Calgary Stoney Trail [Ring Road]

[lubicon]

I finally got around to using the newest portions of Stoney over the weekend when I had occasion t travel from Tuscany to Coral Springs. Notwithstanding the construction related headaches around Crowchild and the lights at Harvest Hills, I am very impressed. This road is a dream to drive and I'll be using it whenever I need to go to the east side of town. I do have a few observations / questions:

1. as others have mentioned, it seems a waste to have only made the road 2 lanes for most of the project. 3 would have been better in my opinion.

2. I have begun to notice more truck traffic on the NW portion of the road. I mean highway transport trucks, not the city variety. Not a lot mind you, but you rarely saw any prior to the 'big opening' of the road.

3. I was a little surprised by the lack of traffic using the road. OK, it was a Sunday afternoon but still....WTF? The NW portion seemed to be busier than the NE portion.

4. people, if you are scared by driving on big bad roads then stay the hell off them!! There is no excuse for driving 60 km on this road, if you are intimidated then find another route.

5. on the WB lanes of Stoney, pretty much directly south of the power plant on the NE side of town, there are 4-5 small light stands (or appear to be light stands) on the north side of the road. They are much shorter than the regular ones, probably only 20 feet or so and look to be for projection light onto the road, but I cannot figure out what their actual use may be.

[korzym]

Originally Posted by lubicon

I finally got around to using the newest portions of Stoney over the weekend when I had occasion t travel from Tuscany to Coral Springs. Notwithstanding the construction related headaches around Crowchild and the lights at Harvest Hills, I am very impressed. This road is a dream to drive and I'll be using it whenever I need to go to the east side of town. I do have a few observations / questions:

1. as others have mentioned, it seems a waste to have only made the road 2 lanes for most of the project. 3 would have been better in my opinion.

2. I have begun to notice more truck traffic on the NW portion of the road. I mean highway transport trucks, not the city variety. Not a lot mind you, but you rarely saw any prior to the 'big opening' of the road.

3. I was a little surprised by the lack of traffic using the road. OK, it was a Sunday afternoon but still....WTF? The NW portion seemed to be busier than the NE portion.

4. people, if you are scared by driving on big bad roads then stay the hell off them!! There is no excuse for driving 60 km on this road, if you are intimidated then find another route.

5. on the WB lanes of Stoney, pretty much directly south of the power plant on the NE side of town, there are 4-5 small light stands (or appear to be light stands) on the north side of the road. They are much shorter than the regular ones, probably only 20 feet or so and look to be for projection light onto the road, but I cannot figure out what their actual use may be.

60 is insane, I could rationalize 90, because its the most fuel efficient speed to drive at. Police ought to be able to enforce some punishment on people that drive too slow, I mean get proper training and quit treating these people like babies.
It would be real interesting if they were going 60 on the straight aways as seen here
• Video Link

and for lack of traffic, probably has to do with no development in the inner NE quadrant..

As for truckers, I still see them using 16th just so that they can go southbound onto deerfoot, this could be addressed with signage the the extreme east and west of the city

-also agree that its a bit unusual to have a 'city road' of only 2 lanes with a higher speed limit.

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by lubicon

5. on the WB lanes of Stoney, pretty much directly south of the power plant on the NE side of town, there are 4-5 small light stands (or appear to be light stands) on the north side of the road. They are much shorter than the regular ones, probably only 20 feet or so and look to be for projection light onto the road, but I cannot figure out what their actual use may be.

These are low height lights that were installed there because of the power line right over them. There's something like a 15m clearance in all directions that have to be met. It's all in the name of making sure every single spot of asphalt has a minimum amount of light shining on it.

[Corndogger]

Originally Posted by korzym

60 is insane, I could rationalize 90, because its the most fuel efficient speed to drive at. Police ought to be able to enforce some punishment on people that drive too slow, I mean get proper training and quit treating these people like babies.
It would be real interesting if they were going 60 on the straight aways as seen here
• Video Link

and for lack of traffic, probably has to do with no development in the inner NE quadrant..

As for truckers, I still see them using 16th just so that they can go southbound onto deerfoot, this could be addressed with signage the the extreme east and west of the city

-also agree that its a bit unusual to have a 'city road' of only 2 lanes with a higher speed limit.

I wonder if the people going 60 were just having a close look at the road? I know back in the summer when the stretch from Sarcee (?) to Harvest Hills opened up in the NW, I went for drive on it a few days after it opened and saw a lot of people driving very slow while admiring the road. They might have been in shock that such a nice road was actually built in Calgary.

The province definitely needs to put up better signage at the entrances to this road. Out-of-towners probably don't know what the road is for and that is probably the case for a number of Calgarians as well. Signage should indicate places such as the airport, Airdrie, Canmore, Banff and even the megamall in Balzac. Indicating it is a northern bypass route would help as well. No doubt once the SE leg is open the NE portion will be packed with commercial trucks headed north and there will be calls for additional lanes shortly after that.

[mersar]

Couple shots from last week at Crowchild:







They were working hard still at 7pm tonight on the abutments, pouring concrete into the footings.

[jsbertram]

I had time on the plane coming home this past weekend, so I knocked off some ideas for tunnels to replace the SW Ring Road (the SWRR Tunnels).

All coloured lines are tunnels. Separate tunnels for each direction of travel. No expropriation may be needed north or south of the Glenmore Reservoir

A)

Simple "straight shot” tunnels on the 37th St alignment. One of the issues with Glenmore around Lakeview is how restricted its ROW is in the area between Richard Rd and the Lakeview Golf Course, unless more Lakeview houses are expropriated. The segment of Glenmore between 37th St and Sarcee Tr is also restricted by the nearby housing and the reserve, so you would have to expropriate Galbraith Dr to widen Glenmore.

By putting the Ring Road traffic in two- or three- lane EB and WB tunnels (green lines) with portals north of and west of the Sarcee/ Highway 8/ Glenmore interchange, the SW Ring Road traffic can be separated from the local traffic around Glamorgan, Lakeview and Mount Royal. Sarcee north of Glenmore and Highway 8 west of Sarcee appear to have sufficent space for the necessary widening of the roads to handle traffic entering and exiting the SWRR Tunnel portals, as well as the space the portals will need. With the SWRR traffic NOT merging with Glenmore, Glenmore itself doesn't need to have extra lanes added to it to handle the extra SWRR traffic from/to the west. Because of the proximity of the reserve lands to 37th St, these West tunnels would loop north under Glamorgan & back south to align with 37th St passing under the new Glenmore / 37th interchange. There is no attempt to integrate the traffic that is using the Glenmore / 37th interchange into the SWRR Tunnel, as it should be used only by local traffic accessing Lakeview, Glamorgan and Mt. Royal U.

The narrow blue line is the NB and SB tunnels (one lane each) so that traffic in the 37th St / 46 Ave area can have access to the SWRR Tunnel without having to drive over to the Crowchild / Glenmore or Scarcee / Glenmore portals.

The red line is the EB and WB tunnels of two or three lanes each that loops north then south under a small section of Lakeview before joining the green and blue segments into the main SWRR NB and SB tunnels of three or four lanes each.

At this point, the main SWRR Tunnels are either side-by-side or stacked one over the other depending on the diameter of the tunnels and the width of the 37th St ROW. In Europe, there are TBM tunnels up to 20 Metres (almost 60 Feet) in diameter being built for 3 lane tunnels, and it appears the ROW for 37th St is sufficient for side-by-side tunnels of this diameter.

One issue with this layout is that Lakeview residents only have access to the SWRR tunnel by using the Crowchild/Glenmore interchange, but they may appreciate having all the SWRR traffic bypassing their neighbourhood, because 37th St on the surface remains a local neigbourhood street. It’s unlikely it will need to be widened to major artery.

After dipping under the Elbow River oxbows & Weaselhead area, the SWRR Tunnels come back to the surface west of Oakridge. A new extension of Southland Dr west to 37th St would connect with the SWRR Tunnels. A new Southland / 37th St interchange can be the transition from the tunnel portals west of Oakridge, and the stacked SWRR roadway west of Cedarbrae. Before this interchange &tc is built, this area at Southland / 37th St can be the main construction area where the SWRR Tunnels TBMs are assembled, and the tunnels are are started & drilled north to Glenmore Tr.

As the SWRR continues south, a new interchange at Anderson Rd would be built. It appears there is enough room in the 37th St ROW beside Woodbine to build the SWRR without having to stack the roadways. After crossing Fish Creek you are back to the original SWRR alignment to 22x.

This can be done without having to expropriate any housing, since everything is underground, and the portals are within the existing ROWs


B)

Instead of the north alignment on 37th St, it is on Crowhild/24th St. This is useful for the traffic using Crowchild / Glenmore/ 14th to get to Oakridge / Cedarbrae/ Woodbine, and the portals for this traffic would be north of the Crowchild / Glenmore interchange. No traffic using the Crowchild / Glenmore interchange would be able to use the SWRR Tunnels, because the entrance portals are before the Crowchild / Glenmore interchange.

This may not work because of the narrow space where the green and red portals would connect with Glenmore. Another issue is that all the SWRR traffic from/to the west will end up driving round Lakeview to Crowhild/24th St to get to the SWRR tunnel portals, and therefore Glenmore from Crowhild/24th St to Sarcee will have to be widened to handle this SWRR traffic. After the SWRR traffic is in the tunnels, it will run under the reservoir back to 37th street to continue with the same southern 37th st alignment as in A)

Again, Lakeview doesn’t have direct access to the SWRR tunnels, and this traffic bypasses Lakeview.


C)

Similar to A) with the “straight shot” 37th St alignment, but the red segment is a straight connection at Glenmore, rather than a loop-around as in A), which then curves into the 37th St alignment of the main SWRR tunnel.


D)

Tunnel under the Enmax ROW along 66th Ave. The Blue segment connecting to Crowchild still has its portals north of Crowchild / Glenmore interchange. The Red segment comes off the Glenmore causeway and follows the NE/SW Enmax ROW, joining Crowchild tunnel at 66th Ave west of 24th St. The SWRR main tunnels start at 66th Ave / 37th St where the green segment containing the SWRR traffic to/from the west joins the Crowchild tunnel.

Lakeview might be appeased by removing the Enmax towers along this alignment between Glenmore and 37th St and have the power lines relocated into the tunnels. Enmax might also use the SWRR tunnels as a way to get new power lines south of the Glenmore Reservoir to the SW areas of the city.

The green segment still has the issue that Glenmore between Sarcee and Richard Rd will need to be widened to handle the extra SWRR traffic. It also doesn’t make sense to have the SWRR traffic drive over the north of Lakeview only to enter a tunnel to go under Lakeview & loop back to 37thSt before joining the main SWRR tunnel under the Elbow River & Weaselhead.

However, this alignment gives Lakeview access by having short one-lane WB and EB tunnels as part of the red segment with Lakeview portals at 24th St south of 66th Ave.


E)

A variant of D) with a different green segment. Like A), this green segment separates the SWRR traffic to/from the west, but the looping to align with 37th St is all under the north tip of lakeview, rather than under Glamorgan.


F)

A variant of A) with the green segment from E). Because this is all underground and built with TBMs, it isn’t hard to get tunnels to go over/under each other before they join up in the main SWRR Tunnels under 37th St.


G)

A variant of C) with the green segment from E).

[korzym]

Contact your provincial and municipal reps and send them those ideas.

Think it's futile? I called a certain alderman and complained about lights being burned out and the next day they were fixed. I requested elusive construction info from my alderman office and they called me back with detailed answers. FYI those offices of MLAs and aldermen do hold an influential voice in policies. This week I received a very good email from an Alberta minister regarding a very large issue particular to Alberta and the rest of Canada. I received a call the week there was an open house on the airport tunnel from my MLA because of my videos and including the note that says to contact your federal rep to fund the airport tunnel.

I strongly encourage you to look up your reps and forward this onto them.

Personally I would like to see the 37th & glenmore area have overpasses similar to those seen at 16th ave nw & stoney. People making suggestions like this shows politicians what they want and twists their arms.

[freeweed]

It finally dawned on me how exactly the ring road is engineered: it's a 4-lane road, period. The only stretches of 3 lanes are temporarily for on/off ramps, and 2 longer sections by my place. WB from Beddington to CHB, and NB/EB from Crowchild to CHB.

What do those spots have in common? They both climb one of the longer, larger hills in Calgary. For a road designed to carry large truck traffic, they're very necessary.

But really, don't kid yourself - this is a 4-lane highway, end of story, and I don't think there were ever serious plans for it to be anything but.

Fortunately, there's plenty of room to expand to at least 6 lanes, but I bet that's 10 years once once the road gets so congested that it's undriveable.

[shreddog]

Originally Posted by freeweed

It finally dawned on me how exactly the ring road is engineered: it's a 4-lane road, period. The only stretches of 3 lanes are temporarily for on/off ramps, and 2 longer sections by my place. WB from Beddington to CHB, and NB/EB from Crowchild to CHB.

What do those spots have in common? They both climb one of the longer, larger hills in Calgary. For a road designed to carry large truck traffic, they're very necessary.

But really, don't kid yourself - this is a 4-lane highway, end of story, and I don't think there were ever serious plans for it to be anything but.

Fortunately, there's plenty of room to expand to at least 6 lanes, but I bet that's 10 years once once the road gets so congested that it's undriveable.

I thought that this was the plan all along?

It is nice to see though, that all bridges, culverts and underpasses appears to be built for easy expansion to 3 lanes in each direction.

[Stang]

At least there's room for expansion. I always kind of laugh to myself when you see a road like Stoney - it was 3 lanes (2 up-hill, one down) for most of the NW leg when it first opened (river to CHB), then expanded to 4 a few years later. In 10 years it'll be 6.

I can understand the point about not wanting to spend money on capacity that won't be needed for a while, but wouldn't it be more efficient in the long run to just build it "properly" when you have the crews out there working on it the first (or second) time?

I guess that's one way to reduce budgets, but it won't be pretty when they have to slow down traffic and/or reduce lanes when the time comes to expand it as traffic volumes will be much greater by then.

[MalcolmTucker]

The ultimate plan is 4 lanes in each direction, but that is all based on demand. If the outer ring road is axed I could see the current one being redesigned to fit more lanes.

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by Stang

At least there's room for expansion. I always kind of laugh to myself when you see a road like Stoney - it was 3 lanes (2 up-hill, one down) for most of the NW leg when it first opened (river to CHB), then expanded to 4 a few years later. In 10 years it'll be 6.

I can understand the point about not wanting to spend money on capacity that won't be needed for a while, but wouldn't it be more efficient in the long run to just build it "properly" when you have the crews out there working on it the first (or second) time?

I guess that's one way to reduce budgets, but it won't be pretty when they have to slow down traffic and/or reduce lanes when the time comes to expand it as traffic volumes will be much greater by then.

Paying to maintain unneeded lane kms is certainly not a way to save money. When the lanes are needed, it really isn't that big a deal to put in another lane.

10-20 years from now, when the third lane is needed, it can be installed, and they will have saved lots of maintenance cost in that time frame. Perhaps it could be lumped together with when the whole road needs a new wearing surface, then they can have all of the construction hassle all at once.

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by freeweed

It finally dawned on me how exactly the ring road is engineered: it's a 4-lane road, period. The only stretches of 3 lanes are temporarily for on/off ramps, and 2 longer sections by my place. WB from Beddington to CHB, and NB/EB from Crowchild to CHB.

But really, don't kid yourself - this is a 4-lane highway, end of story, and I don't think there were ever serious plans for it to be anything but.

The road is graded for it's ultimate cross section already, it only needs the asphalt. The government axed a lane in both directions on the P3 bid for the NE from the original plan for the opening day laning, which came as a surprise to many, though the projected volumes have fluctuated a ton in the last few years. So basically, it wasn't designed at all as a 4 lane road.

Originally Posted by Corndogger

The province definitely needs to put up better signage at the entrances to this road. Out-of-towners probably don't know what the road is for and that is probably the case for a number of Calgarians as well. Signage should indicate places such as the airport, Airdrie, Canmore, Banff and even the megamall in Balzac. Indicating it is a northern bypass route would help as well. No doubt once the SE leg is open the NE portion will be packed with commercial trucks headed north and there will be calls for additional lanes shortly after that.

As funny as this may sound, that's something the province doesn't like doing. Use Anthony Henday Drive in Edmonton for example. Originally the signage entering the City heading Northbound on Highway 2 towards Anthony Henday had West Edmonton Mall listed in nice big letters for everyone to see so they wouldn't use Whitemud anymore. For some strange reason, less than a year later ALL references to West Edmonton Mall were removed. Why? I wish I knew. All destination signage was removed from Stoney Trail, aside from the destinations listed on exits at 16th Avenue and Deerfoot Trail.

[Seadood]

As funny as this may sound, that's something the province doesn't like doing. Use Anthony Henday Drive in Edmonton for example. Originally the signage entering the City heading Northbound on Highway 2 towards Anthony Henday had West Edmonton Mall listed in nice big letters for everyone to see so they wouldn't use Whitemud anymore. For some strange reason, less than a year later ALL references to West Edmonton Mall were removed. Why? I wish I knew. All destination signage was removed from Stoney Trail, aside from the destinations listed on exits at 16th Avenue and Deerfoot Trail.

True dat. My pet peeve is what the Transportation dept (prov) does regarding signage of secondary highways in this province. McKnight and CHB, as well as Glenmore Trail east all have secondary designations, yet you are lucky if you see any signage acknowledging that. I was disappointed to see that Stoney Trail signage didn't remedy that situation regarding McK and CHB. And don't get me started about HWY 8 postings, which seem completely erratic. 18th St. overpass shows #8, yet Deerfoot signage does not. Is it a provincial highway or not? And what happens to 1A? Westbound from Chestermere, it just seems to vanish in the bowels of Forest Lawn, and not acknowleged at Deerfoot. What I like about Saskatchewan? When a highway ends, they tell you!

[Seadood]

"...As funny as this may sound, that's something the province doesn't like doing. Use Anthony Henday Drive in Edmonton for example. Originally the signage entering the City heading Northbound on Highway 2 towards Anthony Henday had West Edmonton Mall listed in nice big letters for everyone to see so they wouldn't use Whitemud anymore. For some strange reason, less than a year later ALL references to West Edmonton Mall were removed. Why? I wish I knew. All destination signage was removed from Stoney Trail, aside from the destinations listed on exits at 16th Avenue and Deerfoot Trail."

True dat. My pet peeve is what the Transportation dept (prov) does regarding signage of secondary highways in this province. McKnight and CHB, as well as Glenmore Trail east all have secondary designations, yet you are lucky if you see any signage acknowledging that. I was disappointed to see that Stoney Trail signage didn't remedy that situation regarding McK and CHB. And don't get me started about HWY 8 postings, which seem completely erratic. 18th St. overpass shows #8, yet Deerfoot signage does not. Is it a provincial highway or not? And what happens to 1A? Westbound from Chestermere, it just seems to vanish in the bowels of Forest Lawn, and not acknowleged at Deerfoot. What I like about Saskatchewan? When a highway ends, they tell you!

[Seadood]

Sorry for the redundancy. I went into edit which when rolled over said I could delete, but it left me hanging.

[Mazrim]

If you use [ quote ] and [ /quote ] (without those spaces between the brackets) around the text you wanted to quote, or just use the quote button under the post, you can get that fixed quickly.

[lubicon]

FromAlberta Transportation's website today.


November 25, 2009

Lights go out at Harvest Hills Boulevard in Calgary

Interchange to replace signalized ring-road intersection
Calgary... Calgary’s ring road is one step closer to becoming free-flow with plans underway for an interchange to replace the signalized intersection at Stoney Trail and Harvest Hills Boulevard NW.

“The Harvest Hills Boulevard NW interchange is part of the Alberta government’s plan to make the Stoney Trail ring road free-flowing with no level-grade intersections by 2013,” said Luke Ouellette, Minister of Transportation. “This project represents our commitment to providing the infrastructure needed to support the province’s economic growth and prosperity.”

Construction will start in early 2010 and the interchange will open to traffic by fall 2010.

“It’s great to see this important project move forward,” said Teresa Woo-Paw, MLA for Calgary-Mackay. “The new interchange will improve access to the ring road for northwest Calgary residents and enhance safety for all users of Stoney Trail.”

Plans for the new interchange reflect high standards of engineering, design, and construction. Interchanges are considered the safest and most efficient way to enter or exit a highway. On average, interchanges reduce collisions by 45 per cent and eliminate t-bone and head-on collisions that frequently result in serious injuries or fatalities.

Visit www.transportation.alberta.ca/804.htm for more details on the Calgary ring road.

The Government of Alberta has a clear plan for a strong economic recovery. The Way Forward will bring Alberta back into a surplus position in three years by trimming government spending; using cash reserves to protect key programs; continuing to invest in public infrastructure; and ensuring that our province's industries are competitive and continue to attract investment to provide jobs and prosperity.

http://alberta.ca/acn/200911/273882BF1F288-E491-F499-ECE7C586CF0E0AC1.html

This also sounds promising for the Nose Hill Drive intersection.

[Seadood]

Originally Posted by lubicon

FromAlberta Transportation's website today.


November 25, 2009

Lights go out at Harvest Hills Boulevard in Calgary

With the abuttments already in place, this is a real slam dunk. Great to see the start/finish dates so close.

[You Need A Thneed]

I imagine it's going to be two seperate bridges for now, as the LRT ROW is in the middle. Or perhaps it'll just be one of the two bridges now? That should be fine, as the road is only one lane each way through the intersection now.