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A-30 Updates

Started by Dr Frankenstein, October 02, 2011, 11:42:51 PM

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vdeane

I think this article or another mentioned something about transponder registration - are the A-30 and A-25 transponders inter-operable, or does Montreal now how two transponders that aren't comparable with each other?
Please note: All comments here represent my own personal opinion and do not reflect the official position of NYSDOT or its affiliates.


Stephane Dumas

One guy already posted a time-lapse video of A-30.

webfil

#52
Quote from: ghYHZ on December 15, 2012, 05:54:02 PM
Quote from: Dr Frankenstein on December 15, 2012, 05:44:36 PM
It is, and I clinched it as soon as I could. :p

I plan to clinch it Boxing Day on the way to Ottawa........and what a pleasure that drive will be now!

Expect heavy traffic between A-20 and R-104, with those humongous shopping centres (Promenades Saint-Bruno and Quartier 10-30) : Not related to the newly opened portion, it is pretty much the case each year, as the road is already nearing capacity between A-10 and A-20.

Anyway, I don't see how giving a hand to urban sprawl will alleviate congestion problems.

vdeane

Simple: through traffic can now bypass downtown Montreal.
Please note: All comments here represent my own personal opinion and do not reflect the official position of NYSDOT or its affiliates.

Duke87

Quote from: webfil on December 16, 2012, 02:01:21 PM
Anyway, I don't see how giving a hand to urban sprawl will alleviate congestion problems.

You're talking about a sizable city where there are farm fields as close as 10 km to downtown. What sprawl?
If you always take the same road, you will never see anything new.

ghYHZ

Quote from: webfil on December 16, 2012, 02:01:21 PM
Quote from: ghYHZ on December 15, 2012, 05:54:02 PM
Quote from: Dr Frankenstein on December 15, 2012, 05:44:36 PM
It is, and I clinched it as soon as I could. :p

I plan to clinch it Boxing Day on the way to Ottawa........and what a pleasure that drive will be now!

Expect heavy traffic between A-20 and R-104, with those humongous shopping centres (Promenades Saint-Bruno and Quartier 10-30)........................

Yes, those Boxing Day crowds.......forgot about that! :)

cpzilliacus

Quote from: Duke87 on December 16, 2012, 05:36:37 PM
Quote from: webfil on December 16, 2012, 02:01:21 PM
Anyway, I don't see how giving a hand to urban sprawl will alleviate congestion problems.

You're talking about a sizable city where there are farm fields as close as 10 km to downtown. What sprawl?

Not quite that close, but there are farm fields just over 18 km from the U.S. Capitol Dome (and inside the Capital Beltway)  in Prince George's County, Maryland.

And in spite of that, traffic on much of the metropolitan Washington highway network is terrible.
Opinions expressed here on AAROADS are strictly personal and mine alone, and do not reflect policies or positions of MWCOG, NCRTPB or their member federal, state, county and municipal governments or any other agency.

Dr Frankenstein

#57
The portion of A-30 between A's 10 and 20 will probably suffer a lot. I don't understand why, as they were repaving it a few years ago, they didn't take the opportunity to upgrade it to 6 lanes. The section around the Boulevard Clairevue interchange in Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville was getting congested daily back in 2008-2009 when I worked there. I can't imagine what it'll be like now that the Montreal bypass is active.

Regarding the video: Daaamn the place name annotations are so off.

Duke87

Quote from: cpzilliacus on December 16, 2012, 07:42:38 PM
Quote from: Duke87 on December 16, 2012, 05:36:37 PM
Quote from: webfil on December 16, 2012, 02:01:21 PM
Anyway, I don't see how giving a hand to urban sprawl will alleviate congestion problems.

You're talking about a sizable city where there are farm fields as close as 10 km to downtown. What sprawl?

Not quite that close, but there are farm fields just over 18 km from the U.S. Capitol Dome (and inside the Capital Beltway)  in Prince George's County, Maryland.

Different. That's a little smattering of farms surrounded by otherwise suburban development. In Montreal's case, go south of Saint-Constant and bam! City vanishes and you're in a rural area. It's actually rather disconcerting when driving - from an American perspective where I'm used to there being a very gradual transition between urban and rural, anyway.

If you always take the same road, you will never see anything new.

haljackey

What's up with the old school toll booths? This is the 21st century.... New roads shouldn't have them.

webfil

Quote from: deanej on December 16, 2012, 04:20:54 PM
Simple: through traffic can now bypass downtown Montreal.

There is not that much through traffic. Studies have shown that the greatest impact will be on A-20 in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, where at most 250 vehicles a day will use A-30 instead. Elsewhere on the island, the impact is minimal, especially downtown (A-15/A-40/Papineau/A-720 grid) : At most, 60 vehicles per day will be removed from the 200k vpd Décarie. It should still raise by 840 vehicles per day on Turcot/Champlain section.

Montréal, especially Saint-Laurent, Dorval and Lachine boroughs, is a turning plate for transportation. A ring road that avoids that area misses the point.

GRUHM, a group of architects and urban planners, have proposed for over 15 years a bonification of the "inner" ring road, A-13, R-138, A-30, A-25 and A-440 : the completion of the 4-kilometre A-730/Mercier bridge missing link and optimization of A-20 between A-13 and R-138 for north-south movements would really have served the current strong demand for transportation in the western part of the Island, but also in the upcoming Laval, Anjou and Brossard industrial centres.

The actual routing of the ring road via Valleyfield and Beauharnois just give a help to housing south of A-30, with psychological effect of a secure and fast road facilitating movements.

Congestion on the island will not be alleviated by ring roads, as there is not that much through traffic, but by enlarging the capacity and fluidity of the on-island roads.

Dr Frankenstein

#61
Toll roads are rare in Canada, and those that exist have non-interoperable tags (we don't have EZPass or anything similar). It works well for local and commuter traffic, but when the toll road is a bypass for through traffic, you have to expect nearly half (or even more) of that traffic to be tag-less.

If you decide to go with toll-by-plate, you have to spend on resources for mailing bills for every non-local motorist that goes through the toll, and processing the payments (or trying to collect late payers) for every account. Most highway agencies decide to tack on processing fees for that. And you need to get agreements with all the DMVs and MoTs in the vincinity to get the motorists' addresses from their plate numbers.

As I said, it works well if the highway has a vast majority of tag traffic, but it's not the case here. The processing fees (usually $5, bumping the toll to $6.50 for ALL non-locals) would drive the traffic away from it and the highway would just not serve its purpose.

And no, travelers won't stop to get a tag. Even if there are no fees. Plus, imagine what the queues at the customer service office would be like if it was the case. Highways are supposed to speed you up, not slow you down.

I would suppose that joining EZPass or creating something similar would be possible, but seeing that neither of 407ETR, A25 and A30Express have done it, something must be keeping them from doing it.

EDIT:
Now, regarding urban sprawl. I agree, urban sprawl is somewhat of an issue, but so is congestion in those suburban areas. And it existed.

I don't know how many people moved out of Montreal to the Southwest in the last 20 years, but there's one thing I could experience first-hand ever since I started driving: Highway 132 had probably exceeded its design capacity long ago. 20 km/h under the limit has almost been the norm between Valleyfield and Châteauguay, and from Saint-Constant to Candiac, it wasn't unusual to get through a signal at the second or third green (this has also been hitting Châteauguay more and more frequently within the last 24 months, with an unpredictable pattern to boot). I don't know what the AADTs, both actual and designed, are; I'm speaking from experience here. I live in Beauharnois and my travel times to Vaudreuil or Delson have been nearly cut in half since the highway opened, for a theoretical speed limit increase of 10 km/h, and a reduction in travel distance of maybe... 10% or less? Going to downtown Châteauguay took 20 minutes in 6 PM traffic (usually doing 75 in almost the entire 90 km/h stretch, + signals and stops). Now it takes 8 minutes.

Sure, Hwy 132 could have been upgraded through the region instead of building a brand new freeway. Beauharnois would certainly have needed a bypass since the highway is currently routed through the crowded (and full of stops) Ellice/St-Laurent couplet. Boulevard René-Lévesque (132) in Châteauguay is okay if you don't mind the signals and stops; Saint-Jean-Baptiste (132/138) is probably nearing capacity though. Completing Chemin Saint-Bernard (an unfinished 4-lane connector to the Mercier Bridge) would have been great, but don't expect the natives in Kahnawà:ke to agree. The urban boulevard through Saint-Constant/Sainte-Catherine/Delson/Candiac was visibly at or above capacity before the bypass came around (it was on my commute back when I worked in Saint-Bruno; my average speed on that section was around 30 km/h, and dipping below on bad days).

But upgrading Highway 132 would have been a costly thing, and then you'd still need money to upgrade the highways throughout the City, which I hope will happen as well no matter what. To be honest, it was one or other, and the loser would still rot in traffic.

vdeane

I think it's interesting that A-25 and A-30 aren't inter-operable with each other.  Also, if they have a tag, it would have been nice to have ORT lanes with the booths on the outside (similar to the setup in places like Florida or the Woodbury barrier on the Thruway), but maybe they don't want to set up a violation system either.

I wonder if Canadian privacy laws have anything to do with this.  Someone from Ontario told me that ON 407 can't bill cars outside of Ontario for this reason, and Doug never did get a bill from A-25 as far as I know.

As for the need of the road, I think the people talking about how their trips will be an hour shorter and the amount of trucks that were in Beauharnois speaks for itself.
Please note: All comments here represent my own personal opinion and do not reflect the official position of NYSDOT or its affiliates.

Dr Frankenstein

Quote from: deanej on December 17, 2012, 03:38:24 PMI wonder if Canadian privacy laws have anything to do with this.  Someone from Ontario told me that ON 407 can't bill cars outside of Ontario for this reason, and Doug never did get a bill from A-25 as far as I know.

I think it used to be true. I remember my parents getting no bill from 407ETR back in 2005... but now they have signs saying "Non-Ontario plates will be billed", and sure enough, I get billed every time.

Transportfan

This freeway should have been numbered as A-20 and the present 20 through Ile perrot and the West Island renumbered 720. That would make 20 seem that much more continuous as the second main route through the Montreal area. The present on-island routing of 20 just doesn't even function as a through-traffic highway at all.

Dr Frankenstein

That's what I have on my fictional renumbering plan too. But sadly, it is fictional.

AsphaltPlanet

Not that it means anything, but the 2011 Mapart Montreal atlas shows the proposed freeway alignment of A-20 on Ile-Perot.  I don't know when this road will be constructed (and Mapart tends to be eager to show proposed roads), but to my knowledge this is the first time the new alignment has been shown on a map.
AsphaltPlanet.ca  Youtube -- Opinions expressed reflect the viewpoints of others.

Dr Frankenstein

Really? I'll look on mine.

It also shows the new alignment of Hwy 236 as a completed road (or is it only in the 2012?). It opened less than a week ago.

webfil

A tunnel?!?!  :eyebrow:

WTF is that sh*t? That canal has not seen a ship in a zillion years! It's not even navigable!!

I thought they would fill out the b*tch and save a couple of bucks by building a single overpass for R-338.

How are they going to maintain the whole thing? How a friggin' tunnel is supposed to be the best way to cross an abandoned canal?

Dr Frankenstein

#69
If I recall correctly, it was for environmental reasons. Something about an ecosystem in the canal.

(Could also be the mobs... who knows?)

EDIT: Turns out I'm wrong. There would be a serious project about reopening the canal.
Newspaper article (French)

NA30 Newsletter article in English
NA30 Newsletter article in French

Alps

Too bad we haven't seen the first Autoroute with a drawbridge.

ghYHZ

Quote from: Dr Frankenstein on December 20, 2012, 04:00:14 PM
EDIT: Turns out I'm wrong. There would be a serious project about reopening the canal.
[

There's certainly potential for reopening the Soulanges when you look at what was done just down river at the Lachine Canal.......and it lay dormant for 40 years.

http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/lhn-nhs/qc/canallachine/natcul.aspx


webfil

I wonder why they build pillars for R-201 Monseigneur-Langlois bridge right in the middle of the canal and added a new dyke like two years ago, then...

Dr Frankenstein


webfil

#74
I expected much better signage for tolls than those VMS. They still sign it 3 times in advance, though I prefer the pictogrammatic signs with 4-digit VMS in them, which make the thing easier to read ―or at least more intuitive― than a whole VMS crammed full with 3 whole lines of text.

Those lineups at the barrier with only one lane closed are a great incentive towards buying a transponder.



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