Jump to content

Traffic Congestion and Highway Construction


monsoon

Recommended Posts


I doubt I'll get much love for this but, in addition to making people consider the true cost of roads by tolling, I hope they also use tolls as a way to incent EV ownership and exempt them from said tolls for the next 10 or so years. We're making little to no progress on climate change and this is easy to do (implementation, not politically tho).
Of course the idiots in the gerrymandered GA are trying to muster votes for a bill to make free electric chargers illegal unless there's free gas too. Probably the same genius crowd that was against solar cause it will use up all the sunlight. :-)

There’s this… weird perception of EV incentives and people saying “it’s not fair” and while EVs have clear disadvantages they are one solution to our climate change issue. The goal should be reducing any vehicular travel as much as possible with transit, bikes, and walking being at least 50% or more of the trips particularly in cities. For car rides EVs is a way better solution to traveling in a vehicle if necessary over gas. The Dilemma between EVs and Gas is were exchanging global impact to more localized impacts. The main source of those impacts being mining of minerals and materials to build these vehicles and gas having similar through mining of these oil and gas resources but also more global impacts with the use and burning of the fuels. There is a clear advantage to EVs over Gas and it should be part of the solution. The “I want EVs to do their fair share” argument is absolutely zealous behavior on pushing “me, me, me” and unforgiving and inconsiderate individualism. Individualism is important but never at the expense of collectivism, empathy and awareness. These policies such as the one you mentioned about “free gas” (which would involve government subsidizing gas which their party is generally against government spending…well only when it’s to actually benefit people, but if it’s to bail out corporation I guess that’s an exception for them.

EVs should be incentivized for what they do better than ICVs do. Highly efficient with an efficacy that is undeniably in favor of EVs. The incentives can be justified by the costs-benefits of EVs outweighing the costs-benefits of ICVs. My senior research project was all about research on their differences including the impacts of each and their economics which from what I could gather the scale tipped to EVs with the notable con being the high upfront cost and manufacturing impacts but would be offset in the long run. EVs also keeping their value for longer. When also coupled with renewables the benefits shoot up.
  • Thanks 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, KJHburg said:

Neighboring Concepts and Inlivian are pushing for the Trade and 5th St exits off I-77 to be made more compact and a huge mixed project built like Atlantic Station on top of a parking garage that would be exposed to 77 but with a huge deck on top with apartments, park etc.   Pedestrian bridge over 77 to uptown. 

https://www.neighboringconcepts.com/projects/five-points-forward

Notice the parking garage underground and 77 would be in front of that.  This would require the existing cloverleafs to be redesigned and this will probably happen with the 77 express toll lanes being extended south from where they end now to SC line.

Learned all of this on the UP walking tour of Five Points. 

This is excellent. I'm OOTL and didn't even realize the express lanes were being extended down to the SC line. I'll be very happy if that interchange is made more compact during that project. Do we have a timeline on this?

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is excellent. I'm OOTL and didn't even realize the express lanes were being extended down to the SC line. I'll be very happy if that interchange is made more compact during that project. Do we have a timeline on this?

Whenever NCDOT has the funds to actually build it I assume…
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, KJHburg said:

Inching towards completion the I-485 express lanes today.  

ever heard the phrase " I drove the wheels off my vehicle"  well happened to me in the Lowcountry this weekend.  Luckily and thank God it happened in a parking lot. the culprit: loose lug nuts.

20220714_104759.jpg

How did that happen?  That's worse than one of my motorcycle friends who bought a Kawasaki at a local dealership, and they forgot to put any oil in it.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you all can attend to speak supporting the I-77 South Managed lanes proposal the meeting tonight at 6:00PM held by the CRTPO at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg  Government Center.  We should all voice our support for this managed lanes proposal as it can be used for express buses as well.  This proposal would provide both express toll options for commuters and free usage for the express buses that will be btwn Uptown, Rock Hill, and the I-485 LYNX transit station. It will also allow the proposed express buses on I-485 link to I-77 express buses

Edited by kayman
  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 7/17/2022 at 10:02 PM, KJHburg said:

Inching towards completion the I-485 express lanes today.  

ever heard the phrase " I drove the wheels off my vehicle"  well happened to me in the Lowcountry this weekend.  Luckily and thank God it happened in a parking lot. the culprit: loose lug nuts. 

20220714_104759.jpg

 

On 7/18/2022 at 9:34 PM, nicholas said:

How did that happen?  That's worse than one of my motorcycle friends who bought a Kawasaki at a local dealership, and they forgot to put any oil in it.

The tire guy was apparently sick on lug nut day.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Semi-monthly Graham St sucks post....

Seriously, there's gotta be something that can be done to improve Graham St.  The existing ROW is pretty narrow, and the lack of turn lanes at nearly every intersection causes constant bottlenecks.  Most of it should probably be restricted to one lane in each direction with a center turn lane, and bus stops should be flared out so that buses can pull aside to let people on/off more safely.  Starita or Craighead should ideally be rerouted so that there are not two intersections within like 250 ft of each other, and Woodward and 24th definitely needs to be fixed (supposedly this is planned?).  Also, a huge roundabout at Graham/Statesville/Dalton would probably be simplest and easiest solution to that cluster of an intersection.  With the remaining ROW left over from removing two lanes, new sidewalks (and separated bike lanes if they can fit) should be added as I see a lot of pedestrians and cyclists along this corridor, and the existing infrastructure is in pretty rough shape.

  • Like 1
  • Thanks 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Luckily I'm in Concord and never deal with 485 down S. I do occasionally jump on the express lane from 85 to 77 to 277 to 74. Huh? But yeah. I'm not a fan of them tho. But, in about 10yrs 77 from SC to 77 at the Brookshire will have an additional free lane (4 total) and 2 express lanes N and S. 

It will be a behemoth undertaking. 

Inconvenience is the only way to get people to live a more urban lifestyle in Charlotte. The suburbs are just so nice it's sickening!! Charging for Saturday parking Uptown was genius.  Also the city should make some of Uptown 2 way streets into one way streets during peak traffic times. Prohibit on street parking completely during peak times and posy confusing "No Parking" signs noone can make sense of.

   Having my car towed in Philadelphia and owing 450$ to get it out of a horrid tow lot was all it took for me to NEVER drive into the Center City again. I took the 108 trolley after that and enjoyed book and not worrying about anything car or parking ticket related again!!!!

  • Like 2
  • Haha 2
  • Confused 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Take2 said:

Luckily I'm in Concord and never deal with 485 down S. I do occasionally jump on the express lane from 85 to 77 to 277 to 74. Huh? But yeah. I'm not a fan of them tho. But, in about 10yrs 77 from SC to 77 at the Brookshire will have an additional free lane (4 total) and 2 express lanes N and S. 

It will be a behemoth undertaking. 

Inconvenience is the only way to get people to live a more urban lifestyle in Charlotte. The suburbs are just so nice it's sickening!! Charging for Saturday parking Uptown was genius.  Also the city should make some of Uptown 2 way streets into one way streets during peak traffic times. Prohibit on street parking completely during peak times and posy confusing "No Parking" signs noone can make sense of.

   Having my car towed in Philadelphia and owing 450$ to get it out of a horrid tow lot was all it took for me to NEVER drive into the Center City again. I took the 108 trolley after that and enjoyed book and not worrying about anything car or parking ticket related again!!!!

The city has been slowly converting some of the one way streets into two way streets in Uptown. One way streets turn into race tracks unfortunately.

  • Like 3
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, norm21499 said:

The city has been slowly converting some of the one way streets into two way streets in Uptown. One way streets turn into race tracks unfortunately.

My experience in Phila was with 2 lane one way streets that had street parking on both sides normally. TONS of people biking in and out of the traffic normally, not to mention the foot traffic. A mix of residents,  employees, tourists, and students. They definitely were not racetracks. 

  I think I get your concern and we have Charlotte's own government to blame for it. After ripping Brooklyn Village apart mid century, they just used built roads with 4 lanes one way in most cases.

   It may sound mean, but think about it, when you vacation in Europes cities or other much older cities then Charlotte, we dont rent a car because we know how confusing and chaotic it would be.

   The best and quickest way to get Charlotte residents to ditch their vehicles is like my original post suggested,  dont make it so easy and cheap to have one the closet you live to Uptown. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I hate on street parking with a passion (at least in most circumstances, there are of course exceptions) as it absolutely takes away from the pedestrian experience. There are better solutions for both parking, and pedestrian safety / traffic calming. Relying on parked cars to slow traffic is a terrible approach imho. If anything it is far more dangerous in general.

  • Like 1
  • Sad 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 7/24/2022 at 7:53 AM, Blue_Devil said:

One way streets and no street parking would make uptown a pedestrian nightmare. 

My suggestion is to have times during peak traffic when cars cannot be parked on the street in order to make additional lanes during rush hours. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.