Posted on 07/06/2019 4:07:52 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
A public interest advocacy group has identified the countrys most wasteful and pointless transportation projects, which are costing taxpayers $25 billion.
The U.S. Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) cites among the biggest boondoggles a $2.2 billion widening of Interstate 81 in Virginia, a $7 billion interstate project in Houston and a $802 million Connecting Miami redesign of city highways.
According to PIRG, widening highways to reduce gridlock fails for several reasons. Multiple studies show that more road space over time leads to further congestion because of a phenomenon called induced demand.
Were stuck in a car-centric rut in the United States, said Matthew Casale, PIRG transportation campaign director and the studys co-author. Yet states continue to spend billions building highways that will exacerbate traffic problems, increase pollution, destroy neighborhoods, encourage sprawl and consume billions of more taxpayer dollars for maintenance.
The fifth installment of PIRGs annual Highway Boondoggles report, developed with the nonpartisan Frontier Group think tank, also criticizes projects in California, Michigan, Illinois, Oregon and North Carolina. It warns state and local governments against publicly financing counterproductive highway projects when the country is facing a backlog of critical repairs on existing roads, bridges and other infrastructure.
PIRG released the report as President Trump and Congress were tussling over a $2 trillion plan to upgrade American roads, highways, ports and airports.
Officials from some of the targeted projects reject PIRGs characterizations and argue that their efforts have merit for the commuters and communities they serve.
In Virginia, PIRG singled out a $2.2 billion widening of Interstate 81 and highlighted potential damage to Civil War sites as a consequence. It also warned about safety dangers because the highways speed limit is expected to increase to 70 mph.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
This group is an extreme leftist group.
possible but i doubt it... it doesn’t even start to rise till about the 2oclock position on the circle and the max elevation doesn’t need to be met till the stanchion just before the tracks
Go to any major urban area with a serious highway congestion problem, and invariably youll find the same historical pattern in the background: a state DOT using a large sum of Federal highway funding went out decades ago and built a major highway in an area that wasnt heavily populated. Everything seemed to be done right back then. Then, over time, municipal governments all along that highway corridor said: Hey, what a great highway! Now we can approve shopping centers and residential subdivisions, and people can live out here and work in that city 10 miles away. Its only a 15-minute drive from here!
That sounded like a great plan until everyone had he same idea ... and within ten years that 15-minute drive became a two-hour ordeal.
This story has been repeated endlessly across the U.S. The crux of the problem is that everyone wants to have the authority for land use decisions vested in local governments, but they want someone else to pay for the infrastructure that is needed to support the development.
Albertas Child, P.E.
Where was that photo taken? Im guessing its one of the areas along the Alameda Corridor in L.A. where a former grade crossing was eliminated to accommodate the growing rail traffic out of the Ports of L.A. and Long Beach.
Lawrenceburg Indiana built an elevated westbound U.S. 50 that looks to be steeper than what the pictured straight connector would have been.Also check out the “ramp in the sky” I-465 to east I-74 on Indianapolis southeast.
no doubt
how gentle a grade to you need in a place that never has snow or ice?
we have steeper grades than that here in the NE where we DO have snow and ice
The U.S. Interstate system is the greatest mass transit system known to man.
I can actually check this out when I'm in the office next week. Can you tell me where that photo was taken?
I’m sure that’s part of it.
It’s time to get all parties together, and get on track to build more infrastructure.
Freeways will typically be designed for a maximum grade of 5% even in mountainous areas. That means the road will need 100 feet of horizontal distance for every rise of 5 feet in the elevation. That means you need 400 feet of horizontal distance to get 20 feet up in the air, and that doesn't even include the transition curves at either end of the grade where the road flattens out.
Look at that photo closely, and you can see that it is a very tight arrangement. The vehicles are large compared to the aerials I saw of the two locations you described.
no idea... what’s the highest elevation to cross the tracks 30’ doesn’t seem that high or that steep but than again i’m no PE
For a railroad line that carries doublestack intermodal trains, a minimum vertical clearance of 23 feet is required. That’s the distance from the top of the rail to the bottom of the bridge structure.
Looks like it is staging space for vehicles entering a tunnel. The tunnel speed is slower than the road, and cars in the tunnel cause a slowdown on the road. One of the tunnels going into Manhattan NY has something similar, because they collect tolls at the opening of the tunnel.
i guess anything’s possible
The political usage of “progressive” actually started in the 1800’s was specifically meant to mean more government control.
Don’t look for any other meaning or outcome when it comes to this Leftist political label. There is NO other outcome for Leftist “progressive” than more government control.
But as with generally every Leftist term, the usage and actual experience is exactly the opposite of the term’s inherent meaning. The Left deals in lies and confusion and is the materialization of George Orwell’s 1984.
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