What'ya think of the new I-35 plan? (Dallas, Austin: construction, moving)
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I think it's "fugly" and a boondoggle and won't fix traffic problems, but maybe that's just me. They need to dig out 8 lanes underground and have 4 exits, from the river north they would be Cesar Chavez, 12th, MLK, and Airport. The key to moving traffic is not to have a lot of exits. It would be a cut and cover operation which is cheaper and a 6 lane boulevard (3 lanes each direction) with a bike trail would be built above the tunnel. It would serve as the access road, but it would be a surface street integrated with the street network.
I think it's "fugly" and a boondoggle and won't fix traffic problems, but maybe that's just me. They need to dig out 8 lanes underground and have 4 exits, from the river north they would be Cesar Chavez, 12th, MLK, and Airport. The key to moving traffic is not to have a lot of exits. It would be a cut and cover operation which is cheaper and a 6 lane boulevard (3 lanes each direction) with a bike trail would be built above the tunnel. It would serve as the access road, but it would be a surface street integrated with the street network.
I concur pretty much exactly. I believe the plan they're showing would be designed so that the City of Austin could install parks over the interstate if they were willing to pay for it. TxDOT could easily just work with the city to fund the caps and construct them while the whole interstate is under construction, but that would make too much sense and be too beneficial to Austin for their bosses to approve.
There are a ton of old fuds in TxDOT (and a ton of constituents) that don't understand the concept of weaving reducing the capacity of the lanes involved in weaving action, and they especially don't understand that putting so many weaving zones close together reduces capacity of weaving zones even further. They also don't understand that there's a steep economy of diminishing returns for each lane added to a freeway. More lanes = more lane changes = lower capacity per lane. My traffic modeling experience leads me to say that anything more 4 lanes in each direction is pointless. I can get behind a reversible two-lane tollway in the middle, though, because it encourages public transit and facilitates emergency vehicles.
I concur pretty much exactly. I believe the plan they're showing would be designed so that the City of Austin could install parks over the interstate if they were willing to pay for it. TxDOT could easily just work with the city to fund the caps and construct them while the whole interstate is under construction, but that would make too much sense and be too beneficial to Austin for their bosses to approve.
There are a ton of old fuds in TxDOT (and a ton of constituents) that don't understand the concept of weaving reducing the capacity of the lanes involved in weaving action, and they especially don't understand that putting so many weaving zones close together reduces capacity of weaving zones even further. They also don't understand that there's a steep economy of diminishing returns for each lane added to a freeway. More lanes = more lane changes = lower capacity per lane. My traffic modeling experience leads me to say that anything more 4 lanes in each direction is pointless. I can get behind a reversible two-lane tollway in the middle, though, because it encourages public transit and facilitates emergency vehicles.
Yep, it seems anything more than 4 lanes is pointless, I think 3 lanes and a tolled managed lane is probably the way to go, but it all needs to be underground from the get go.
I may differ in opinions on this matter and while it's not the prettiest thing I've seen, I would prefer they do this rather than do NOTHING given Austin does not seem to care much for expanding mass transit.
Texas Highways are awesome in ways but I really wish they could do away with the access roads on ever single highway.
While you may all hate it, it technically IS needed especially given Austin is one of the fastest growing cities in the nation currently ... we cant think of it in terms of what's pretty or ugly but more so...what's necessary.
I do wonder though, given it's a submerged highway, how is it going to cross the river?
I concur pretty much exactly. I believe the plan they're showing would be designed so that the City of Austin could install parks over the interstate if they were willing to pay for it. TxDOT could easily just work with the city to fund the caps and construct them while the whole interstate is under construction, but that would make too much sense and be too beneficial to Austin for their bosses to approve.
There are a ton of old fuds in TxDOT (and a ton of constituents) that don't understand the concept of weaving reducing the capacity of the lanes involved in weaving action, and they especially don't understand that putting so many weaving zones close together reduces capacity of weaving zones even further. They also don't understand that there's a steep economy of diminishing returns for each lane added to a freeway. More lanes = more lane changes = lower capacity per lane. My traffic modeling experience leads me to say that anything more 4 lanes in each direction is pointless. I can get behind a reversible two-lane tollway in the middle, though, because it encourages public transit and facilitates emergency vehicles.
The other way of doing it is separating express lanes from local lanes, but Texas has been very slow to adopt that practice (besides the 35 upper level).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Need4Camaro
I may differ in opinions on this matter and while it's not the prettiest thing I've seen, I would prefer they do this rather than do NOTHING given Austin does not seem to care much for expanding mass transit.
Texas Highways are awesome in ways but I really wish they could do away with the access roads on ever single highway.
While you may all hate it, it technically IS needed especially given Austin is one of the fastest growing cities in the nation currently ... we cant think of it in terms of what's pretty or ugly but more so...what's necessary.
I do wonder though, given it's a submerged highway, how is it going to cross the river?
They do that in the Netherlands all the time, but I think they'll be reconstructing the bridge over Town Lake on this one.
This is like the biggest transportation news in Austin in years and it seems people are just ambivalent at this at best.
There needs to be discussion so that the right thing is done, not just "something".
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