Austin access roads discussion (moved from Formula 1 thread)

[JAM]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Agreed.

Perhaps they'll extend the urban rail route past the airport to the site? That wouldn't just be a good idea, it'd be a great one.

I'm having troubles thinking this would be done. Austin can hardly justify rail in its densest areas. How could the costs of extending rail to the country ever by justified?

[Spaceman]

Austin's "weirdness", which is as passe' as a Nehru jacket, probably won't be affected by road extensions. Build the roads DAMMIT....A city goes up or it falls....It doesn't hover in one place. Newton proved that with an apple.

[austlar1]

Originally Posted by Spaceman

Austin's "weirdness", which is as passe' as a Nehru jacket, probably won't be affected by road extensions. Build the roads DAMMIT....A city goes up or it falls....It doesn't hover in one place. Newton proved that with an apple.

I wasn't really suggesting that roads should not be built to keep Austin weird. It is more that roads get built in some pretty weird ways in our fair city. Frequently they get about half way built and then left in that state until some money shows up to finish the job, like the stimulus money getting spent now to finish out freeway interchanges that should have been built whole in the first place.

[M1EK]

Originally Posted by austlar1

I wasn't really suggesting that roads should not be built to keep Austin weird. It is more that roads get built in some pretty weird ways in our fair city. Frequently they get about half way built and then left in that state until some money shows up to finish the job, like the stimulus money getting spent now to finish out freeway interchanges that should have been built whole in the first place.

If we didn't have frontage roads on all our highways, the cost of upgrading interchanges would be 1-10% as high as it ends up being with the 5-level monstrosities. There's a whole set of enhancements that we basically rule ourselves out of because we love dem frontage roads so much.

So when you're looking at those stub ramps, blame all the freeway frontage sprawl.

[austlar1]

Well, MiEK, you won't get any argument from me about frontage roads. They create an ugly landscape, take up too much room, and make everything cost more. It is nice that we can agree on something for a change.

[Scott Wood]

Originally Posted by Spaceman

Austin's "weirdness", which is as passe' as a Nehru jacket, probably won't be affected by road extensions. Build the roads DAMMIT....A city goes up or it falls....It doesn't hover in one place. Newton proved that with an apple.

The city is going to grow -- but I'd rather it grow up and in than out. Build good rail and run good buses and build good, dense, urban infill DAMMIT.

[Downtown_Austin]

Originally Posted by Scott Wood

The city is going to grow -- but I'd rather it grow up and in than out. Build good rail and run good buses and build good, dense, urban infill DAMMIT.

You sir, deserve a beer on the house.

[DougRockstead]

I just gotta ask. I've read your posts for years and this is the second time I've seen you make the comment regarding frontage roads. Sooo

The questions are as follows (and please do me the courtesy of answering before expanding on your response):

#1) do you have or have you ever had a driver license and if so when?
#2) Do you actually drive a car? I can't think of any sane rational person that has to travel by car that would want to travel the highways without frontage roads.

Originally Posted by M1EK

If we didn't have frontage roads on all our highways, the cost of upgrading interchanges would be 1-10% as high as it ends up being with the 5-level monstrosities. There's a whole set of enhancements that we basically rule ourselves out of because we love dem frontage roads so much.

So when you're looking at those stub ramps, blame all the freeway frontage sprawl.

[Scott Wood]

Originally Posted by DougRockstead

I just gotta ask. I've read your posts for years and this is the second time I've seen you make the comment regarding frontage roads. Sooo

The questions are as follows (and please do me the courtesy of answering before expanding on your response):

#1) do you have or have you ever had a driver license and if so when?
#2) Do you actually drive a car? I can't think of any sane rational person that has to travel by car that would want to travel the highways without frontage roads.

Wow, someone has a different opinion of something than you implies they're etiher not "sane [and] rational", or have no experience of the subject matter -- as if driving is the only way to be affected by these things (or that the only drivers that matter are the ones on the highway)... Freeway frontage roads tend to be awful for pedestrians, bicycles, and transit, and they influence development patterns in what I consider a bad way.

FWIW, even when driving, I don't like frontage roads.

Too much weaving between cars trying to get on the highway, cars trying to get off (at high speeds with no traffic-light-induced grouping, often trying to quickly get to the right lane to turn, or sometimes even to avoid being forced to turn left), and cars trying to come out of a parking lot or side street.

Too hard to go the "wrong" direction for the side you're on, especially when there's a large distance between crossings, and no nearby parallel normal streets (or no access to a parallel street from the highway-fronting parking lot you're exiting).

Too much congestion caused by combining highway access traffic, local arterial traffic, and traffic trying to get from one side of the highway to the other that would more likely have had a direct crossing if the frontage road weren't there. Said crossings would be an increased cost; not sure how it balances with the cost of the complications frontage roads bring when freeways meet (plus the cost of having the frontage roads in the first place), from a purely financial perspective. But from a non-financial perspective I'd much rather have those extra crossings.

I've lived -- and driven -- in places where freeways don't have frontage roads. It works just fine, or at least not worse than here. I don't see how jamming in an arterial straddling each freeway would have improved things.

[hookem]

Originally Posted by DougRockstead

I just gotta ask. I've read your posts for years and this is the second time I've seen you make the comment regarding frontage roads. Sooo

The questions are as follows (and please do me the courtesy of answering before expanding on your response):

#1) do you have or have you ever had a driver license and if so when?
#2) Do you actually drive a car? I can't think of any sane rational person that has to travel by car that would want to travel the highways without frontage roads.

I consider myself sane and rational, and I strongly dislike driving the poorly designed highways w/frontage roads that seem to plague only (or mostly) our state.

I would much prefer to drive on a freeway that actually takes me to a destination -- like puts me on a major arterial, or inside a suburb, etc. Instead, I've got an exit every 500 feet because of the stupid access road and the crappy linear business sprawl it creates. So if I actually want to get from the freeway sprawl to SOMEWHERE (like an actual destination), I've got to dodge cars coming out of the business entrances/exits every 100 ft... I've got to cut across 3 lanes, then sit at a light, or make a U Turn because 1/2 of the businesses are not even accessible on my side of the freeway...

I guess one might not notice the problem if you've never driven somewhere with a good highway that actually takes you to a PLACE, not just the side of the road... and while you are on the highway, doesn't bother you with useless exits/entrances to nowhere every 500 feet, so you can actually travel at a good rate of speed without having to deal with people merging constantly.

So my questions to you would be -

1) Have you ever left the state, and if so, have you ever actually driven in another state?
2) Ever wonder why most other states don't have frontage roads? Do you think it's just the brilliance of highway designers here in TX?

[M1EK]

Thanks, you two, you pretty much covered it - except for the last piece, which is that there's a whole range of intermediate capacity improvements for interchanges which are precluded by frontage roads (once an interchange with frontage roads gets too congested, you have to go to the most expensive solution possible - multilevel flyovers). And intersections with frontage roads fairly quickly reach a degraded condition - like 183/360 or 183/Braker in NW Austin much of the day - where there is literally nothing you can do other than bulldoze the whole area (thus removing the need for the traffic in the first place, I guess).

[ATXboom]

Doug... have you ever driven on a freeway outside of Texas?

Ever notice how all texas freeways look like mexican freeways with endless strip malls strung along them.

Not only do they drive ugly development, they also double the cost of typical freeway construction.

Without access roads - think of Dallas North Tollway through the city... its a beautiful drive and it functions pretty well for handling a so much. Think of Mopac from 2222 to the river... tree lined/home lined... the traffic bog downs are due to 2 lane through put at the river that's 20 years outdated.

[JAM]

IMO - Mopac looks good due to the absence of bill boards, not the absence of access roads. There is plenty of strip malls along Mopac, just no bill boards.

Gee, I always thought access roads were a good idea to keep traffic moving and in a city like Houston there is no way the city could function w/o out them. I can't say that I've been to every city in the U.S., but the ones I have been to that don't have access roads have sheet for roads, just outdated junk from the 80's, with cloverleaf designs so no comparison there.

People expect to move 80MPH thru the city, as if they were in the country. Really, if you can move 45MPH thru the city non-stop, your doing pretty darn good. The reason its so hard to navigate down the freeway isn't due to the access roads, its due to the accholes on the roads.

[hookem]

Originally Posted by JAM

IMO - Mopac looks good due to the absence of bill boards, not the absence of access roads. There is plenty of strip malls along Mopac, just no bill boards.

No! The section of Mopac that doesn't have access roads (just south of 2222 to Lake Austin) DOESN'T have strip malls alongside it. Look in google earth if you don't ever drive that area.

Farther north or south, where there are access roads, there is the inevitable adjacent linear business sprawl. But the stretch ATXboom was referring to, no strip malls. The back of some residential along the side of the road, yes.. but no strip malls. How could there be? You couldn't get to them without exiting on something like 35th or 45th then driving inside the neighborhood, only to turn back outside and drive up to next to the highway, and do the whole thing in reverse when leaving. Who would do that? No one. See how that works? So instead they just have the retail inside the neighborhoods -- where it belongs, where it can actually be accessed by the residents even if they don't drive a car.

I can't say that I've been to every city in the U.S., but the ones I have been to that don't have access roads have sheet for roads, just outdated junk from the 80's, with cloverleaf designs so no comparison there.

Couldn't disagree more. I'm not sure what states you are referring to, but most places I've ever been to, even the highways built in the 60s-80s work much better than the even the brand new stuff TxDOT builds. There are reasons TxDOT is considered the most corrupt agency in the state; it hands out billions of dollars to build highways that are worth *maybe* millions.

Really, if you can move 45MPH thru the city non-stop, your doing pretty darn good.

And this is exactly what you'll find on well designed, access-road free highways in other states... during rush hour (it's faster than 45 otherwise!). Constant moving traffic, because of FAR fewer entrance/egress issues caused by access roads and the linear sprawl they create.

Plus they are much nicer visually! Billboards or not, it's nice to have some landscaping right on the side of highway, instead of another 300 ft of concrete, strip malls and trash.

[ATXboom]

The worst part about access roads is that they are the life blood of suburban sprawl... they de-promote density...

Think Mueller would have unfolded like it has if there were no access roads on I-35?

[austlar1]

Originally Posted by JAM

IMO - Mopac looks good due to the absence of bill boards, not the absence of access roads. There is plenty of strip malls along Mopac, just no bill boards.

Gee, I always thought access roads were a good idea to keep traffic moving and in a city like Houston there is no way the city could function w/o out them. I can't say that I've been to every city in the U.S., but the ones I have been to that don't have access roads have sheet for roads, just outdated junk from the 80's, with cloverleaf designs so no comparison there.

People expect to move 80MPH thru the city, as if they were in the country. Really, if you can move 45MPH thru the city non-stop, your doing pretty darn good. The reason its so hard to navigate down the freeway isn't due to the access roads, its due to the accholes on the roads.

Well, Los Angeles, the Bay Area, and the DC area freeways for the most part do not have any access roads, and those are some pretty impressive roads in my opinion. There is also a lot more commercial development along nearby arterials, frequently in node like developments that are frankly more pleasant environments than the mega parking lot squalor of most service road developments.

[JAM]

Originally Posted by hookem

No! The section of Mopac that doesn't have access roads (just south of 2222 to Lake Austin) DOESN'T have strip malls alongside it. Look in google earth if you don't ever drive that area.

Know it ALL TOO well. Plenty of pseudo access roads in that area, if you don't believe me, sit their in rush hour traffic and watch people use them to cheat their way around parked traffic.

Originally Posted by hookem

Farther north or south, where there are access roads, there is the inevitable adjacent linear business sprawl. But the stretch ATXboom was referring to, no strip malls.

Agreed, but still not ugly like 35. Its the bill boards (and landscaping)

Originally Posted by hookem

Couldn't disagree more. I'm not sure what states you are referring to, but most places I've ever been to, even the highways built in the 60s-80s work much better than the even the brand new stuff TxDOT builds. There are reasons TxDOT is considered the most corrupt agency in the state; it hands out billions of dollars to build highways that are worth *maybe* millions.

And this is exactly what you'll find on well designed, access-road free highways in other states... during rush hour (it's faster than 45 otherwise!). Constant moving traffic, because of FAR fewer entrance/egress issues caused by access roads and the linear sprawl they create.

Try BW8 in Houston sometime, plenty of access roads, no merging problems - they work fantastic. I-35 issues are due to antiquated designs and patch work from the past. I-10 is good too.

[JAM]

Originally Posted by Spaceman

Isn't this thread about Formula 1 coming to Austin???? How did it evolve into a discussion about access roads?

Apparently the only thing related anyone could find to discuss was roads, which are always good for some vigorous discussion. And this site is is supposed to be about skyscrapers, go figure. Maybe you could find some new news to contribute to get us lost souls back on "track".

Here's a little news:

Formula One raced into City Council chambers in an unexpected way last week, with a council member making the rare step of reconsidering an item after its passage, over fears the city unwittingly locked itself into a water/wastewater agreement with the racing giant.... Moments after the council's agenda passed on consent, Bill Spelman moved to reconsider the innocuous-sounding Item 4, an Austin Water service extension request to run pipes out to a plot of land owned by Wandering Creek Investments in Elroy, located in south Travis County, just south of Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. Spel­man made the motion in light of "surprising" and "disturbing" information he pieced together on the dais: that the plot is under discussions to house the Formula One racetrack.

Noting that no disclaimer or map was included in council backup, Spelman asked Rudy Garza, assistant city manager over Austin Water, for answers. "Clearly everyone knows this is the F1 racetrack," Garza began. "I did not know that, Rudy," said an obviously disgruntled Spelman. However, Garza noted, the agreement – wherein the developer would build $4.4 million worth of pipes and infrastructure that would be reimbursed by the city, which ostensibly recoups its costs through new water and wastewater sales – only applied to an existing 2008 agreement for single-family residential development, not a racetrack, and any change to the agreement had to be run by council. "So, what we did, minutes ago, was not approve any service to the F1 racetrack," Spelman clarified. The item then passed again, unanimously.

However, with the debate over F1 racing still raging, especially in regard to how much public subsidy the sport should receive, Spelman worries council "set a precedent to run pipes out to the same place for a different purpose," he told the Chronicle afterward, in effect "giving the F1 people an argument" for future service, conceivably under the same reimbursable terms. Moreover, the fact that the potential F1 overlap wasn't made clear to council, leaving some council members in the dark and others in the loop

http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/story?oid=oid%3A1068553

[DougRockstead]

@ Scottwood, hoomem, M1ek and ATXBoom

ok. originally I posed the question to M1EK, but since you others decided to dive in...

I'll be more than glad to answer my question as soon as each of you answer my two original questions, and I'll be more than glad to expound upon it. However just like I suspected, people are eager to speak their opinion, but when a motive is suspected, and called out the questions are not answered.

Soooo... since I asked first and you others decided to dive in... I'm waiting...

Originally Posted by ATXboom

Doug... have you ever driven on a freeway outside of Texas?

Ever notice how all texas freeways look like mexican freeways with endless strip malls strung along them.

Not only do they drive ugly development, they also double the cost of typical freeway construction.

Without access roads - think of Dallas North Tollway through the city... its a beautiful drive and it functions pretty well for handling a so much. Think of Mopac from 2222 to the river... tree lined/home lined... the traffic bog downs are due to 2 lane through put at the river that's 20 years outdated.

[M1EK]

Originally Posted by DougRockstead

@ Scottwood, hoomem, M1ek and ATXBoom

ok. originally I posed the question to M1EK, but since you others decided to dive in...

I'll be more than glad to answer my question as soon as each of you answer my two original questions, and I'll be more than glad to expound upon it. However just like I suspected, people are eager to speak their opinion, but when a motive is suspected, and called out the questions are not answered.

Soooo... since I asked first and you others decided to dive in... I'm waiting...

Doug, I skipped your questions because they were ludicrous ad-hominems. But in the interest of getting you to move on:

1. I have a license and have had one since 1988. I live in central Austin and work out by Westlake High. Previous offices at older jobs were on the 183 or 360 corridors.
2. I drive to work every single day now -- I had to give up biking to work a couple years ago after my chronic reactive arthritis rose to a new plateau where if I overdid it, I couldn't walk the next day. Even when I biked to work frequently, I still drove often as well - the longest I ever went without driving to work was a 2 week stretch when my car was in the shop. Commutes to work have involved Mopac, 183, 360 over the years; I-95 in South Florida as well.

Happy? You don't have to be against car-dependence or suburban sprawl to be against frontage roads, although it helps. They suck even if you're a suburban car-lover; they reduce the capacity of the freeway itself.