Let's Leave I-85 Closed (Atlanta, Union City: transfer to, quality of life, where to live)

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by jsvh

That is the beautiful thing. It was no one option. It was all the options. Some took the bus. Some drove to a different rail station. Some took a different roadway. Some worked from home. Some adjusted their schedule. Some were on spring break.

If we made this a permanent closure, we would get even more alternatives being taken up like people & offices moving.

People will adjust to fill whatever free road capacity is available.

The one thing you're blatantly ignoring is how development around the region has followed these interstate corridors and continues to follow road development.

If you pinch things off, you just pinch things off all around. Yes, people will alter their choices, but you're really just raising costs and forcing decisions on people.

Now the other reality is that most people in the northeast corridor are not going to Midtown and Downtown. Most are staying along the Northeast corridor, going to Alpharetta, Perimeter Center, Buckhead, etc...

So what is noteworthy is that most people's commutes in the corridor are unaffected and perhaps even better, because fewer people are forced into taking a more draconian commute with higher costs.

Really what we are discussing is how much it affects the commute of a few tens of thousands commuters, but a higher paid commuter, and how much extra traffic we are dumping onto I-285 to get to other destinations. The latter of which is no small thing. Portions of I-285 are more in the red now, especially on the east side.


Ultimately, the real flaw is your inability to break outside the mindset that everyone beyond I-285 is stuck in a 1950's idealistic suburban commuter and the inability to understand how important these arteries are at connecting the region and driving development in other ways.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

The one thing you're blatantly ignoring is how development around the region has followed these interstate corridors and continues to follow road development.

Not at all. I am fully aware our giant freeways are incentivizing people to move further out along them.

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

If you pinch things off, you just pinch things off all around. Yes, people will alter their choices, but you're really just raising costs and forcing decisions on people.

No, overall "I" would be lowering costs by allowing people to decide how to spend money. Many likely are willing to spend a little more on housing costs (or sacrifice SF) in order to save on transportation costs like the trillions we use to build and maintain these giant freeways.

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

Now the other reality is that most people in the northeast corridor are not going to Midtown and Downtown. Most are staying along the Northeast corridor, going to Alpharetta, Perimeter Center, Buckhead, etc...

So what is noteworthy is that most people's commutes in the corridor are unaffected and perhaps even better, because fewer people are forced into taking a more draconian commute with higher costs.

Really what we are discussing is how much it affects the commute of a few tens of thousands commuters, but a higher paid commuter, and how much extra traffic we are dumping onto I-285 to get to other destinations. The latter of which is no small thing. Portions of I-285 are more in the red now, especially on the east side.

Great. Since you think so few suburban commuters are using these in town highways, lets discuss scaling them down to a more manageable size.

Glad many in the city are wising up to the great "deal" many in the suburbs have been offering.




This highway closure shows that drastically reducing roadway capacity is not the apoclypse we have been sold.

[AnsleyPark]

Originally Posted by jsvh

This highway closure shows that drastically reducing roadway capacity is not the apoclypse we have been sold.

Let's wait and see how things are next week when Spring Break is over. I hope you continue to be right.

[fieldm]

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[cwkimbro]

JSVH... once again you're failing to see many of the points I'm raising.

Yes, fewer people than you play it up are specifically trying to get Midtown and Downtown, which is where this freeway falling out is a barrier. However, new jobs and other job centers in the whole region are a part of the picture too.

A large part of what is going on is diversification. We are driving in all directions and not just one single point in town to work.

Freeways matter and development follows freeways. Just because everyone isn't trying to solely get downtown/midtown doesn't mean the transportation access they provide aren't critically important. Sadly, that went over your head

[cwkimbro]

What is also sad is how many people fail to see that the freeways aren't only about suburban lifestyles further out of town.

They were originally built to help preserve suburban lifestyles intown by taking traffic off the streets and allowing many older suburbs to exist and not be forced to converted away from single family homes to maintain a region of 6 million people.

Sadly, the most biased people here miss that and too many of the most aggressive opinions are people who will have their cake and eat it too.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

JSVH... once again you're failing to see many of the points I'm raising.

Yes, fewer people than you play it up are specifically trying to get Midtown and Downtown, which is where this freeway falling out is a barrier. However, new jobs and other job centers in the whole region are a part of the picture too.

A large part of what is going on is diversification. We are driving in all directions and not just one single point in town to work.

Freeways matter and development follows freeways. Just because everyone isn't trying to solely get downtown/midtown doesn't mean the transportation access they provide aren't critically important. Sadly, that went over your head

Yes, apparently I am failing to see the "many points" you are raising. Development follows freeways. So why do we want to spread out development with more freeways and lanes? Let people make the choice where they want to live on their own. Don't you think the metro would be a better place if more people made the choice to live closer in?

[cwkimbro]

People are making a choice and we are adjusting our transportation infrastructure to that.

You're just failing to accept that, because it isn't the one single-minded way you'd like.

Atlanta in the '70s put money into both transit and freeways and most people chose to spread out. It also made the cost of development and housing cheaper and allowed us to compete with more expensive northeastern cities better.

We have paid for our infrastructure through normal channels and much of the largest parts of it were paid through the gas tax, an indirect user fee

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

People are making a choice and we are adjusting our transportation infrastructure to that.

No, it is more that we adjusted our transportation infrastructure and people made a choice in response to that. Other countries that did not subsidize freeeways as much did not see the spraw we did in the US.

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

Atlanta in the '70s put money into both transit and freeways and most people chose to spread out. It also made the cost of development and housing cheaper and allowed us to compete with more expensive northeastern cities better.

We have paid for our infrastructure through normal channels and much of the largest parts of it were paid through the gas tax, an indirect user fee

Put an even amount of tax subsidies in both highways and transit and lets see the choices people make. You can even exclude the gas tax. Highways' handouts are orders of magnitude more than transit. Level the playing field and let people have their choice then. You know many less would choose the suburbs and the metro would be a better place for it.

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by jsvh

No, it is more that we adjusted our transportation infrastructure and people made a choice in response to that. Other countries that did not subsidize freeeways as much did not see the spraw we did in the US.



Put an even amount of tax subsidies in both highways and transit and lets see the choices people make. You can even exclude the gas tax. Highways' handouts are orders of magnitude more than transit. Level the playing field and let people have their choice then. You know many less would choose the suburbs and the metro would be a better place for it.

JSVH, compared to use and what we get back from direct of indirect fees, highways are less subsidized.

Been over this a million times and back and I like both modes personally.

Now back in the '70s and into the '80s, we had provided both avenues of transportation and the majority of people clearly chose one direction....

I'm just tired of all the hypocritical aggressive biasness of people eating their caking and having it too moving into our region, ignoring the history and choosing to move into an older intown suburban style neighborhood, pretending like its urban (but its ok because its near a few trendy condo buildings and you can see tall pretty buildings a few miles away) and pretending like all 6 million people have the choice to live like that.

People adjusted to how Atlanta grew when it was far smaller and many of the prime areas (pre-freeways) were already developed by a relatively few land lots that took up a great deal of land. The same NIMBY-resistence that led to the freeway revolts were stoppoing redevelopments over time as well. Many of them led to neighborhoods getting historical status, not welcoming in a cheap way for all land to be redeveloped (in an affordable manner) for 6 million people to live there.

The freeways were originally a way past that. It was, at the time, a mutually beneficial thing too. Many were trying to find a way to unjam the arterial highway and not be forced to redevelop their neighborhoods.

Yes, things could be different and won't always be the same, but there are tons of costs, land use, historical, and social realities you're blantantly ignoring time and time again and it gets old. There are nearly 6 million people here and they have to find a way to live affordably.


What's worse is that for those several tens of thousand of commuters who are hurting right now, you've chosen to orient a thread in such a bias fashion this way to prove a point at their costs.

Imagine had some crackhead set a first under a MARTA bridge and it collapsed in one section and than some tools at the capital, usually with a big R by their name, said hey lets just leave it shut down to prove a point. I can't imagine that going down well here. It shouldn't, but neither are your worn out arguments that have been rehashed a million times over at this point.

It doesn't matter what side of the fence you are, the more aggressively biased you are and the more you ignore others wills, costs, and desires... the more of a tool you are.