Should Missouri add truck lanes to I-70 between KC and StL? (Kansas City: to rent, contractor)

[ShadowCaver]

If we can't get more freight and goods delivered via rail [that is another topic ], and the interstates are so full of trucks, then by all means yes... would love to see dedicated lanes for trucks over a certain size. Too often is there a dangerous mismatch between smaller vehicles and larger mass, and, again too often, many people in these smaller vehicles do not know how to drive in safe enough manner around the trucks. Make the truck-only lanes w/ thicker bed, longer lasting pavement, and all the other necessary safety aspects. The interchanges would be interesting to construct, as will the entire project be highly costly, ~$4B for just the I-70 section in MO... would there be savings or pay-back, financial and/or safety wise? I don't know. But, at least in the relatively flatter and/or straighter sections of the interstates, put some multiple mile sections of truck-only lanes.

[GraniteStater]

How about making the freight companies foot some of the bill if it benefits the truckers. The majority of the bill should not be forced on the state.

[DeanMoore]

that's what fuel taxes are for. how about spending fuel taxes on roads ONLY?

[12GO]

Originally Posted by DeanMoore

that's what fuel taxes are for. how about spending fuel taxes on roads ONLY?

Why that would crush the tax and blow it mentality of politicians!!!

[cyrano]

I'm a little surprised to hear of I-70 being referred to as being so dangerous. I drive it often between Columbia and StL and sometimes to KC, and once you clear the big cities, the biggest continuing problem I see is absent-minded drivers, usually car drivers. It's also one of the slowest-moving true interstate highways I drive, but then I'm used to a faster pace of things. Expand it where there are bottlenecks, but in the long stretches of nothing (it is also one of the most boring interstates in the country), it sounds like nothing but corporate welfare for favored highway contractors.

If it goes 8 lanes through Columbia, that is going to present some truly interesting land problems. Do they condemn land along the existing right of way, threatening the restaurants that cater to the highway trade, or route the freeway north of town and starve those businesses of traffic? I wouldn't want to be one of them-- sounds like a Hobson's choice.

[Hillman]

Truth it has been years since I drove Big Rig on I 70.But the two worse spots was the interchange going and coming across the Bridge in St.Louis.And the other spot was Ice on the Bridge going across the Missouri River near Columbia.

The worse roads in the U.S. was Pennsylvania.My wife refused to drive there.

hillman

[northbound74]

Originally Posted by cyrano

I'm a little surprised to hear of I-70 being referred to as being so dangerous. I drive it often between Columbia and StL and sometimes to KC, and once you clear the big cities, the biggest continuing problem I see is absent-minded drivers, usually car drivers. It's also one of the slowest-moving true interstate highways I drive, but then I'm used to a faster pace of things. Expand it where there are bottlenecks, but in the long stretches of nothing (it is also one of the most boring interstates in the country), it sounds like nothing but corporate welfare for favored highway contractors.

If it goes 8 lanes through Columbia, that is going to present some truly interesting land problems. Do they condemn land along the existing right of way, threatening the restaurants that cater to the highway trade, or route the freeway north of town and starve those businesses of traffic? I wouldn't want to be one of them-- sounds like a Hobson's choice.

Even the most rural parts of I-70 in MO has substantially more traffic than some other interstates. I drive from KC to Omaha, Des Moines, and Minneapolis on occasion, and the traffic is much lighter in those areas, with far fewer trucks, as well.
In Missouri, it's almost like city driving for 4 hours straight between KC and St. Louis. It's not relaxing at all.

[cyrano]

Originally Posted by northbound74

Even the most rural parts of I-70 in MO has substantially more traffic than some other interstates. I drive from KC to Omaha, Des Moines, and Minneapolis on occasion, and the traffic is much lighter in those areas, with far fewer trucks, as well.
In Missouri, it's almost like city driving for 4 hours straight between KC and St. Louis. It's not relaxing at all.

I guess we just perceive it idfferently. I think it's boring and definitely not stressful. I always thought I-80 through Iowa was a lot faster and more crowded.

[northbayeric]

Originally Posted by GraniteStater

The bottom line is that they need to do an in-depth engineering study of the I-70 corridor in question and then figure out the economically viable option to take. I do think that truck lanes would be an enormous expense, and would not be asthetically pleasing. I don't think anyone likes driving on 8-10 lane highways in a sea of concrete. Whenever I hear truck lanes I think of the NAFTA Superhighway unfortunately.

Check out these links: MoDOT News Release


YouTube - Dedicated Truck Lanes for I-70

The NAFTA Superhighway--I'm 100 percent in agreement with you on that. Ah, but since I-70 is an east-west highway instead of north-south like I-35, I think adding dedicated truck lanes on Missouri's I-70 would do a world of good. Better safety, fewer accidents, fewer traffic jams, except as you near Columbia, possibly. A six-lane I-70 through Columbia is probably the best that can be done, and even that will involve quite a few eminent domain issues along this very narrow corridor.

The aesthetics of a widened freeway with truck lanes could be vastly improved by adding native landscaping and making the overpasses visually pleasing as MoDOT is doing with Highway 40 (The New I-64) in St. Louis. And if only they could do SOMETHING with those infuriating Passions Adult Superstore billboards that currently befoul the I-70 corridor--or at least they did the last time I drove along it in September 2007. I'll trade half the current total of billboards for four extra lanes! (But I'd probably lose on First Amendment grounds re Passions. Even so, I've never seen porn advertising billboards in other states including California)

My chief concern right now is the absolutely unfathomable amount of debt our country is taking on, which could make such ambitious freeway projects like I-70 all but impossible in the near future.

[GraniteStater]

Originally Posted by northbayeric

Check out these links: MoDOT News Release


YouTube - Dedicated Truck Lanes for I-70

The NAFTA Superhighway--I'm 100 percent in agreement with you on that. Ah, but since I-70 is an east-west highway instead of north-south like I-35, I think adding dedicated truck lanes on Missouri's I-70 would do a world of good. Better safety, fewer accidents, fewer traffic jams, except as you near Columbia, possibly. A six-lane I-70 through Columbia is probably the best that can be done, and even that will involve quite a few eminent domain issues along this very narrow corridor.

The aesthetics of a widened freeway with truck lanes could be vastly improved by adding native landscaping and making the overpasses visually pleasing as MoDOT is doing with Highway 40 (The New I-64) in St. Louis. And if only they could do SOMETHING with those infuriating Passions Adult Superstore billboards that currently befoul the I-70 corridor--or at least they did the last time I drove along it in September 2007. I'll trade half the current total of billboards for four extra lanes! (But I'd probably lose on First Amendment grounds re Passions. Even so, I've never seen porn advertising billboards in other states including California)

My chief concern right now is the absolutely unfathomable amount of debt our country is taking on, which could make such ambitious freeway projects like I-70 all but impossible in the near future.

It seems like support is building for that I-70 project. It strikes me as odd that I-70 would be such a truck heavy route considering I-80 is more widely traveled route both for cars and trucks.

The economic climate right now is just awful putting all politics aside. I think we have so many issues to address right now with regard to: the banking system, the credit system, the housing issue, and the jobs issue. The problems have been building up for awhile, and they will not be easy to solve. My feeling on the stimulus was that it should have been much more targeted with greater oversight. I also feel that it should have been smaller. Some of the infrastrcture projects are very much needed, though. I think many would agree with that one. In my state we have some cities that have obsolete sewage treatment facilities that are in violation code.

Here is the course of events update for the rest of this week:

"Tuesday: President Obama speaks to a joint session of Congress in a prime-time (9 pm ET) address that some are calling a de facto State of the Union address.
Wednesday: Following Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's recently announced plan, the nation's largest banks are slated to undergo a "stress test." (I believe expectations Citigroup would "fail" the test prompted discussion of the government upping its stake in the back to as much as 40%, as discussed here.)
Thursday: President Obama is scheduled to unveil his budget and provide a blueprint that will "tip the president's hand on his plans for near-universal health care, changes to entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare, tax policy, and a budget deficit widening into territory never seen in peacetime," The WSJ says.
Speaking of that deficit, Obama has pledged to reduce it by 50% by the end of his first term. One way he's going to do that is to stop the Bush Administration's "off-balance sheet" treatment of the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Getting more transparency on those costs is a good policy goal, but this isn't a totally altruistic endeavor: putting the costs of war in the budget now will help Obama reach his goal of reducing the deficit by 50% by 2013 -- assuming military spending really does diminish by then"