Three of America's Worst Traffic Bottlenecks Are in Miami (Doral: 2015, neighbourhoods)

[angelscorpio]

You ever find yourself stuck on the Palmetto during rush hour and think, "Jeez, there can't be traffic anywhere else in the country worse than this." Well, technically, there are 19 stretches of road in the country with worse traffic. Not that that's much of a comfort.
Indeed, a new report from the American Highway Users Alliance finds that Miami does have some of the worst traffic in the nation. Three stretches of road in Miami-Dade made the list for the country's worst 50 traffic bottlenecks.
All three are on our expressways.
Palmetto Expressway Between 41st and the Dolphin Expressway
"The most severe Miami area bottleneck is a 1.7-mile section on the Palmetto Expressway (SR 826) extending between 41st Street and the Dolphin Expressway (SR 836) near Miami International Airport," reads the report. "The delays add up to about 1.4 million hours annually. This costs the local economy approximately $30 million in lost time per year. "
The stretch of road was ranked the 20th worst bottleneck in the country.






Dolphin Expressway From 72nd to The Palmetto
The second worst bottleneck in Miami was also near the intersection of the Palmetto and the Dolphin. This stretch was ranked the 32nd worst traffic bottleneck in the country. Backups on the half-mile stretch account for about 800,000 hours of total lost time a year, or a loss of about $17,000,000 in total working hours.






Dolphin Expressway Between 17th Ave and 22nd Ave
Meanwhile, another stretch of the Dolphin accounted for the 39th worst bottleneck in the country. Many commuters end up having to travel through both Dolphin backups before getting home. This backup accounted for 500,000 of lost hours a year, worth approximately about $11,000,000.

[angelscorpio]

And I am not sure if it is me or what but I have noticed even more cars on roads every day. It is unbearable now. Too much cars!!!

[blam]

that's cute. here's a map of a real bottleneck in case you are interested. purple means "parking lot"

[ruski]

Originally Posted by angelscorpio

and i am not sure if it is me or what but i have noticed even more cars on roads every day. It is unbearable now. Too much cars!!!

+1

But I thought it was because of the snowbirds.

[tallrick]

That is what happens when you take a road system built for 1970 and dump the world's castoffs and quadruple the population. No new major roads have been built since the 1980's and thousands of low density properties have been converted to stackers. Traffic will never be moving until you reduce the population density and start connecting local roads.

[hurricaneMan1992]

Originally Posted by tallrick

That is what happens when you take a road system built for 1970 and dump the world's castoffs and quadruple the population. No new major roads have been built since the 1980's and thousands of low density properties have been converted to stackers. Traffic will never be moving until you reduce the population density and start connecting local roads.

Thing is even if you connect more local roads people will still eventually have to get on the main thoroughfares like US1, Dolphin, and Palmetto because they're the most direct route, and in the case of US1, most businesses are only accessible from the main road. And to build more main thoroughfares where they would be effective, you're talking about bulldozing through established neighbourhoods. Also when Detroit depopulated the suburbs surrounding Detroit grew, so that now you run in to some pretty bad traffic around there even though their density is significantly less than ours.

We just got overdeveloped for our infrastructure. Perhaps a big hurricane would help reduce population density...however, what happened with Andrew is people from South Dade moved to Doral and west Broward and increased the density there, and on top of that, eventually South Dade came back more dense than before!

Sounds a bit draconian, but perhaps it's time to charge tolls that go up with congestion to discourage unnecessary trips during peak hours. Good old supply and demand. Due to demand being greater than supply, we will have to pay for our own congestion either through tolls or time lost in traffic. Question is whether we value our time enough to be willing to pay the tolls. And expand mass transit where it makes the most sense as far as peak hour trips, especially east/west on the 836/Flagler/8th ST corridor, so that at least some people have a viable alternative. As we see on national holidays when the courts and government offices close but 90% of us still go to work, reducing peak hour driving by even a modest amount can have a huge impact. Staggering work hours could greatly help too.

[ElGuito]

The bottleneck at the 836 and 826 intersection is due to the ongoing construction (running about a year late I think) and once that is completed, maybe it will get better.

[ruski]

Originally Posted by ElGuito

The bottleneck at the 836 and 826 intersection is due to the ongoing construction (running about a year late I think) and once that is completed, maybe it will get better.

[tallrick]

Originally Posted by ElGuito

The bottleneck at the 836 and 826 intersection is due to the ongoing construction (running about a year late I think) and once that is completed, maybe it will get better.

Traffic will be no better if they ever finish construction. You know that the palmetto expressway has been under continuous construction since it was started in the 1950's. Building a new road would have been better than expanding existing ones. It is far better to have two roads with three lanes than one road with 6 lanes. Hurricane should help but there has to be other ways to get people to stop crowding this area than waiting for it to crash and become Detroit south.

[jambo101]

A real bottle neck=


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKhsPO6yYko