Regional Boards > Great Lakes and Ohio Valley
Minnesota Notes
Coelacanth:
--- Quote from: flowmotion on May 19, 2012, 04:57:59 AM ---I will miss that old-school I-694/MN 51 interchange though.
--- End quote ---
You should be missing it now. It's already effectively gone.
Mdcastle:
I've notice Mn/DOT added two traffic lights on MN 7 at MN 100, and now is taking them out at Louisiana and Woodale. And on MN 13 taking out a light at 101 and adding one at Quentin. I drive 13 several times a week because it's between my house and my parents house and Valleyfair, and the single lane for adding the light at Quentin really ties things up to the point I use the Ferry Bridge if it's rush hour. I told my sister what they were doing and she's like "gotta keep the workers busy somehow I guess".
[/rant]
Anyway, a few notes:
Two more business route signage variations on the big green signs on the Willmar bypass. A white 71 shield with business in the top part of the shield, and "Business 71" spelled out. The cutout shields are faded but still there, as is the other nonstandard set. The "294" shields have finally been removed from the big green signs now that the route is years defunct, they didn't replace the signs, there's a non-faded patch where they used to be.
Paynesville bypass is almost done. The concrete on the bypass is finished and they're doing the asphalt tie-in to the old road on the south end. I was stopped taking pictures at one of the side road crossings and an old couple pulled over and asked if I needed any help. Another guy saw me in Wilmar and asked "what I saw down there". I said I was "taking pictures" as a non-sequitor and left.
The old Sauk Rapids bridge they saved the abutment on the Sauk Rapids side and it's an overlook now, the old road grade has ornamental lumineires and trees and stuff along the trails.
MN 361 is gone from the new highway maps. A vending machine at the St. Cloud rest stop said basically "get rid of your dollar coins here". I remember in 2008 Six Flags Great Adventure had lockers that only took dollar coins, with a vending machine nearby to change bills for coins. My thought was they try to force a politically correct coin that we don't want on us and it gets reduced to the level of a Chuck-E-Cheese token.
Concrete paving was going down on the westbound US 10 lanes between Clear Lake and Big Lake. I remember this stretch as being especially bad. A few FYAs and LED luminaires in Big Lake.
Apparently people don't know what a double white lines means, so the built a concrete wall between the mainline I-94 and traffic coming from the southbound to eastbound loop of 101. I'm happy most of the lights are gone of 101 because it was always aggravating getting behind underpowered vehicles pulling boats coming to or from the north woods.
MN 23 is stripped down to bare earth east of MN 95.
I've decided I like the new bare galvanized signals. They're not as nice as the all black painted ones D1 likes to use, but the green-yellow-silver the rest of the state used looks ugly to me now even before they fade and rust. I guess someone from Iowa DOT, which has used galvanazed for years took a job with Mn/DOT and was influential in the change. Mn/DOT buys most of their lights and signal poles from a company called Millerbend Mfg in Winsted, so they had to switch production to galvanized steel for signals.
Mdcastle:
They're getting ready to open the new eastbound mainline bridge over MN 13 at the junction with County 101. The paving is done and the barricades are being removed, MN 13 is closed and they're paving the junction with the eastbound ramps.
Stephane Dumas:
A bit off-topic, Google maps updated their satellite imagery showing a more recent picture of the US-169/I-494 interchange reconstruction. http://goo.gl/maps/M9EJ
on_wisconsin:
Just digging around the MnDOT site and came across something interesting, they offer free monthly web seminars called Traffic Topics. Including very road geeky subjects such as last months "What's New in the 2011 AASHTO Green Book".
Check it out: http://www.dot.state.mn.us/trafficeng/topics/index.html
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