into arguments about taxation, inequity and poo poo and leads nowhere. I mean, from what you write, I can come up with a few ideas for how to fix that broken taxation system but I don't think anyone here wants to hear it. Edit: Carbon dioxide posted:But why would you put more effort in making office areas livable than suburbs where people actually live? Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 09:17 on Jun 3, 2021 |
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Jun 3, 2021 09:00
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Cat Hatter posted:That's some serious shade to throw at MARTA, which at least passes the bar of "exists". MARTA is crippled by a high degree of local jurisdictional fragmentation severing tax bases into little useless chunks, as well as a lack of state-level support on funding and political cohesion to empower the local regional planning body (ARC, or GRTA, or ATL now) its a bit outside the scope of this thread though because as stated above, a lot of this fragmentation exists not just as a consequence of mid 20th c suburbanization and white flight but predates it. even if you look at the growing "cityhood" movement across the sunbelt as unincorporated areas newly incorporate, you have to look at this through the most cynical, c-spammy possible perspective to chalk up bike lanes to "these loving racist republican scum" and so on. it makes us feel powerful and knowledgeable to say "actually, the problem is america is racist" but this level of discourse just makes historians sigh and shake their heads Mr. Fall Down Terror fucked around with this message at 14:35 on Jun 3, 2021 |
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Jun 3, 2021 14:33
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Hippie Hedgehog posted:The point of the 15-minute city is that you don't separate them into office areas and suburbs. Again, look at the sat pics of Carmel - small areas of housing are interspersed with office parks and small-scale shopping areas, with minimal parking space, which allows very short commutes and makes mixed neighborhoods that are walkable/bikeable.
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Jun 3, 2021 22:21
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Or more accurately, they pay tax but poo poo their pants at the idea of raising it to a level that would pay for all the infrastructure they use, even within their own municipality. Modern American suburbia is an exercise in constantly shifting and spreading out the costs of building and maintaining it so nobody has to acknowledge how expensive it actually is.
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Jun 3, 2021 23:16
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:MARTA is crippled by a high degree of local jurisdictional fragmentation severing tax bases into little useless chunks, as well as a lack of state-level support on funding and political cohesion to empower the local regional planning body (ARC, or GRTA, or ATL now) Yeah, there's obviously room for improvement, but even when I lived down there I could do basic things like hop on a CCT bus and transfer to MARTA to go downtown or to the airport. I've certainly lived in cities with worse mass transit.
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Jun 4, 2021 02:59
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I was mostly talking about Atlanta being fully surrounded by suburbs that ensure it can't have nice things, MARTA is bad but it's better than nothing, for sure for sureHippie Hedgehog posted:Look at the satellite pictures from the neighborhood, though, looks like they mix residential and commercial a lot. So, people could hypothetically live within walking distance from their office. That's the part they're getting right. It isn't because Carmel isn't a City. Saying Carmel has good urban infrastructure is like saying your yard has good infrastructure or, as I said the first time, a shopping mall having good infrastructure. it's the equivalent of building a bike lane along a 6 lane highway. It can be the nicest fanciest bike lane in the history of the goddamn universe but it still misses the loving point.
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Jun 6, 2021 01:50
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Bad pedestrian "infrastructure":  There's a tiny slope here, and we really need to preserve the maximum angle AND right of way of this one driveway into a rectangle of dirt that has been empty for all living memory, so let's make the sidewalk so inconvenient and horrible that everyone just walks next to it in the 1.5 lanes of road instead It really feels like it exists to comply with a law and/or code and nobody actually looked at it with their human eyeballs and realized what a turd it is
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Jun 11, 2021 23:33
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Javid posted:Bad pedestrian "infrastructure": I'm guessing ADA compliance.
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Jun 11, 2021 23:44
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Deteriorata posted:I'm guessing ADA compliance. ADA tends to have some flexibility. But it looks like there’s an approach/entrance (to the dirt field?) and without actually regrading the road they forced themselves to maintain a 8% slope (the max) in the dumbest/only way they could. It all comes down to how they define the walk/ramp that determines their allowable slopes. EDIT: I was looking at it backwards but the same idea applies. If the whole thing is considered Happy Noodle Boy fucked around with this message at 23:50 on Jun 11, 2021 |
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Jun 11, 2021 23:46
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:ADA tends to have some flexibility. But it looks like there’s an approach/entrance (to the dirt field?) and without actually regrading the road they forced themselves to maintain a 8% slope (the max) in the dumbest/only way they could. It all comes down to how they define the walk/ramp that determines their allowable slopes. If it's an actual "road" then the ADA has an exception for pedestrian facilities within the ROW that allows them to match, but not exceed, the grade of the road they run along. Lots of folks don't know that, though. It's possible that that state or locality has something more stringent. If it's private property that may be legit required for a sidewalk. Looks older than the surrounding road infrastructure, though. And with no other pedestrian facilities, you'd probably be within rights to just rip it out. Maybe future stuff is planned. It would be a lot more usable if you just added some stairs, in addition to the ramp. I'm sure there would have been a way to do that correctly.
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Jun 12, 2021 03:28
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https://twitter.com/gdoteasttraffic/status/1415628773488222211?s=21 Now that’s what I call sturdy design.
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Jul 15, 2021 21:17
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somebody help me understand RI-238. what the gently caress is up with that poo poo. was it originally supposed to connect to Route 24 towards Fall River? why does a 600ft strip of half-abandoned highway get its own route number from the state when it's basically just the continuation of 138 into Newport. the 138/238 concurrency makes no sense at all. why wouldn't they sign it as 138A which already exists
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Jul 16, 2021 17:41
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barnold posted:somebody help me understand RI-238. what the gently caress is up with that poo poo. was it originally supposed to connect to Route 24 towards Fall River? why does a 600ft strip of half-abandoned highway get its own route number from the state when it's basically just the continuation of 138 into Newport. the 138/238 concurrency makes no sense at all. why wouldn't they sign it as 138A which already exists RI-238 connects Goat Island to RI-138, and predates RI-138A. Goat Island was a military base in some form from the 1700s up until 1951, which is why it has its own route designation - 238 is what you followed to get to the base. Once the military base relocated to the north for more space (US Naval Undersea Warfare Command) and the area became touristy, there was no longer a need to connect RI-238 to RI-24 and I-195 for defense purposes. After that, emphasis shifted to RI-138A as a tourist cooridor. In terms of wayfinding, it makes sense to co-sign 238 and 138A for that short distance, to make navigation easier. Could 238 be eliminated? Sure, but it probably has a century of construction plans and funding commitments tied to it. More trouble than it's worth, compared to just slapping up a second set of signs. Varance fucked around with this message at 18:10 on Jul 16, 2021 |
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Jul 16, 2021 17:50
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this is why I love this thread. instant answers from people who know the good stuff 
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Jul 16, 2021 19:03
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Ontario again proving that whoever is heading up MTO is a loving moron:quote:Entering and exiting HOV lanes on Highways 400  Taking up extra space for an HOV merge lane.
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Oct 14, 2021 14:33
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Chris Knight posted:Ontario again proving that whoever is heading up MTO is a loving moron: What's the problem with the idea of an extra lane to help with merging? Are you in the pocket of a bodywork shop? Just generally pro-sideswiping?
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Oct 14, 2021 15:03
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We already have entry/exit points: I'm only in the pocket of Big Know How To Drive Properly.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:02
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Chris Knight posted:We already have entry/exit points: When an HOV is "working" properly, it can be moving 60mph faster than non-HOV lanes. The friction of folks getting in and out of the HOV lane causes the HOV performance (and safety) to drop drastically. It's a challenging problem to solve, but the merge lane you posted earlier is one method.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:04
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yeah I'm not sure knowing how to drive properly is going to help someone behind the wheel of your average 4 banger Honda Civic when they need to jam the gas pedal through the floor in order to get up to HOV speed without being rear ended
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Oct 14, 2021 16:07
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barnold posted:yeah I'm not sure knowing how to drive properly is going to help someone behind the wheel of your average 4 banger Honda Civic when they need to jam the gas pedal through the floor in order to get up to HOV speed without being rear ended Daily Driver CYOA: You are stopped in the fast lane with a carpool of slugs glaring at you from the passenger seat, back seat, and four in the trunk. They are all angry that you are not currently in the HOV lane, which is speeding by at 70mph. But you see a gap coming up - it's not much of a gap, but it's probably the biggest once you'll see for 10 minutes. It's definitely the biggest one you'll see before you creep past the "entry zone" to the HOV lane. 1) That gap isn't safe, I'm just going to stay in the stop-and-go traffic. Turn to page 45, where you will learn what the slugs in the car do to people like you who make them late for work. 2) YOLO, the next car after the gap will probably brake in time. If they brake smoothly, there will only be a small shockwave behind them. Turn to page 69, where you will learn about the fate of the young mother who took her eyes off the gap in front of her for a moment to look at her child in the rearview mirror.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:15
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The issue I see is you're still going to run into trouble when you have someone entering the hov transfer lane behind someone exiting from the hov lane. You can't get up to speed if you're behind someone slowing down
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Oct 14, 2021 16:35
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Watermelon Daiquiri posted:The issue I see is you're still going to run into trouble when you have someone entering the hov transfer lane behind someone exiting from the hov lane. You can't get up to speed if you're behind someone slowing down The Highway Capacity Manual has methods for assessing the impact of weaving operations on capacity that could be applied to situations like this. If you're unhappy with what one merge lane does, you could do things like make it longer, control how or where people enter/exit the merge lane, or change it so that each area only does entrances or exits, but not both. The extreme would be to completely channelize the HOV lanes behind concrete barrier, and enforce entry/exit just like entering or leaving exits from a highway.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:57
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The real issue is having to change lanes twice, which is inevitably going to reduce overall capacity and make the move in and out of HOV riskier. This will likely lead to more accidents and merge delays, making the leftmost and HOV lanes unreliable.Devor posted:The Highway Capacity Manual has methods for assessing the impact of weaving operations on capacity that could be applied to situations like this. If you're unhappy with what one merge lane does, you could do things like make it longer, control how or where people enter/exit the merge lane, or change it so that each area only does entrances or exits, but not both. Varance fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Oct 14, 2021 |
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Oct 14, 2021 18:20
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That's what Texas has been doing and lol if there's a crash
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Oct 14, 2021 18:21
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they should just build another highway on top of that highway and then put all the HOV cars up there. if they want to take an exit they can blues brothers their way off the side, landing perfectly on the offramp
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Oct 15, 2021 18:52
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Chris Knight posted:Ontario again proving that whoever is heading up MTO is a loving moron: Judging from that diagram, they're creating more space by widening the shoulder, not taking up any currently existing road space.
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Oct 15, 2021 20:19
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