Has anyone's opinion on an Outer Perimeter / Outer Bypass changed? (Smyrna: residential, rating)

[Need4Camaro]

Originally Posted by primaltech

Ronald Reagan Pkwy (another odd anomaly of that metro), is exactly what I wished the Outer Perimeter looked like, all the way around in a huge bypass loop:

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.8898...8192?entry=ttu

2 continuously flowing lanes in each direction, nice natural scenery (not junky bill boards and commercial crap), grade separations, a few exits, and no fuss. Doesn't need to be an interstate. Just a nice scenic North GA parkway.

Would be nice but Ronald Reagan Pkwy is also closed off the truck and freight traffic which is what a road like that should be intended to do, diverge freight traffic from the metro area. The curves and grades might not be so truck friendly.

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by Brillemeister

What would prevent it from turning into the sprawling morass around so many I-285 exits? Would Georgia DOT ever agree to even the mildest restrictions on development?

That's not a GDOT thing 'nor their fault.

It's a local/county issue.

GDOT just buys the property the potential outer perimeter would be built on. Outside that property, it's the rights of the land owner, local zoning policy, and state law (ie. billboards) that control what is or isn't built.

The problem with what I call extreme local-level conservatism is many local cities and outer counties strapped for cash do not want to build as many local routes often drive much of the development to the busiest roadways paid for at the federal and state level, even though it is worse for speed and amount of traffic on the roadway. They're usually best off creating perpendicular and parallel routes for local development/traffic and not placing it directly on the GRIP corridor, but that costs them money.

This is one concern I have with the GRIP corridors we spent decades building across Georgia. They work well and they are very quick at a somewhat affordable cost, without the cost of building freeways. However, every local town wants to make the new corridors a busy suburban strip. It creates increasing land values with little or no investment by the towns, but it is bad for long-range travel.

We didn't do much to limit curb-cuts on state and federal roadways, unless it was freeway, for a very long time.

[cwkimbro]

A few notes on Ronald Reagan:

It's on the regional freight plan to be included as a freight route in the future.

However, it was not developed to be used for freight. I'm not sure how much weight the road is designed to hold at it's current speed limits.

It was developed much like Lawrenceville-Suwanee Rd was, except they use a wide undeveloped path that parrallels a floodplain that intentionally didn't have street connectivity. They were able to build relatively few bridges to make it be the mini-freeway that it is.

The original intention was to connect Snellville to I-85/Gwinnett Place. The original in streets across the area were indirect and not oriented in that direction. Traffic was pretty bad. What Gwinnett was facing is they were going to have to overhaul a large number of smaller 2-lane roads and intersections, not just 2 or 3 and there were limited room to try to re-align existing roads.


Ronald Reagan Pkwy offered the ability to put most resources into one new alignment vs. upgrading many smaller ones and it also alleviated public backlash against making the smaller 2-lane roads 4-lanes where neighborhoods have already been developed.

That's how we ended up with this short disconnected mini-freeway. It wasn't really designed to be apart of the freeway system, but it was designed in lieu of creating a type of Pleasant Hill-extension, Sugarloaf-like, or 124-like road along existing 2-lane roads between Lilburn/Duluth and Snellville.

It isn't really in an active demand freight corridor. The land-use isn't freight intensive. Grayson Hwy, 124, GA20, Mountain Industrial/Jimmy Carter and US78 are freight corridors and they would be the ideal routes for freight moving between other existing freight corridors anyways. I suspect if freight it allowed on Ronald Reagan it would mainly attract a small amount of local retail delivery trucks, but not much thru-freight or much movements between freight intensive land-use areas.


It is also worth mentioning a large reason you don't see much development from that roadway is it parallels and is built through the edge of the wetlands of several smaller flood plains. Half the route was built through existing developed areas and that development had been held in by those wetlands. So you see a few sound walls on the Lilburn end and it parallels Dogwood Rd on the Snellville end, but other areas are undeveloped due to wetlands.

As an example: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Li...3eXg?entry=ttu

You can see where there is potential for new development to the north, but you can see where streams and wetlands are hemming them in, as well as leaving them disconnected, to the north. And you have Sweetwater creek snaking along the alignment to the South, west, and Northwest.

[walker1962]

Originally Posted by JMatl

TN State Government is more openly hostile to public transit than Georgia, by far. They passed a law last year practically forbidding light rail in their Metro's.

that's ridiculous governance!

[primaltech]

Originally Posted by Need4Camaro

Would be nice but Ronald Reagan Pkwy is also closed off the truck and freight traffic which is what a road like that should be intended to do, diverge freight traffic from the metro area. The curves and grades might not be so truck friendly.

Well, I mean, a straighter version of that type of road, then.

The main point is that there exists a type of road that acts sort of like a freeway, but is not technically freeway grade, or part of the US interstate system.

And, that is also not a tacky eyesore superhighway, and can actually be a pleasant drive.

Another good example is the East-West Connector, in Cobb:

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.8520...8192?entry=ttu

Why can't they make the GA-20 corridor (or a big loop further out) like that? It would function as the outer perimeter/bypass, while also minimally disturbing the areas it runs through.

[SEAandATL]

Originally Posted by primaltech

Well, I mean, a straighter version of that type of road, then.

The main point is that there exists a type of road that acts sort of like a freeway, but is not technically freeway grade, or part of the US interstate system.

And, that is also not a tacky eyesore superhighway, and can actually be a pleasant drive.

Another good example is the East-West Connector, in Cobb:

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.8520...8192?entry=ttu

Why can't they make the GA-20 corridor (or a big loop further out) like that? It would function as the outer perimeter/bypass, while also minimally disturbing the areas it runs through.

East-West Connector is a good one. It almost acts as an outer loop for Marietta itself as the 120/Marietta Pkwy is the inner and almost a full circle (backwards letter C).

Even the Hwy-92 project around Alatoona/Acworth looks a lot nicer and flows pretty well with minimal stops. Once the GA-20/Cumming Hwy section is finally finished it should be a lot better than what it was. As I've stated before I like the highways like GA-400 between Cumming and Dawsonville, or Hwy 5/515 after I-575 ends in Jasper.

Parts of GA-20 is like that, like Burford Dr in Gwinnett, at least as a divided highway with a grassy median.

Buford Dr
https://maps.app.goo.gl/cVqdB8NxMPHqTxhM9

[DJDeadParrot]

Originally Posted by primaltech

Why can't they make the GA-20 corridor (or a big loop further out) like that? It would function as the outer perimeter/bypass, while also minimally disturbing the areas it runs through.

I think that is what has been in the works for some time now, albeit slowly. For instance, the segment of GA 20 between PIB and the Chattahoochee [and even further west from there] had been a 2-lane road up until about 10 years ago. It might never be a true limited access freeway or even parkway like Ronald Reagan Pkwy, but it has gotten expanded in recent years.

[Need4Camaro]

Originally Posted by DJDeadParrot

I think that is what has been in the works for some time now, albeit slowly. For instance, the segment of GA 20 between PIB and the Chattahoochee [and even further west from there] had been a 2-lane road up until about 10 years ago. It might never be a true limited access freeway or even parkway like Ronald Reagan Pkwy, but it has gotten expanded in recent years.

Most likely that route will just sprawl with more development before it successfully obtains its role as a true bypass. Just an exurban super street arterial, won't be a bypass. It's already a thing between Cumming and Buford. Same for Canton.

The only hope they would have in building a route that serves as a true bypass would be a limited access highway with strict zoning and development restrictions around its area. That and they would need to limit the number of exits to keep it from becoming a commuter road. They could potentially limit it to major state highways and freeways.

[primaltech]

Again I point to that Windy Hill Boulevard project, as a way that they could do both, if they put the money into it.

https://www.croyengineering.com/proj...ill-boulevard/

2 mostly grade-separated bypass lanes in the center, with minimal traffic lights, and a surface lane or 2, for local commercial/residential access.

That plus DDI's at the freeways (if not stack interchanges), for the whole length of the SR-20 corridor, would serve all needs.

Just sayin'.

[Need4Camaro]

Originally Posted by primaltech

Again I point to that Windy Hill Boulevard project, as a way that they could do both, if they put the money into it.

https://www.croyengineering.com/proj...ill-boulevard/

2 mostly grade-separated bypass lanes in the center, with minimal traffic lights, and a surface lane or 2, for local commercial/residential access.

That plus DDI's at the freeways (if not stack interchanges), for the whole length of the SR-20 corridor, would serve all needs.

Just sayin'.

I had no idea they were doing this to Windy Hill, when did that come about and have they started?

That will help out Windy Hill so much. Atlanta metro could use alot more inter-suburban parkways built like that.