Mopac Expwy : Rushhour Parking Garage (Houston, Austin: neighborhoods, purchasing, live)

[infoseeker2010]

Rushhour traffic is horrible on Mopac. It's like parking garage. Any new changes coming up to improve traffic flow??

[capcat]

It is a bad situation, for sure. My question is this: Are there efforts to build organized contact networks for carpooling, say among company employees and through structures like HOAs in outlying neighborhoods? Or, has that already been done and this is the best we can do?

I'm not trying to be sarcastic, for I really don't know. However, in the absence of efficient mass transportation, keeping the same number of, or more, cars on the roads and building more roads in response to that problem seems a less healthy option for those neighborhoods that commuter traffic passes by or through. Moving traffic faster is better than at a dead stop, but still not good.

[TexasHorseLady]

I was driving on Mopac the other day during heavy traffic (not 5:00 traffic, but heavy, all lanes full traffic). I thought for a moment how slow the traffic was going. There was one point where it slowed down a bit more (down to 45!) for about a minute, tops, then back up to 65. I found that to be enlightening in light of the many discussions on this list - my perception was that traffic was going a lot slower than it actually was, and the traffic was actually going right at the speed limit.


Then I looked down at my speedometer. All of that slow traffic was going 65 mph. In other words, the speed limit.

I've been on Mopac when it was literally stop and go, and in those situations, I get off and take one of the several alternate routes that are available.

Hint to those who want to pave over Central Texas with "infrastructure": If more roads are built, it won't help the situation any, because two things will inevitably happen: more people will move into the area, thus "clogging" the roads so that you end up with the same situation that building more roads was supposed to fix, and more people will move further out and then complain because there aren't enough big roads for them to get in as fast as they want (never mind they moved out there already knowing this).

Bottom line, more roads isn't the real, long-term solution, it's just lazily throwing money at the problem rather than looking for a real solution. (Not that that's not a very common human reaction to things that inconvenience us.) We need another way to fix the problem, if it is, indeed, really a problem (which might be a fix in and of itself - recognize that the problem isn't with the roads and figure out a way to develop patience and planning-ahead capabilities on the part of the drivers. Naaah. Never happen).

[FueledByBlueBell]

I think the roads are part the problem (not all, but part). Take SW parkway for example- should be a freeway (yes, I know this idea sucks but it is reality) and there needs to be an on-ramp to mopac and to 71 instead of the stupid stoplights. The light at the Y? Really? Needs to be an elevated (or something) interchange.

[Moonlady]

Well, there is a website dedicated to improving the traffic flow on Mopac. MoPac Improvement Project I'm curious to see what they decide to do.

THL - no offense, but when I'm stuck on Mopac during rush hour, it doesn't get anywhere close to 45 MPH. Going southbound, it starts backing up before Far West and slows to a complete crawl until south of the river. I'm pretty sure northbound is the same or worse. Like this picture from website mentioned above:

[CptnRn]

Talk to your boss about staggering your work hours, coming in an hour early and leaving an hour early give you a big edge on the traffic flow.

[atxcio]

Houston has been promoting this concept for years, trying to get their employers to offer flex time schedules, in the name of reducing congestion.

Flex in the City

In Austin, it would be nice to see all the state and city government implement this, if they haven't already. I also would like to see HOV lanes (or even the managed lanes) added, but I agree with THL that roads are not the answer. It's like treating obesity by purchasing a bigger belt.

[TexasHorseLady]

Moonlady, I'm just reporting my personal experience. Today, on 360 heading east from Lamar for Mopac, I did get stuck in bumper to bumper traffic apparently heading for Barton Creek Mall, but once I turned right on the access road and got on Mopac, it was back to 60-65 mph. Again, this wasn't rush hour, but it was busy shopping time, apparently. Again, as I also said, I have been in rush hour traffic on Mopac where the only reasonable thing to do was to get off and take one of the several alternate routes available. None of that, however, negates the experience I described above.

Like I said, that one experience made me decide that I'd make a point of noticing what speed I was really going when I felt like traffic was going really really slow, because clearly my subjective perception is way out of whack.

[TexasHorseLady]

Originally Posted by atxcio

Houston has been promoting this concept for years, trying to get their employers to offer flex time schedules, in the name of reducing congestion.

Flex in the City

In Austin, it would be nice to see all the state and city government implement this, if they haven't already. I also would like to see HOV lanes (or even the managed lanes) added, but I agree with THL that roads are not the answer. It's like treating obesity by purchasing a bigger belt.

Exactly.

[Unclemeat]

There are certainly worse cities for traffic than Austin (I've lived in Chicago, to name one)... but for the size of the city, it's a joke. The "planning" of the roadways here is/was a disaster.

A couple things that would definitely help:
- Longer onramps with metering (this should be priority #1, no freeway should be without them)
- Widen MOPAC to get rid of the 5th street lane drop. I don't understand why you would have an expressway lose a lane at it's busiest section.
- Express lanes on 35/MOPAC

But, as all cities eventually learn and atxcio noted... roads are not the answer. Public transit here (as with most Southern cities) is completely unusable. Busses are NEVER the answer. That joke of a rail system needs to go underground and cover the city. It's probably a 10 year proposition for all the building that needs to happen, but Austin is still growing fast, so they better get started now. At the rate this city is growing, we're probably not far away from you commute from Far West to downtown taking 1.5 hours on MOPAC (it's already a good 45 min). We'll probably become a top 10 traffic/congestion city just because our roads and transit options are so pathetic.