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TBH I’m kind of glad I-85 does not go through Athens. It’s current routing makes for a more direct path to SC and it would add a lot more traffic to the road from both NC/SC and ATL during UGA games or other UGA related events. A spur route is better for Athens.
GA-316 as a full freeway and US129/441 with grade separation at major intersections would be more than enough.
Houston has 3 perimeter loops, and only the inner one is an interstate (I-610). The others are the Sam Houston Tollway and the Grand Parkway, and both are state routes.
Atlanta should be able to do something similar for an outer loop. Not an interstate, but a major parkway that's at least mostly free-flowing, and allows trucks and interstate traffic to bypass the metro.
It should, but GDOT seems averse to building any sort of real outer perimeter. Politically, everyone is afraid of building new highways, and also the suburbs don’t want MARTA transit. The area’s transportation options are pretty much gridlocked at this point. Texas has gone all in on highways and it seems to be working alright for them.
For trucks and interstate traffic to use it the loop would need to be a freeway, if it has traffic lights that many would continue to use 285. I recall reading about a proposal of an outer loop with a limited amount of interchanges to make it more of a bypass to move traffic around the city at high speeds. I think something like that would do wonders for the area.
Yeah, yeah. Boring reality is such a buzzkill. Bleh.
I guess it's more important to waste half of everyone's life in traffic jams, than to dare displace anything ever, in a state that has tons of space to relocate things. Georgia with its ever-logical priorities.
Well, it’s not just about facilitating improved traffic flow along a corridor like Scott Boulevard (which is also designated and signed as a multiplexed state-maintained surface route US-23/29/78 and GA-8/10) through the North Decatur area.
That’s because Scott Boulevard is not just a regional commuter route but is also a local business route with many businesses both small and large that provide important services to the local North Decatur community. Scott Blvd is also an urban boulevard, a local residential collector street and (very interestingly) a local residential street. While west of the Ponce De Leon Avenue intersection, the US-23/29/78/278/GA-8/10 route (also known as Ponce De Leon Avenue) is a much beloved and cherished historic urban surface parkway/boulevard district that runs through a string of urban parks designed by legendary landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted.
Like it or not, Scott Blvd is a street that has to fully serve at least five different transportation functions in an area of very heavy existing development that includes a considerable amount of great wealth, affluence and political influence. So any transportation solution has to take all of those numerous factors into account in order to have a chance of succeeding.
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Originally Posted by primaltech
I don't care what the name is, I'm just saying, if the roads didn't change name 10 times as you head in the same direction, then they would seem more like metropolitan corridors.
Like, just name all of 78 east of Ponce, as 'Stone Mountain Parkway'. All the way out through Snellville. Even if some parts of it are more free-flowing than others, it would at least then be one road.
Lol. It probably should be noted that different local government jurisdictions generally decide street names on surface routes through urban areas, while road names on superhighways are decided by the state (though local government jurisdictions may have input on road names on superhighways, and state government may name state-maintained routes if local governments have no objections).
So the different road names on a route like US-78 from Atlanta to Loganville, the different names on the roadway reflects the different jurisdictions that the road runs through:
> Ponce De Leon Avenue in the City of Atlanta proper and unincorporated DeKalb County
> Scott Boulevard through the City of Decatur proper
> Lawrenceville Highway in unincorporated DeKalb County
> Stone Mountain Freeway along the state-controlled superhighway stretch of US-78 from the US-29 Lawrenceville Highway junction east to Park Place, just east of the DeKalb/Gwinnett county line
> Stone Mountain Highway from Park Place east through unincorporated Gwinnett County to the Snellville City Limits
> Main Street through the incorporated area of the City of Snellville proper
> Athens Highway from east of the Snellville city limit through unincorporated Gwinnett County and the incorporated area of the City of Loganville proper out to the Gwinnett/Walton county line.
Normally, the different road names probably might not be much of an issue, but it’s just that metro Atlanta’s developed area has grown so large that the different road names become noticeable while one keeps driving on the same major roadway.
And one roadway of regional importance having multiple street and road names through different jurisdictions doesn’t make a corridor any less metropolitan. It just makes a corridor metropolitan in a way that may be unique to metropolitan Atlanta.
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Originally Posted by primaltech
What they did looks absolutely awful, though. I completely hate the design and look of it, and how much space it takes up (wastes):
They should have just done a simple underpass for a free-flowing 78, with a diverging diamond interchange for 124.
Terrible job, Snellville.
I agree that some of grade separated intersection that keeps traffic flowing on US-78/GA-10 (preferably along the lines of the mini-SPUI that Datdudebrah mentioned) should have been constructed at that US-78/GA-124 junction.
But it probably should be noted that it was the State of Georgia (by way of the Georgia Department of Transportation or GDOT) that planned, funded and executed that displaced left-turn lanes project at the intersection of two extremely busy state-maintained roadways at US-78/GA-10 and GA-124 and not the City of Snellville municipal government.
Though even if the design of that displaced left-turn intersection seems strange, at least the traffic flow at that intersection seems to be much improved since it was completed.
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Originally Posted by primaltech
They should have made a logical corridor in the first place. Then you wouldn't need to do anything to it. Instead they design everything like a country road, or a big country road. That seems to be the only 2 things GDOT knows how to do. And half of the roadway space gets used for left-hand turn lanes, with cars backed up at a red arrow waiting to make a left turn. And that's when it's the less dangerous variety.
Well, in fairness to GDOT, a country road is exactly what US-78/GA-10 Stone Mountain Highway/Main Street was until GDOT initially widened the road from 2 lanes to a 4-5 lane exurban surface road in the 1970’s.
Also in fairness to GDOT, US-78 Stone Mountain Highway developed like most major surface arterial roads running through very fast-growing suburban areas did in the 1980’s and 1990’s.
The current version of US-78 Stone Mountain Highway (with 3 travel lanes on each direction of a divided highway with dedicated left-turn lanes at signalized intersections) is much improved from the previous version of the road that featured 2 travel lanes in each direction, and a reversible travel lane and a switchable middle left-lane (or basically 2 suicide lanes) in the middle of a 6-lane roadway that often confused many motorists and led to numerous deadly high-speed collisions in the middle suicide lanes during morning and afternoon/evening rush hours.
The current US-78 Stone Mountain Highway roadway is a much safer, much less-dangerous/deadly roadway than previous roadway with the double suicide lane system.
And somewhat like the aforementioned Scott Blvd corridor through the North Decatur area, US-78 Stone Mountain Highway is a route that has to serve multiple important purposes, including:
> Moving a heavy volume of commuter traffic during morning and afternoon/evening rush hours
> Providing customer access to numerous businesses and services along an important commercial corridor that generates meaningful amounts of revenue for the Gwinnett County and Snellville municipal tax bases
> Moving longer-distance regional traffic between Atlanta and Athens.
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Originally Posted by primaltech
Where they can't do full grade separation, then do a roundabout, or allow only yielding right turns, and then turnaround at a roundabout at the next intersection ahead.
Left hand turns across major roads gotta go. That's prehistoric road design. And that's where most of the road fatalities happen, too.
I still think you could feasibly do a few grade separations along 141 in Brookhaven and Chamblee. Buckhead is more difficult where the buildings are right up to the road.
But, again, where you can't grade separate, re-configure for more optimal flow. Embrace roundabouts.
I agree that more should be done to attempt to keep commuter traffic moving. But we’ve also got to keep in mind that a route like GA-141 Peachtree Road/Peachtree Boulevard (formerly Peachtree Industrial Boulevard) is a heavily developed corridor has to serve multiple purposes, including providing access to the very high density of commercial businesses and residences located along the corridor.
Moving commuter traffic moving can’t be the only priority and/or only purpose of the roadway along urban multi-use surface routes like the ITP portion of GA-141.
It should, but GDOT seems averse to building any sort of real outer perimeter. Politically, everyone is afraid of building new highways, and also the suburbs don’t want MARTA transit. The area’s transportation options are pretty much gridlocked at this point. Texas has gone all in on highways and it seems to be working alright for them.
For trucks and interstate traffic to use it the loop would need to be a freeway, if it has traffic lights that many would continue to use 285. I recall reading about a proposal of an outer loop with a limited amount of interchanges to make it more of a bypass to move traffic around the city at high speeds. I think something like that would do wonders for the area.
To be fair, GDOT did attempt very hard to build an Outer Perimeter superhighway, with the support of then-Georgia Governor Roy Barnes.
But the harder that GDOT seemed to push for the road, the more unpopular the road seemed to become with the public who eventually voted Governor Barnes out of office due in large part to the growing public unpopularity of the proposed Outer Perimeter superhighway in a metro Atlanta and North Georgia region where large-scale road construction proposals are not always received well by the public.
... Which is probably something that seems very ironic to many onlookers given the Atlanta region’s uniquely extreme dependency on automobile transportation.
But North Georgia often can be a deeply libertarian region (that often may come across as a highly NIMBYish region) were residents often may not mind the idea of new transportation infrastructure being built. They just don’t want to have to pay to build and/or use that new transportation infrastructure and they just don’t want it to be built anywhere remotely near where they live.
I-85 should have been built alongside US-29, just like I-75 was built along US-41. Should have run south of Lake Hartwell.
GA-316 should never have had to been built in the first place. It was necessary because they put I-85 out in the middle of nowhere, instead of following the historic towns of the pre-Eisenhower US highway system.
To be fair, I-85 and U.S. 29 still loosely follow each other, they're just a fair distance apart. They re-meet just outside of Greenville SC. U.S. 78 does the same thing with I-20 when it gets east of Stone Mountain and remeets I-20 just outside of Augusta, and that would also be a very indirect route to get to Augusta / Columbus. I can't speak for how places like Braselton, Commerce, and Jefferson were before I-85 was conceived but they definitely are not the middle of nowhere anymore and are heavily dependent on I-85's current configuration. Another issue is, I-985 toward Gainesville would have either had not existed, or it would have had to begin in Duluth had I-85 replaced GA-316... I-85 to Athens would add quite a bit of travel time for someone looking to travel to NC/SC, and there's alot of interstate commerce that does that which would make an even bigger logistical nightmare should all of that traffic be diverted right through Athens and the Northeastern Exurbs along GA-316.
The main issue with GA-316 is its not grade seperated through most of its route. A spur is the better way to go for Athens because not everyone wants to go through it to get to SC / NC. Maybe a 3dgi should have been built to take I-85's place to run along side U.S. 29 toward Athens... ...there are other places throughout the country where this happens... but I don't think I-85's currently alignment is a logistical mistake.. ..I think it helps I-85 overall, reduces the amount of overall traffic and also provides a more direct route, and I-85 is pretty congested as is for a rural freeway.
The area’s transportation options are pretty much gridlocked at this point.
Only because the people of said area have decided that's what they want. You all should get together and un-gridlock it.
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Originally Posted by Born 2 Roll
While west of the Ponce De Leon Avenue intersection, the US-23/29/78/278/GA-8/10 route (also known as Ponce De Leon Avenue) is a much beloved and cherished historic urban surface parkway/boulevard district that runs through a string of urban parks designed by legendary landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted.
Ponce is indeed a super beautiful drive (when it's not backed up and you actually can drive), and I'm all for not changing it. What I'm suggesting is that Freedom Parkway should do something useful. And ideally it should connect with the Stone Mountain Freeway somehow. I'll leave y'all to figure it out from there, since apparently almost anything I even suggest about changing anything is automatically a no-go.
Doing literally anything at all... it's the third rail of Georgia politics!
Quote:
Like it or not, Scott Blvd is a street that has to fully serve at least five different transportation functions in an area of very heavy existing development that includes a considerable amount of great wealth, affluence and political influence. So any transportation solution has to take all of those numerous factors into account in order to have a chance of succeeding.
Well, there's not much point in doing much of anything to it, unless you can connect Freedom Parkway into it, and bypass Ponce somehow.
So sue me, I think Decatur and Emory should have a freeway/parkway connection coming from the Connector, keeping some traffic off local streets. And I think the south half of Gwinnett shouldn't have to rely as much on I-85, as the one freeway connecting that entire county of a million people with the rest of the 6 million populated metro area.
Quote:
But it probably should be noted that it was the State of Georgia (by way of the Georgia Department of Transportation or GDOT) that planned, funded and executed that displaced left-turn lanes project at the intersection of two extremely busy state-maintained roadways at US-78/GA-10 and GA-124 and not the City of Snellville municipal government.
Well, I don't like it.
Quote:
I agree that more should be done to attempt to keep commuter traffic moving. But we’ve also got to keep in mind that a route like GA-141 Peachtree Road/Peachtree Boulevard (formerly Peachtree Industrial Boulevard) is a heavily developed corridor has to serve multiple purposes, including providing access to the very high density of commercial businesses and residences located along the corridor.
Moving commuter traffic moving can’t be the only priority and/or only purpose of the roadway along urban multi-use surface routes like the ITP portion of GA-141.
It wouldn't be. But I think for these main arterials we're discussing, you could have 2 centered lanes going in each direction, that make a short depth (cut and cover) tunnel under intersections, to approximate a free-flowing parkway or a small freeway. While keeping the outside lanes for access to local businesses, and of course making left and right turns.
Quote:
To be fair, GDOT did attempt very hard to build an Outer Perimeter superhighway, with the support of then-Georgia Governor Roy Barnes.
But the harder that GDOT seemed to push for the road, the more unpopular the road seemed to become with the public who eventually voted Governor Barnes out of office due in large part to the growing public unpopularity of the proposed Outer Perimeter superhighway in a metro Atlanta and North Georgia region where large-scale road construction proposals are not always received well by the public.
... Which is probably something that seems very ironic to many onlookers given the Atlanta region’s uniquely extreme dependency on automobile transportation.
"Idiotic" is the word I'd use.
Quote:
But North Georgia often can be a deeply libertarian region (that often may come across as a highly NIMBYish region) were residents often may not mind the idea of new transportation infrastructure being built. They just don’t want to have to pay to build and/or use that new transportation infrastructure and they just don’t want it to be built anywhere remotely near where they live.
Then how do you even build anything at all? If the rules for metropolitan transportation infrastructure are, that it can't be built near anyone, and it can't be funded? Whether we're talking cars or trains or buses or whatever, at the end of the day, things need to be be built near some people, and they need to be funded.
It's like. Get the hell over it, Georgia. Build your infrastructure and move your citizens around.
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Originally Posted by Need4Camaro
To be fair, I-85 and U.S. 29 still loosely follow each other, they're just a fair distance apart.
Yeah, but it was intended to run much closer, with 29 as the local route. And that's where they definitely failed Athens (and Lawrenceville, until the 316 short freeway spur was built).
"From Auburn, Alabama to Greensboro, North Carolina, Interstate 85 (I-85) runs parallel with US 29, which along that stretch, serves primarily as a local route."
I guess I do agree with the point about UGA football game traffic being less bad than it could have been, had Athens been connected by I-85. But, I still think that would have been an overall better alternate universe for Athens in general.
IMO both routes have been built and expanded relatively quickly for large highway projects. I think the biggest mistake was promising to remove the toll on 400. Other states that are building out larger highway systems like NC-540 and tons of routes in FL and TX are doing it through tolled highways over federally funded interstate projects, at least that's been my impression of it. Plus we're spending nearly $2B to come back and add lanes to toll on 400 now after the removal. I imagine 316 will end up similarly in the future as well.
Overall I think the past approach to tolling just set a bad precedent for the future.... Are there any states larger in pop than GA or metros larger than ATL without fully tolled highways?
Just an FYI, toll road expansion in TX has basically ceased due to negative feedback. A new tollroad planned for northeast metro Dallas was shelved. Hasn't been any new ones proposed the last 4 to 5 years. I've seen studies that say a 5 cent increase to the gas tax is more efficient and equitable. TX hasn't raised its gas tax in over 25 years. I'm sure Georgia gas tax hasn't changed in a similar period of time.
Just an FYI, toll road expansion in TX has basically ceased due to negative feedback. A new tollroad planned for northeast metro Dallas was shelved. Hasn't been any new ones proposed the last 4 to 5 years. I've seen studies that say a 5 cent increase to the gas tax is more efficient and equitable. TX hasn't raised its gas tax in over 25 years. I'm sure Georgia gas tax hasn't changed in a similar period of time.
Good info, I'll give GA its props for changing the gas tax with HB170 and tying it to inflation.
Just an FYI, toll road expansion in TX has basically ceased due to negative feedback. A new tollroad planned for northeast metro Dallas was shelved. Hasn't been any new ones proposed the last 4 to 5 years. I've seen studies that say a 5 cent increase to the gas tax is more efficient and equitable. TX hasn't raised its gas tax in over 25 years. I'm sure Georgia gas tax hasn't changed in a similar period of time.
Aren't they expanding DNT up to U.S. 75? What about PGBT as a full loop?
They're still building Toll Roads in Austin area, they are literally expanding one right by my house. They are also making managed lanes on U.S. 183.
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Originally Posted by Datdudebrah
IMO both routes have been built and expanded relatively quickly for large highway projects. I think the biggest mistake was promising to remove the toll on 400. Other states that are building out larger highway systems like NC-540 and tons of routes in FL and TX are doing it through tolled highways over federally funded interstate projects, at least that's been my impression of it. Plus we're spending nearly $2B to come back and add lanes to toll on 400 now after the removal. I imagine 316 will end up similarly in the future as well.
Overall I think the past approach to tolling just set a bad precedent for the future.... Are there any states larger in pop than GA or metros larger than ATL without fully tolled highways?
GA-316 likely won't end up tolled with the exception of maybe HOT lanes through Lawrenceville. They will just take a decade or so in converting it into a full freeway. I believe GA has a law that prohibits turning existing state maintained lanes into tollroads. It was passed just after they completed the I-85 managed lanes IIRC.
As for states without toll roads, Arizona is smaller than Georgia by about 3 million people but it has no toll roads besides maybe manage lanes.
Last edited by Need4Camaro; 04-28-2022 at 03:40 PM..
Only because the people of said area have decided that's what they want. You all should get together and un-gridlock it.
Ponce is indeed a super beautiful drive (when it's not backed up and you actually can drive), and I'm all for not changing it. What I'm suggesting is that Freedom Parkway should do something useful. And ideally it should connect with the Stone Mountain Freeway somehow. I'll leave y'all to figure it out from there, since apparently almost anything I even suggest about changing anything is automatically a no-go.
Doing literally anything at all... it's the third rail of Georgia politics!
Quote:
Originally Posted by primaltech
Well, there's not much point in doing much of anything to it, unless you can connect Freedom Parkway into it, and bypass Ponce somehow.
So sue me, I think Decatur and Emory should have a freeway/parkway connection coming from the Connector, keeping some traffic off local streets. And I think the south half of Gwinnett shouldn't have to rely as much on I-85, as the one freeway connecting that entire county of a million people with the rest of the 6 million populated metro area.
It’s not that anything you suggest about changing anything is automatically a no-go.
It’s that any traffic improvement proposal along that Scott Boulevard corridor can’t disturb any existing local homes, businesses, schools, properties, parks or trees for it to have even a remote chance of ever being enacted in a region with a significant aversion to large-scale road construction proposals... And in a part of the metro area where residents have the resources, the connections and the iron will to fight and defeat any large-scale road construction proposals that they dislike and feel existentially threatened by.
This is in a part of the metro area where residents would most assuredly prefer to have traffic on their local streets instead of any type of large-scale highway running through their area.
We should also keep in mind that even though US-78 Stone Mountain Highway may not be freeway through South Gwinnett County, US-78 Stone Mountain Highway is a major surface arterial route that already possesses a freeway level of importance to the South Gwinnett County community.
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