Disappearing Control Cities

[KCRoadFan]

You travel miles on one particular roadway and you are following a specific control city and after so many hours of driving it changes over to another location with the original one not even mentioned anymore.  I had it happen on I-70 in Missouri.

First you see St. Louis from as far back as the Kansas junction of I-435 with it being pull through on I-70 into KC.  It appears at many places in Metro KC, but after you leave the metro area, the mileage signs on I-70 E Bound favor Columbia as control point.  Then several miles later Columbia disappears completely with still a long ways to go to get to it.

Missouri has always been hit-and-miss on control cities. I-70, I-44 and I-55 frequently drop St. Louis in favor of an intermediate city (Springfield, Rolla, Cape Girardeau). It forces you to do some mental math whenever you do see a St. Louis mileage sign and add it to the next milepost.

As someone who has driven across Missouri many, many times on I-70, here's my mental shortcut for St. Louis: just subtract the current mile marker from 250.

[KCRoadFan]

Rolla shouldn't be used at all in my opinion. Nobody cares about Rolla.

Except, perhaps, Missouri S&T students heading back there after a trip to St. Louis for a Cardinals game, or any other reason...

[Road Hog]

You travel miles on one particular roadway and you are following a specific control city and after so many hours of driving it changes over to another location with the original one not even mentioned anymore.  I had it happen on I-70 in Missouri.

First you see St. Louis from as far back as the Kansas junction of I-435 with it being pull through on I-70 into KC.  It appears at many places in Metro KC, but after you leave the metro area, the mileage signs on I-70 E Bound favor Columbia as control point.  Then several miles later Columbia disappears completely with still a long ways to go to get to it.

Missouri has always been hit-and-miss on control cities. I-70, I-44 and I-55 frequently drop St. Louis in favor of an intermediate city (Springfield, Rolla, Cape Girardeau). It forces you to do some mental math whenever you do see a St. Louis mileage sign and add it to the next milepost.

As someone who has driven across Missouri many, many times on I-70, here's my mental shortcut for St. Louis: just subtract the current mile marker from 250.

And do the same from 200 coming up I-55.

[SkyPesos]

As someone who has driven across Missouri many, many times on I-70, here's my mental shortcut for St. Louis: just subtract the current mile marker from 250.

The subtract from 250 rule also works for I-71 in OH, and probably some other highways as well. I-65 IN is close, it's 260 mi in the state.

[KCRoadFan]

As someone who has driven across Missouri many, many times on I-70, here's my mental shortcut for St. Louis: just subtract the current mile marker from 250.

The subtract from 250 rule also works for I-71 in OH, and probably some other highways as well. I-65 IN is close, it's 260 mi in the state.

And along I-70 in Ohio, for the distance to Columbus, subtract from 100 if coming from the west, and subtract 100 from the mile marker if approaching from the east.

[ozarkman417]

Rolla shouldn't be used at all in my opinion. Nobody cares about Rolla.

Except, perhaps, Missouri S&T students heading back there after a trip to St. Louis for a Cardinals game, or any other reason...

If we are going to use colleges as a reason to set a control city, Springfield (which would replace Rolla as a WB control city between Rolla and St. Louis) should be used instead. It has Missouri State University (MSU), in addition to the smaller, private Drury and Evangel Universities.

Missouri S&T, as of fall 2020, had just over 7.6k students enrolled, a significant percentage of the town's total population, yet a fraction of MSU's enrollment. That said, why I have "or any other reason" in bold is that a few of my friends (none of which care for the Cardinals) will be attending Missouri S&T, and as such I'll likely be visiting Rolla on a regular basis, starting in a few months.

[SkyPesos]

Rolla shouldn't be used at all in my opinion. Nobody cares about Rolla.

Except, perhaps, Missouri S&T students heading back there after a trip to St. Louis for a Cardinals game, or any other reason...

If we are going to use colleges as a reason to set a control city, Springfield (which would replace Rolla as a WB control city between Rolla and St. Louis) should be used instead. It has Missouri State University (MSU), in addition to the smaller, private Drury and Evangel Universities.

Missouri S&T, as of fall 2020, had just over 7.6k students enrolled, a significant percentage of the town's total population, yet a fraction of MSU's enrollment. That said, why I have "or any other reason" in bold is that a few of my friends (none of which care for the Cardinals) will be attending Missouri S&T, and as such I'll likely be visiting Rolla on a regular basis, starting in a few months.

Springfield isn't used in the St Louis area due to proximity to Springfield, IL; that's one reason why Tulsa is used instead in the first place. As for when to switch out Tulsa to Springfield, probably in Rolla, if we're getting rid of Rolla.

As for MoDOT's constant switching of control cities, I hate it too. They have been using Wentzville as an I-70 WB control city in St Charles in new sign installations (most of them are full APL signs, which imo are a waste and partial APLs should've been used, but that's another topic), after it has all been Kansas City in the past, and KC is still used in St Louis County.

[ozarkman417]

Rolla shouldn't be used at all in my opinion. Nobody cares about Rolla.

Except, perhaps, Missouri S&T students heading back there after a trip to St. Louis for a Cardinals game, or any other reason...

If we are going to use colleges as a reason to set a control city, Springfield (which would replace Rolla as a WB control city between Rolla and St. Louis) should be used instead. It has Missouri State University (MSU), in addition to the smaller, private Drury and Evangel Universities.

Missouri S&T, as of fall 2020, had just over 7.6k students enrolled, a significant percentage of the town's total population, yet a fraction of MSU's enrollment. That said, why I have "or any other reason" in bold is that a few of my friends (none of which care for the Cardinals) will be attending Missouri S&T, and as such I'll likely be visiting Rolla on a regular basis, starting in a few months.

Springfield isn't used in the St Louis area due to proximity to Springfield, IL; that's one reason why Tulsa is used instead in the first place. As for when to switch out Tulsa to Springfield, probably in Rolla, if we're getting rid of Rolla.

As for MoDOT's constant switching of control cities, I hate it too. They have been using Wentzville as an I-70 WB control city in St Charles in new sign installations (most of them are full APL signs, which imo are a waste and partial APLs should've been used, but that's another topic), after it has all been Kansas City in the past, and KC is still used in St Louis County.

MoDOT could use a Postal style abbreviation (like it already does on I-270 as it approaches I-44).. until a certain exit. Besides, MoDOT doesn't use Rolla until at MO 141 anyways (which is where Springfield would take over at the very earliest). I personally haven't seen Springfield, IL be used as a control city within a (un)reasonable distance of that point given how far west of I-55 MO 141 at I-44 is.

[wanderer2575]

At the risk of stirring up another "this shouldn't be a control city in the first place" argument, I'll mention northbound I-275 in Michigan.  For all of its length, its control city is Flint.  When westbound I-96 joins it, Lansing is added as a second control.  But at the I-696 interchange where I-275 terminates, Flint disappears and Lansing is shown as the only control for I-96 west.  At least from I-275 (not the other legs of the interchange), Flint should still be a second control city.  (There is a single supplemental "Flint / Follow I-96 West" sign but IMO that's not sufficient.)

[mrsman]

From the Port of Long Beach all the way up to just before the 60, the 710's northbound control city is Pasadena, yet just past the 60, when you are still many miles from Pasadena and the way to get there is very much uncertain, the northbound control city on BGS's for the 710 north unceremoniously changes to Valley Blvd, with no further mention of Pasadena except for one reference at the gore point on the 10 interchange lanes that to get to Pasadena you need to transition to the 10 east.  And because Pasadena disappears from signs several miles before that, there is no advance warning that you need to be over to the far right and get on the 10 east to get to Pasadena.  And that right lane tends to back up quite a bit.

And once you're on the 10 east, there is no further mention of Pasadena.  There used to be a sign directing you to use Fremont Ave, but it's long been gone.

If you take the 710 all the way to its terminus at Valley Blvd, there are no signs there telling you which direction to go on Valley Blvd to get closer to Pasadena.

I know I mentioned this on some relevant thread in Pacific Southwest, but I believe a lot of that is purposeful.  Since no truck-friendly freeway route exists to Pasadena, they specifically don't sign a way to get there, so that no one surface street becomes the preferred way or reaching Pasadena.  Caltrans does not want the blame for directing an interstate's worth of traffic onto any one given surface street.

The most direct ways of reaching Pasadena are either 710 N to 10 E to Fremont Ave N or 710 N to Valley Blvd E to Fremont Ave N.  But depending upon where in Pasadena you are heading to, another surface street parallel to Fremont (like Atlantic or Garfield) may be better for you.  Also, other ways of getting into the Pasadena general area could involve taking I-5 north to either CA-110 (but no trucks allowed) or CA-2 (great freeway but heading to Pasadena would involve a lot of backtracking this way).

FWIW, Caltrans does provide one additional piece of Pasadena signage.  As you mentioned following the control city will lead you to I-10 east.  While many would probably take Fremont or Atlantic (especially if headed to Old Town Pasadena), it seems that Caltrans recommends Pasadena traffic to take Rosemead Blvd.

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0720178,-118.0821883,3a,37.5y,100.7h,84.73t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sOSin8njj5jlWAy89B9vjMA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

I think this is done because Rosemead was/is state highway CA-19, so at least in some respects better able to handle heavier traffic.  But it leads to the very eastern edge of Pasadena.

Regardless of all of this, most people seem to be using Fremont.  Once you exit I-10 at Fremont, you get a helpful sign for South Pasadena, but it's not on the freeway itself.  Then, unfortunately the next sign only tells you Monterey Park or Alhambra, with no specific guidance to South Pasadena.  The offramp's configuration is confusing enough that the signage shoud be less confuising and more consistent.

[roadman65]

Rolla shouldn't be used at all in my opinion. Nobody cares about Rolla.

Except, perhaps, Missouri S&T students heading back there after a trip to St. Louis for a Cardinals game, or any other reason...

If we are going to use colleges as a reason to set a control city, Springfield (which would replace Rolla as a WB control city between Rolla and St. Louis) should be used instead. It has Missouri State University (MSU), in addition to the smaller, private Drury and Evangel Universities.

Missouri S&T, as of fall 2020, had just over 7.6k students enrolled, a significant percentage of the town's total population, yet a fraction of MSU's enrollment. That said, why I have "or any other reason" in bold is that a few of my friends (none of which care for the Cardinals) will be attending Missouri S&T, and as such I'll likely be visiting Rolla on a regular basis, starting in a few months.

Springfield isn't used in the St Louis area due to proximity to Springfield, IL; that's one reason why Tulsa is used instead in the first place. As for when to switch out Tulsa to Springfield, probably in Rolla, if we're getting rid of Rolla.

As for MoDOT's constant switching of control cities, I hate it too. They have been using Wentzville as an I-70 WB control city in St Charles in new sign installations (most of them are full APL signs, which imo are a waste and partial APLs should've been used, but that's another topic), after it has all been Kansas City in the past, and KC is still used in St Louis County.

Copy InDOT and use the state name in addition. That is why Columbus, OH was used for I-70 east from Indy to avoid confusion with nearby Columbus, Indiana.

Then Jackson, Miss is used for I-55 south out of Memphis, as I-40 east also heads to Jackson, Tennessee from Memphis.

[roadman65]

https://goo.gl/maps/ypMxWAv1wBYUAYeJ8

Lewistown for US 322 west from Harrisburg now got rewritten to State College.

https://goo.gl/maps/oRPyznnDX7z8vvj5A

https://www.aaroads.com/pa/083/i-083_nb_exit_046_06.jpg