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Hey, the Courant's main story tonight is a familiar subject, and one close to my heart today! http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-worst-roads-1118-20111117,0,1263504.story  Crashes Pile Up On State's Worst Roads Problem Areas Well-Known, But Money For Fixes Is Limited About every three days, a motorist on Route 17 trying to merge onto Route 9 in Middletown cranes his or her neck to look for an opening in the traffic, hits the accelerator when a gap appears, and in the blink of an eye plows into the back of another car that was merging onto the highway. That well-traveled on-ramp is, according to state Department of Transportation records, the most reliable accident producer in the state. In 2008, there were 120 rear-end crashes serious enough for state police to respond, and fender-benders there have climbed into the triple digits nearly every year going back a decade. --- So, why is this important? Tomorrow morning, I'm giving a presentation to the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce, including their new Mayor and Chief of Police, about this very area. Local businesses have demanded we allow left turns onto Route 9 at Washington Street, which would back traffic up to the Route 17 ramp and beyond, making the accident problem significantly worse. Let's hope I can convince them to abandon this idea.
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Nov 18, 2011 03:53
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Cichlidae posted:Pffft, yeah, people whine so much. You're supposed to turn where the turn lane ends, not where the arrow is. We always put the last arrow 40 feet back from the stop bar here. Cat tracks would help, yes, but it's not a huge deal.
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Nov 18, 2011 05:40
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Cichlidae posted:So, why is this important? Tomorrow morning, I'm giving a presentation to the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce, including their new Mayor and Chief of Police, about this very area. Local businesses have demanded we allow left turns onto Route 9 at Washington Street, which would back traffic up to the Route 17 ramp and beyond, making the accident problem significantly worse. Let's hope I can convince them to abandon this idea. You'd have access to the photos of crashes, right? Just create a slideshow of them set to the 1812 overture, and then glare at them until they ask you to leave. Foolproof, I say!
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Nov 18, 2011 13:53
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Cichlidae posted:About every three days, a motorist on Route 17 trying to merge onto Route 9 in Middletown cranes his or her neck to look for an opening in the traffic, hits the accelerator when a gap appears, and in the blink of an eye plows into the back of another car that was merging onto the highway. That whole article is just a depressing bit of failed government. "Oh yeah, we know it's terrible, but we have no money to fix it and really, only a quarter of the accidents cause injuries so that's not so bad!" As someone who uses that onramp quite a bit, I feel like I'm just rolling the dice. I guess the answer is "use another onramp."
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Nov 18, 2011 15:14
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Volmarias posted:You'd have access to the photos of crashes, right? Just create a slideshow of them set to the 1812 overture, and then glare at them until they ask you to leave. Oh, I have my ways of getting the pathos I need  The presentation went very well! I even got job offers afterward, which is always a good sign. smackfu posted:That whole article is just a depressing bit of failed government. "Oh yeah, we know it's terrible, but we have no money to fix it and really, only a quarter of the accidents cause injuries so that's not so bad!" As some of the comments hinted at, we've had the motivation and potentially the cash to fix the problem for 40 years. It's the Middletown business owners who don't want things to change.
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Nov 18, 2011 22:38
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I propose this as the theme song for this thread: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCfDLmcJc-g In the time this thread has been around, I started and finished an urban planning master's degree and am still trying to get back into transportation planning with no luck finding a job so far. Be that as it may, here's to one of the best threads on SA and another two years of traffic engineering questions and complaining about bad highway design.
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Nov 18, 2011 23:29
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Dominus Vobiscum posted:I propose this as the theme song for this thread: I'll drink to that! There's certainly no end to misguided design, off-the-mark rehab projects, or promising new technologies. As to finding a job, the whole market's tight right now. Long-term, though, you and I are in luck: there's a big deficit of young engineers, and the profession is losing so much to attrition that we've got a fruitful future ahead of us. About half of my coworkers have retired or left the field in the last 3 years. That's a lot of unfilled positions throughout the career ladder. Combined with a national highway network that's collapsing and an entirely new paradigm of transport on the horizon, we'll have plenty of work to do once the world gets its head on straight.
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Nov 18, 2011 23:41
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Cichlidae posted:Oh, I have my ways of getting the pathos I need 
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Nov 19, 2011 00:24
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Jonnty posted:This whole idea of dual-dual highways is new to me, coming as I do from Scotland. We've got that stuff right here in Europe man  http://maps.google.com/?ll=52.05998...=m&z=14&vpsrc=6 - Utrecht http://maps.google.com/?ll=51.70644...=m&z=14&vpsrc=6 - Den Bosch http://maps.google.com/?ll=51.40862...=m&z=14&vpsrc=6 - Eindhoven http://maps.google.com/?ll=40.36740...=m&z=15&vpsrc=6 - Madrid (which has a ton of parallel lane-setups)
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Nov 19, 2011 00:47
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Cichlidae posted:I'll drink to that! There's certainly no end to misguided design, off-the-mark rehab projects, or promising new technologies.
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Nov 19, 2011 01:17
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There was another accident at that on ramp tonight. Crazy!
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Nov 19, 2011 03:35
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smackfu posted:There was another accident at that on ramp tonight. Crazy! I saw a 3-car rear-end happen on the Putnam Bridge this evening, too. The beginning of Winter is always a tricky time of year. --- So, for the MEET-UP at JOEY GARLIC'S tomorrow! Is anyone coming, or should I pick a different day instead? I am, as you say, at your disposal.
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Nov 19, 2011 05:18
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Koesj posted:We've got that stuff right here in Europe man Oh, I haven't come across any as we don't have them in Britain (as far as I know.) Still, that's pretty cool, thanks (to everybody) for the links!
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Nov 19, 2011 14:29
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I've never driven through this area of Waterbury... but.. http://g.co/maps/2j8mc Do you think this is fixed? 
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Nov 20, 2011 00:19
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I don't think this is MUTCD-compliant signage for an onramp: http://g.co/maps/v2ujd (There's a yield sign in the right place further back.) The South Street left exit/entrance is one of the nastiest on the generally nasty Schuylkill Expressway in Philadelphia, also lovingly known as the "Surekill Distressway". If it were on the right, there would be even worse weaves from the University Ave/Grays Ferry exit to the south and the Walnut Street onramp to the north. There's no fixing it short of completely rebuilding the entire road, which will most likely never happen.
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Nov 20, 2011 00:50
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Cichlidae posted:Hey, the Courant's main story tonight is a familiar subject, and one close to my heart today! I am so glad you posted this link. My only adult accident was in Austin TX in a similar configuration: from a stop (due to traffic) into a no-merge, nearly parallel approach on-ramp onto a prone-to-backups heavy traffic 60mph highway, directly into the rear of someone before me who decided it was just a grand idea to stop on the on-ramp. I still feel like an idiot, but at least I have company in my stupidity. Here's the location where it happened. I have a question about that on-ramp actually: Why is there such an extended length of the ramp parallel to the highway but no marked merge area? Shifty Pony fucked around with this message at 02:59 on Nov 20, 2011 |
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Nov 20, 2011 02:53
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excitebike1 posted:I've never driven through this area of Waterbury... but.. Probably not, but you can get it fixed pretty quickly by calling up the Local Traffic Authority! BOARD OF POLICE Mr. Mark Pronovost WATERBURY COMMISSIONERS Supervisory Engineer (151) City of Waterbury 26 Kendrick Avenue Waterbury, CT 06702 Tel: (203)574-6851 FAX: (203)574-8277 E-Mail: mpronovost@waterburyct.org Dominus Vobiscum posted:The South Street left exit/entrance is one of the nastiest on the generally nasty Schuylkill Expressway in Philadelphia, also lovingly known as the "Surekill Distressway". If it were on the right, there would be even worse weaves from the University Ave/Grays Ferry exit to the south and the Walnut Street onramp to the north. There's no fixing it short of completely rebuilding the entire road, which will most likely never happen. Hahaha, that's ghetto as gently caress! Not even a spray-painted stop bar. There's no way that they actually expect people to see that. CaptBubba posted:Why is there such an extended length of the ramp parallel to the highway but no marked merge area? There are two methods for making on-ramps: taper, and parallel. Here's a handy diagram from the FHWA showing the difference.  Personally, I'm not fond of the taper design. It's really hard to position yourself in a wide lane, and I don't like being squeezed into a merge like a zipper. The upside is, it wouldn't be too hard to re-stripe into a parallel design.
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Nov 20, 2011 17:19
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Cichlidae posted:Hahaha, that's ghetto as gently caress! Not even a spray-painted stop bar. There's no way that they actually expect people to see that. Given the amount of absurd locations I've seen graffiti on in Philly, it probably wasn't officially done. As for *why* someone would put that there, who knows? That ramp would be even more suicidal if it was actually stop-controlled. Street View looks like it's from before the South Street Bridge replacement, so I doubt it's still around. I'm usually too busy trying not to get creamed by oncoming traffic when I'm driving through there to look.
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Nov 20, 2011 17:35
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Cichlidae posted:There are two methods for making on-ramps: taper, and parallel. Here's a handy diagram from the FHWA showing the difference. Huh, that is interesting. I would think that the tapered design would lead to more people panicking and coming to a stop. Are there any rules for mixing the two designs in a stretch of road? That ramp stands out from the rest due to the tapered design while most of the rest of the road uses parallel ramps that run to the next exit.
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Nov 20, 2011 19:07
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CaptBubba posted:Huh, that is interesting. I would think that the tapered design would lead to more people panicking and coming to a stop. Are there any rules for mixing the two designs in a stretch of road? That ramp stands out from the rest due to the tapered design while most of the rest of the road uses parallel ramps that run to the next exit. Generally, you want to keep your exits and entrances consistent along a stretch of road. For example, if you use a partial cloverleaf with the exit ramp after the overpass, you should try to keep all ramps after the overpass for every exit in the corridor. This is just about the last thing you consider when designing an interchange, though, since its benefits aren't tangible. Taper and parallel are the same way, but the right-of-way available has a bigger effect than maintaining consistency. As you can see by the diagram, tapered ramps can use less space.
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Nov 20, 2011 20:07
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excitebike1 posted:I've never driven through this area of Waterbury... but..
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Nov 21, 2011 01:08
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I was there a month ago and no, it is not.
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Nov 21, 2011 02:10
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GWBBQ posted:Do they have money to fix things in Waterbury these days? It took them 50 years to fix the cross at Holy Land USA, so I'd wager that no, they have no money to fix things.
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Nov 21, 2011 04:48
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http://timdelger.bigcartel.com/ This site got me thinking...what do you guys do with your used/obsolete street signs? Is there a cheap way to legally acquire these?
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Nov 21, 2011 07:14
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Solis posted:I just finished marathonning this entire thread over three days... It's a pretty awesome chunk of knowledge. - Highway 427 between the QEW and Hwy 401 was the original alignment of Hwy 27, and was upgraded to a freeway through Etobicoke later on, then rebuilt as Hwy 427 in the 1970s. This is why Hwy 427 aligns perfectly with Hwy 27 north of Hwy 401. - Eglinton Avenue at that point was part of an aggressive plan of freeways through Toronto that Jane Jacobs and her ilk fought to destroy in the 60s. That's the reason it's so overbuilt at that point, it was supposed to terminate a freeway. - The 'Airport Expressway', today's Hwy 409, was built around the 1970s-1980s and then Hwy 427 was extended up to meet it. Hwy 427 was then later extended up to Hwy 50 and Hwy 7. This is where the big fuckup happened, those loving overpasses are only good for 8 lanes across or else you'd rip off the tops of transport trucks. The only way around it is to build up the grade on the south 427 section. Sounds like a big project.
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Nov 21, 2011 09:55
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Mandalay posted:http://timdelger.bigcartel.com/ Our state-owned signs are made of aluminum, so they're all recycled. When they're taken down, the contractor delivers them to the sign shop in Rocky Hill. There, they're either cleaned and re-surfaced for re-use, or considered to be scrap and sold to a recycler. If you wanted to get your hands on one legally, the best (and cheapest) way is just to call up the sign shop and negotiate something. Just keep in mind, those signs are worth about $11/square foot.
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Nov 21, 2011 13:35
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Cichlidae posted:Our state-owned signs are made of aluminum, so they're all recycled. When they're taken down, the contractor delivers them to the sign shop in Rocky Hill. There, they're either cleaned and re-surfaced for re-use, or considered to be scrap and sold to a recycler. $1400 Coffee Table With a 3'x3' table going for $1400, it's definitely worth the price if you're planning on making one yourself. This is actually pretty awesome though and if I was independently wealthy I'd just buy one straight up.
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Nov 21, 2011 15:15
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I sure hope he's taken a grinder to those edges and smoothed them.
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Nov 21, 2011 18:22
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Koesj posted:http://maps.google.com/?ll=52.05998...=m&z=14&vpsrc=6 - Utrecht Ooh, I drive there nearly every day. 
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Nov 21, 2011 20:08
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Sagacity posted:Ooh, I drive there nearly every day. That's a longass commute.
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Nov 22, 2011 04:07
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Nov 22, 2011 08:58
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Koesj posted:That's a longass commute. Still, most of this is moot because at the halfway point between Utrecht and Eindhoven (more precisely, Knooppunt Vught) merges traffic from all sorts of places into a dual-lane highway which jams up *every single day*.
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Nov 22, 2011 13:10
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less than three posted: What?
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Nov 22, 2011 13:46
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Ah yes. I expect that is a sign mistake. I hope.
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Nov 22, 2011 16:49
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Thanks for the awesome thread! I lived in Providence for 6 years and have been in CT for a few months now (off US-44 in Bolton) so I'm familiar with some of your examples. I'm working my way through but I had to get these questions off my chest first. Apologies if either came up already. First: The Henderson Bridge Expressway, Providence, RI (aka "The New Red Bridge", "Where the Red Bridge Used to Be," "The Red Bridge") If you've ever driven on this (and I imagine you have) it's obvious that this was at one time planned to continue as an expressway. Especially if you catch it with the covering on the signs destroyed by weather revealing "Some other Exit 1/2 mile" right next to "ALL LANES EXIT RIGHT". You can also see the cleared right of way very clearly on google maps.  My girlfriend grew up a little ways down US-44 in Seekonk (I lived there for a bit, and we also lived on Smith St in Providence for a while, meaning we've lived on or just off 44 in CT, RI, and MA) and when we lived on the east side we would have taken this exact route all the time. Instead you're forced to cut through that residential neighborhood as there's no left turn at six corners where N Broadway hits 44. Would be so convenient, and how hard can it really be to put it in with nothing in the way? Do you know anything more about the story than the wikipedia page? Second: Oak St and Oregon Rd, Ashland, MA Unfortunately I can't get this intersection on street view but let me see if I can explain it. Oak St is a relatively busy 2-lane road through a residential area, with a speed limit of 35 if I had to guess from memory. Oregon is more of a back road and winds through the woods, speed limit 25. Traffic is pretty light but not negligible. I grew up on Oregon and my parents still live there so I have turned at this intersection many times. The view of the intersection from Oregon (the slower road) is slightly obstructed from both directions due to the curvature of the road. However speeds are pretty slow. Oak St is on a slope so that cars coming one direction are going pretty fast (45-50 on average) and from the other direction they can't see the intersection so well. For as long as I can remember there has been a blinking yellow/red light at this intersection, with Oak St getting the yellow obviously. However there have always been bad accidents here. Once when I was in elementary school we saw two cars get completely totaled from the back window of the bus just a few seconds after we turned. I was in an accident here myself, when my friend was driving and just wasn't careful enough basically. After I moved away they started beefing up the intersection; every time I came home I noticed something new. First they installed giant stop signs on Oregon that were 10x bigger than the normal ones. Then they painted diagonal white stripes on Oregon as the intersection approached. Finally a couple years later, they changed the blinking red light to look more like a siren. It flashes really bright and 10x faster than before. I thought it was a cop the first few times I saw it and I still have that instinct. The people who live at that intersection must hate it because it probably looks like they have a red strobe light on even when the blinds are down. Anyways, why go through all this trouble to prevent accidents when you could just upgrade to a complete red-yellow-green light cycle? It's not like there's too much traffic on Oak St to handle it. If you had to guess, do you think it's an issue of traffic efficiency, or money, or something else? Edit: Sorry third question. I see you've worked in Mansfield CT. Are the pedestrian stop signs really necessary? I've seen them in a few other places in CT but I don't remember where exactly. One place in Mansfield is on US-44 west of the intesection with CT-195. It just looks so silly driving by the little mini stop signs, and confused me the first time I saw them. I can understand the stop signs I guess, but is it really necessary to put a mini "stop ahead" sign 20 ft before the intersection as well, where the stop sign is clearly visible? It adds up to a lot of signage. Also shouldn't the pedestrians have the right of way? SurgicalOntologist fucked around with this message at 23:16 on Nov 22, 2011 |
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Nov 22, 2011 21:46
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Wolfy posted:
A boulevard with service roads combined with a badly-made sign, maybe? It's hard to tell from the angle.
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Nov 22, 2011 22:00
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Sagacity posted:Still, most of this is moot because at the halfway point between Utrecht and Eindhoven (more precisely, Knooppunt Vught) merges traffic from all sorts of places into a dual-lane highway which jams up *every single day*. Dun dun dun http://centrumpp.nl/Images/Tracebesluit_tcm318-306148.pdf (from page 57 onwards) And here's the maps: http://centrumpp.nl/Images/Detailkaarten_tcm318-306149.zip
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Nov 22, 2011 22:59
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Cichlidae posted:So, for the MEET-UP at JOEY GARLIC'S tomorrow! Is anyone coming, or should I pick a different day instead? I am, as you say, at your disposal. Crap!! I forgot about this
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Nov 23, 2011 00:13
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less than three posted:Beautiful photo, by the way. theDoubleH posted:First: The Henderson Bridge Expressway, Providence, RI I don't have much more information on this than what Wikipedia shows, but given how much I used to go through that corridor as a kid (I lived in Bristol), I'd have loved to see the expressway finished. Heck, RIDOT still has the right-of-way. Unfortunately, the Henderson Bridge will be replaced soon, and they'll probably opt for a narrower crossing considering the meager volumes it carries. theDoubleH posted:If you had to guess, do you think it's an issue of traffic efficiency, or money, or something else? They were probably looking for cheap fixes to a persistent accident problem. Each revision, alone, was likely cheaper than a signal. Since they didn't solve the problem, though, (which is probably poor sight distance) it was something of a waste of money overall. Certainly a signal would do a better job here, or even an all-way stop, if the volumes are low enough. theDoubleH posted:I can understand the stop signs I guess, but is it really necessary to put a mini "stop ahead" sign 20 ft before the intersection as well, where the stop sign is clearly visible? It adds up to a lot of signage. Also shouldn't the pedestrians have the right of way? Probably just because pedestrians (especially inebriated college students) don't tend to pay much attention to traffic control devices. Advance warning signs aren't needed from a sight distance point of view, and I wouldn't put them in, but I'm guessing the local police got fed up with pedestrian accidents and figured it wouldn't hurt to try something. Honestly, if a ped wants to cross the street, there's pretty much nothing you can do to stop them. May as well alert the motorists rather than trying to get the peds to look both ways and act rationally. Fizzle posted:Crap!! I forgot about this No worries, we can have it in a couple weeks, instead. I'll have to see when I'm free. You guys let me know when's good for you, too.
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Nov 23, 2011 00:37
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I was sure I'd seen places where the interstate flyovers ran parallel and directly over bits of (old, decaying) downtown and/or things built between the flyover ramp and the highway, but I either misremembered where they were or it was a trick of perspective. I did find a good example of the "replacing the wetlands we paved over" use of space in Alexandria, LA: Also I have no idea what's going on with 3rd street across the way there. Well, it's fairly obvious what -- it's a u-turn going under the bridge that goes over the railroad -- but why? The road isn't divided as far as I can tell (it's not streetviewed, but looking at it from either end or over the side of I-49 doesn't appear to show a barrier) and there's an intersection just out of frame on both sides. Maybe it's a turnoff for an industrial park that never got built? Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 08:20 on Nov 23, 2011 |
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Nov 23, 2011 08:17
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Bad Angus! Bad!