Highways in Canada

[libtard]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

Perusing google street view as one does... I noticed that Alberta doesn't use a lot of crash protection for roadside hazards. Notice this, this is the AB-16/216 interchange on the east side of Edmonton. Note that neither the overhead sign supports, the high mast poles, or the bridge piers have any crash protection. This seems to be fairly typical in Alberta (at least on the highways that I have looked at). The median of this highway isn't very wide. I have a hard time envisioning a similar highway in Ontario or Quebec that didn't have some kind of crash protection for similarly designed highways.

I don't see anything wrong with this. What type of crash protection would you suggest they use?

[sonysnob]

Originally Posted by libtard

I don't see anything wrong with this. What type of crash protection would you suggest they use?

Guiderail.

Or at the very least, an energy attenuator in front of the concrete. Those concrete supports look close enough to the highway that if they were to be struck by an errant vehicle, the driver would likely be killed, or very seriously injured.


This is a similar interchange in Quebec. Note how the bridge pier and high mast light support has been protected by guiderail.

[TownGuy]

The median in the Edmonton example is shockingly narrow for not having a guardrail.

[libtard]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

Guiderail.

Or at the very least, an energy attenuator in front of the concrete. Those concrete supports look close enough to the highway that if they were to be struck by an errant vehicle, the driver would likely be killed, or very seriously injured.


This is a similar interchange in Quebec. Note how the bridge pier and high mast light support has been protected by guiderail.

That highway has its own problems though. The inside shoulder is non existant. Guide rails are great for the outside shoulder of a lane because they allow flying debris to pass by them and off the road instead of being bounced back into traffic from solid barrier. I'm not a fan of guidrails dividing opposing lanes though because that same debris will just pass by the rail into the opposing traffic. Now in this case there is some sort of ditch which makes the set up better. I still think from an aesthetics point of view the highway you posted in AB is nicer.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

Perusing google street view as one does... I noticed that Alberta doesn't use a lot of crash protection for roadside hazards. Notice this, this is the AB-16/216 interchange on the east side of Edmonton. Note that neither the overhead sign supports, the high mast poles, or the bridge piers have any crash protection. This seems to be fairly typical in Alberta (at least on the highways that I have looked at). The median of this highway isn't very wide. I have a hard time envisioning a similar highway in Ontario or Quebec that didn't have some kind of crash protection for similarly designed highways.

[img]http://www.asphaltplanet.ca/ON/Ontroads/nocrashprotection.jpg[img]

That median is 20m wide. I agree putting in a barrier of some sort would be safer, but the median seems to work in practise - a semi will just ditch there and not block the lanes most of the time.

Edit: my mistake, actually more like 14m which does seem on the narrow side without a barrier.

[sonysnob]

I don't know what you mean by flying debris.

In any event, having a projectile bounced back into the traffic direction that it came from is always safer than having it cross into the opposing flow. The opposing trajectories would mean that any impact from a projectile approaching in an oncoming manner would be much, much more serious vs. that of a sideswipe hit.

Most jurisdictions don't build a full width inner shoulder for a highway that only has two lanes per direction. Alberta is no different.



I'm sure the emergency service personnel must appreciate the nice aesthetics when they are powerwashing blood off the concrete posts.

[sonysnob]

Originally Posted by milomilo

That median is 20m wide. I agree putting in a barrier of some sort would be safer, but the median seems to work in practise - a semi will just ditch there and not block the lanes most of the time.

Edit: my mistake, actually more like 14m which does seem on the narrow side without a barrier.

14m probably meets bare minimum standard without a barrier, but the concrete pillars would be less than 7m, which should be in the highway's "clear zone".

[The Chemist]

Originally Posted by megadude

Very easy to make these kinds of mistakes there. I've made practically the same mistakes around there when I was a new driver.

I was taking the 410 south to 401 east assuming I could exit at Dixie. Nope. Had to exit at Renforth and cut back to Dixie. Had done that twice before I finally learned.

And of course, 401/409/427 at YYZ is very confusing. Have made mistakes going to and from probably three or four times before I got the hang of it.

Can only imagine how confusing it is in some bigger foreign cities. I found NYC confusing as well.

Thank God for google maps on the smart phone now.

Like this one - Xinzhuang Interchange in Shanghai:


4 highways intersect here - the S4 (bottom right), S20 (top right to top left), G60 (bottom left), and Humin Elevated Road (top centre). You have to be VERY careful and watch the signs to make sure you don't go the wrong way. At least the signage is generally very clear.

[Franco401]

NB always uses super wide medians whenever possible, but the old Trans-Canada bypass of Fredericton (the oldest freeway in the province, built 1959) is a disaster for crash protection. Even with guardrails near signs, you basically just have a narrow strip of flat grass separating traffic flows, even when the road curves and traffic doing 110 on a road designed for 90 has to swerve just to stay in lane. You then get to go down a VERY steep hill where it narrows to one lane for no reason, adds another, goes down to a four-lane undivided road, loses the right lane at a ramp with a laughable indicated speed of 30 and makes another dangerous turn onto a narrow bridge.

[sonysnob]

1950s highway design pretty much always sucked. Virtually all of the original interchanges on Ontario's 1950's era highways have been reconfigured, but it's pretty easy to look at the old designs and wonder what the hell the designer was thinking.

[sonysnob]

I made this video a few weeks ago of Autoroute 20 entering downtown Montreal:

• Video Link

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

1950s highway design pretty much always sucked. Virtually all of the original interchanges on Ontario's 1950's era highways have been reconfigured, but it's pretty easy to look at the old designs and wonder what the hell the designer was thinking.

Traffic used to be light, and cars weren't capable of going very fast (like 140 fast)...? It's not a rhetorical question.

Nice video on Autoroute 20 by the way. Since when does it have HOV lane for that short strip? I haven't been on that highway for so long because I usually use 40 to exit Quebec instead. (Funny enough, except for 2 occasions, whenever I leave Montreal, I head towards Ottawa instead of Toronto.)

[sonysnob]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

Traffic used to be light, and cars weren't capable of going very fast (like 140 fast)...? It's not a rhetorical question.

Nice video on Autoroute 20 by the way. Since when does it have HOV lane for that short strip? I haven't been on that highway for so long because I usually use 40 to exit Quebec instead. (Funny enough, except for 2 occasions, whenever I leave Montreal, I head towards Ottawa instead of Toronto.)

That's true, but it's more than that. In the 1950's engineers didn't understand driver behaviour at all. Things like shoulder width, and clear zones, and sight lines play an enormous factor in how much capacity a given highway is.

In the 1950's they also didn't really understand turbulence, caused by things such as weaving and merging. Superhighways were still such a new concept at that time, that they really didn't understand how drivers were going to adapt to the designs of the day.

In Ontario, to their credit, they did learn fairly quickly. The first design assignment for the twelve lane 401 in Toronto was started in 1959. 1959! While flawed by today's standards. The 401 was a marvel of design for it's vintage.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by TownGuy

The median in the Edmonton example is shockingly narrow for not having a guardrail.

You would not see that in Ontario. The MTO would require an Ontario tall wall.

I'm very surprised to see that on a busy Alberta highway. And there is no crash protection for the pillars and lighting posts!!

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by Loco101

You would not see that in Ontario. The MTO would require an Ontario tall wall.

I'm very surprised to see that on a busy Alberta highway. And there is no crash protection for the pillars and lighting posts!!

401 between Essex/C-K boundary and Middlesex/Elgin boundary though...

[libtard]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

I don't know what you mean by flying debris.

In any event, having a projectile bounced back into the traffic direction that it came from is always safer than having it cross into the opposing flow. The opposing trajectories would mean that any impact from a projectile approaching in an oncoming manner would be much, much more serious vs. that of a sideswipe hit.

Most jurisdictions don't build a full width inner shoulder for a highway that only has two lanes per direction. Alberta is no different.



I'm sure the emergency service personnel must appreciate the nice aesthetics when they are powerwashing blood off the concrete posts.

I agree debris flying into opposing lanes is worse. The rule of thumb is guide rails for outside lanes, cement barriers for dividing opposing lanes of traffic.

And to touch on your earlier picture of an AB highway, BC is guilty of this too. Look at how small the dividing median is. Also nothing guarding against the light pole.

And no thats not a a shoulder on the outside, thats a bus lane!

[sonysnob]

Conventional light standards such as those in the photo above are usually breakaway posts, so if they get hit there is a shear point which causes them to fall, minimizing the damage to other vehicles.

[milomilo]

None of the provinces west of Ontario really understand the concept of what a freeway should be and what is important. Highway 2 between Calgary and Edmonton still has a few uncontrolled left turns! The 'freeways' have no different rules or standards really, they are just treated as large roads, and this lack of standards affects the driving - having traffic lights and left turns everywhere on them means that the golden rule of 'keep right' can, and has to be, ignored sometimes. Which leads to people ignoring it all the time.

Other countries have a legal definition of freeways - in France it's Autoroutes, the UK motorways, Germany Autobahns etc. And those roads will be built the entire way to certain standards and will have their own set of rules. In western Canada, everything is piecemeal - your gravel road eventually gets paved and another one put beside it, but they leave in the traffic lights and dangerous left turns. And eventually they might put in an overpass if it's getting really busy.

I was much more impressed with the long distance roads in Newfoundland, they understand more what was important. Rather than have a massive 4 lane divided highway but with dangerous intersections every 1.6km, they might have a 2 lane road but with overpasses only at important places, and no other uncontrolled intersections.

[LucasAnderson]

Originally Posted by milomilo

None of the provinces west of Ontario really understand the concept of what a freeway should be and what is important. Highway 2 between Calgary and Edmonton still has a few uncontrolled left turns! The 'freeways' have no different rules or standards really, they are just treated as large roads, and this lack of standards affects the driving - having traffic lights and left turns everywhere on them means that the golden rule of 'keep right' can, and has to be, ignored sometimes. Which leads to people ignoring it all the time.

Other countries have a legal definition of freeways - in France it's Autoroutes, the UK motorways, Germany Autobahns etc. And those roads will be built the entire way to certain standards and will have their own set of rules. In western Canada, everything is piecemeal - your gravel road eventually gets paved and another one put beside it, but they leave in the traffic lights and dangerous left turns. And eventually they might put in an overpass if it's getting really busy.

I was much more impressed with the long distance roads in Newfoundland, they understand more what was important. Rather than have a massive 4 lane divided highway but with dangerous intersections every 1.6km, they might have a 2 lane road but with overpasses only at important places, and no other uncontrolled intersections.

I agree with you that the construction of a freeway or autobahn should be approached carefully working out all the key points, but you need to take into account that everything is up to the budget and people who understand little of the convenience and safety of driving on such roads.

[milomilo]

It's true, very easy to criticize without remembering the cost. They could do things differently though which wouldn't cost much. IMO, the biggest thing would be to not have every tiny little farm road have its own intersection. Uncontrolled left turns have no place on major roads, it actually surprises me that there aren't more accidents on those, I'm always on edge a little when I have to use one.

If you cut off the majority of those intersections, it wouldn't be too bad to have an overpass every 5 or 10km.