Anyone else use the Poplar St. ramp in Greentree?

[ditchdigger]

Yeah, I nearly died on that thing today....

So it's YOU that doesn't know how to merge!

You're giving the rest of us a bad reputation...

[Jcrouzzo]

I definitely think a close second to the poplar street onramp is only an exit or 2 east. I am of corse speaking of the parkway center ramp. This is the probable reason PCM is dead.

I have to say this one because I rear ended someone on that ramp once. I glanced to see if traffic was clear... well the person in front of me already knew it wasn't and was stopped. I was in a dodge intrepid, she was in something small and asian, i forget what. Needless to say her trunk was mostly gone.

[ryanm3685]

Here's a really embarrassing one: 28 North getting on from Fox Chapel. Too much of the on-ramp is circular and only a small amount runs parallel to the road, so you're often in the same predicament as the Beechwood Blvd on-ramp, because it's hard to really pick up speed on the circular part.

Dishonorable mention (although this might have been hard to plan for): the constant lane switching right before the Fort Pitt Tunnel outbound. I imagine that is a big cause of problems late afternoon. The signs are almost hidden, and if you're not used to the area, you might be going somewhere you didn't intend. I also don't care for the small window of time you have coming out of the Fort Pitt Tunnel, towards downtown, when you have a small window of time to either stay on 376, or get over to 279 to 28.

These days, when I know I'm getting near an on-ramp, I'll try to move over to the far left if possible, both to help myself keep my speed and to give someone an easier time merging.

I'm of the persuasion that you should not make a city car centered if you cannot make it car friendly. It's this kind of outdated infrastructure that makes me believe that Pittsburgh should put more emphasis on mass transit than most places. We're built differently than say, Houston or Phoenix, where they can keep adding lanes (and they were built around cars from the get-go). Although it's true that some people will need personal vehicles some or all of the time (i.e. carrying equipment, going somewhere remote, large number of people, etc.), why not try to have more ways to reduce the number of people on the road? That way, the people who absolutely need to use automobiles have a much better drive.

Lately I've been wondering whether Parkway Center Mall, with its plethora of open space, could serve well as a park and ride?

[gbpriv]

Originally Posted by ryanm3685

Here's a really embarrassing one: 28 North getting on from Fox Chapel. Too much of the on-ramp is circular and only a small amount runs parallel to the road, so you're often in the same predicament as the Beechwood Blvd on-ramp, because it's hard to really pick up speed on the circular part.

I forgot how bad this on ramp is until I had to use it just this weekend. It's a narrow loop where you really can't pick up any speed (and if you can, you cannot see the 28 N traffic anyway and you'll likely have to stop to avoid merging into a semi-truck). Once the circular part is over you have a few car lengths to merge and nobody ever moves to the left to allow you in. The 28 N on ramp just before it coming from Aspinwall/St. Margaret's isn't much better - cars always have to wait there at a standstill since people stay in the right lane to exit at FC Road or Blawnox.