What would be your area's "Carmageddon"?

[texaskdog]

Worth $4 to get molested by TSA?

[1995hoo]

Worth $4 to get molested by [the] TSA?

Not to me, but CNN reports that the flights sold out very quickly.

[thenetwork]

It won't be that bad now that Jet Blue is running non-stop flights between Burbank and Long Beach for $4 this weekend.

Sounds like a promotion you'd hear on the old Rowan & Martin's Laugh In. 
[Gary Owens]  Hey Long Beach, now you can fly non-stop to Beautiful Downtown Burbank! [/Gary Owens]

[english si]

(The shortest scheduled flight in the world is by BA affiliate Loganair from Westray to Papa Westray in the Orkney Islands. It takes all of about two minutes. The pilot looks across the strait to check the wind direction at the destination "airport"–which is in fact a beach–before taking off.)

The pilot would need good eyesight to do that! Seeing a windsock at the distance of 1.7 miles is quite hard.

What gets me is that there are two passenger ferries, and a lift on vehicle ferry between the two islands, so what's the point of a plane flight. IIRC, the smaller Papa Westray (pop ~70) has the primary school, and Westray (pop ~560) has the secondary school, so there used to be some people who went to school in a plane, but I don't know now (the ferry would be cheaper and nearer for most people on the islands, and the schools) as the children that did it would be either at the school on their island, or not at school at all now. When they did, as the flight was only twice daily, the three of them took up a third of the seats.

a video.

Oh, and neither airport is a beach - that's Barra - these are gravel runways on airfields.

Back on topic, I guess the M25 closing would cause a nightmare, but the places where it really does screw up the works via a lack of redundancy (eg western Surrey, crossing the Thames) are already snarled up anyway, so it's doubly bad.

[Dougtone]

In Albany, we're about to witness our own Carmageddon, with the South Mall Expressway that leads into/under the Empire State Plaza being closed due to emergency reasons through the end of July.

[1995hoo]

english si, I know I read the thing about looking at the windsock somewhere. Maybe he's supposed to use binoculars? (Of course the writer could have been wrong or exaggerating too.)

[hbelkins]

A catastrophe involving the Clays Ferry Bridge (carrying I-75 and US 25/US 421 across the Kentucky River south of Lexington) would probably qualify.

I remember in the mid-1990s, I-75 was being widened and that widening included the Clays Ferry Bridge. There was an incident involving a crane and the road had to be closed overnight one night. The detour was KY 627 from Exit 95 to I-64 at Winchester. We were living in Winchester in a duplex that overlooked KY 627, and traffic was bumper-to-bumper all evening and night.

[brownpelican]

NOLA Area Scenario 1: Shut down I-10 between Williams and I-610. Airline Highway and the east-west arteries would be a mess, especially West Esplanade and West Napoleon.

NOLA Area Scenario 2: Shut down both the Huey P. Long Bridge and Crescent City Connection. The ferries wouldn't keep up and everybody has to go west to I-310 to get across the river.

[Alex]

Pensacola, Florida had its when Hurricane Ivan knocked out the Escambia Bay Bridges of Interstate 10. When the eastbound span was put back together with temporary elements, it was narrowed to one lane with extremely low speed limits for trucks and 40 mph for everyone else. Eastbound back-ups stretched up to three miles EVERYDAY:



To make matters worse, the right-hand lane was converted into a make-shift weigh station!



Additionally, wide-loads were required to take long detours, other trucks (as directed by the weigh station) and traffic would use U.S. 90 across the north edge of the bay. U.S. 90 doubles as a congested commuter route between Pensacola and Pace/Milton, so you can imagine how great of a ride that was.

If you were driving westbound, it was not bad, as two lanes were maintained. This configuration lasted until 2006!

Edit - forgot about the ridiculous weigh station built into the main lanes...

[1995hoo]

^^^^ I know it wasn't funny at the time to people stuck in the backup, but that "Your Speed 7" sign is probably the funniest thing I've seen yet today.

[Chicagosuburban]

In Chicago it would be the Kennedy, Eisenhower, or Dan Ryan Expressways

[PAHighways]

Stephen Colbert's report on L.A.'s 405 closure.

[mgk920]

In Chicago it would be the Kennedy, Eisenhower, or Dan Ryan Expressways

You mean the Circle Interchange going down?  Probably.

Mike

[mjb2002]

Our Carmageddons? The JEFFERSON DAVIS HY in Aiken County; the Palmetto Pwky/Bobby Jones Expwy in Augusta, Ga. and North Augusta; North Road and John C. Calhoun Drive in Orangeburg; and Deans Bridge Road, Windsor Spring Road, Walton Way and Gordon Hy in Augusta, Ga.

[vtk]

Problem is, you'll spend more time standing on line at the TSA checkpoint than you will on the flight itself. It's about 37 miles by road, but it's shorter than that as the Airbus flies.

Actually, taking approach patterns into account, it might actually be longer as the Airbus flies.  Crows, on the other hand, aren't subject to air traffic control.

[The Premier]

Akron-Canton carmageddons:

1. Closure of I-76/77. The eastbound lanes were closed down earlier this month for repaving and bridgework. The westbound will be subject to the same thing for two weeks.

http://www.ohio.com/news/local/odot-to-shut-down-i-76-77-in-akron-1.225158

2. Closure of SR 8.

The only Cleveland carmageddon is the I-90 Innerbelt bridge

Cincinnati carmageddons:

1. Closure of the Brent Spence Bridge. Imagine having to go use I-275 to either I-471 or going around it outright if something was wrong with the bridge.

2. Closure of I-75

3. Closure of I-71's Fort Washington Way

The only Columbus carmageddon is the closure of I-70/I-71 split (the curve only, not the one with SR 315)

[vtk]

The only Columbus carmageddon is the closure of I-70/I-71 split (the curve only, not the one with SR 315)

You mean the East Split?  I suppose that would be quite problematic, making the East Freeway rather unusable.  The alternate would have to be I-670 past the airport, and that already jams in rush hour.

[rickmastfan67]

^^^^ I know it wasn't funny at the time to people stuck in the backup, but that "Your Speed 7" sign is probably the funniest thing I've seen yet today.

Psh, I can beat that with a "Your Speed 6" sign.


This was on I-80 in PA.  Traffic was at a complete standstill because they were putting the construction zone up in the middle of the afternoon.  They even had to have a Trooper driving the wrong way on the shoulder of EB I-80 to let people know traffic was completely stopped!

[allniter89]

Pensacola, Florida had its when Hurricane Ivan knocked out the Escambia Bay Bridges of Interstate 10. When the eastbound span was put back together with temporary elements, it was narrowed to one lane with extremely low speed limits for trucks and 40 mph for everyone else. Eastbound back-ups stretched up to three miles EVERYDAY:



To make matters worse, the right-hand lane was converted into a make-shift weigh station!



Additionally, wide-loads were required to take long detours, other trucks (as directed by the weigh station) and traffic would use U.S. 90 across the north edge of the bay. U.S. 90 doubles as a congested commuter route between Pensacola and Pace/Milton, so you can imagine how great of a ride that was.

If you were driving westbound, it was not bad, as two lanes were maintained. This configuration lasted until 2006!

Edit - forgot about the ridiculous weigh station built into the main lanes...

Further east along the Emerald Coast, Carmageddon would involve the closing of the Brooks Bridge on US 98 in Fort Walton Beach, FL. US 98 is the only highway connecting Fort Walton Beach and beach towns east. The detour would involve moving the 98 traffic onto FL 85 and FL 189 north to FL 20 east at Niceville. All these highways are already very busy and I suspect US 98 traffic would nearly double the traffic count. FL 20 east of Niceville narrows to one lane each direction and US 331 south (to get back to 98) is also a dangerous 2 lane road.
Tugboats pushing barges are routine in the Intercoastal Waterway that the Brooks Bridge spans so "it could happen tomorrow!"

[Alps]

Not sure if NYC has been done, but one of the worst realistic (and non-coincidental) outcomes would be a structural failure at the Highbridge Interchange, shutting down I-95, I-87, and any connections between them. Think of this: all trucks heading east would either have to use I-287 all the way around NJ to the Tappan Zee (which itself is ready to fail), or stall through the GWB and have to exit into Manhattan, using whatever bridge can hold them into the Bronx. Billions of dollars a day, if not an HOUR, would be lost in commerce.

[hbelkins]

3. Closure of I-71's Fort Washington Way

It wouldn't be THAT bad. I remember when it was closed for rehab a few years ago and the Norwood Lateral was the detour. Things weren't that messed up in Cincy.

[BigMattFromTexas]

San Angelo:
Say an alien comes from space, they hate minor, and secondary roads. They wipe them out, but let people get on the "freeway" here (Houston Harte). Then we might actually get a little traffic! Haha, well I guess if anything happened to US 67 here and closed it, it would divert to access roads, which would be a mess.
BigMatt

[kharvey10]

a carmageddon in Hilton Head, SC would involve closing the first US 278 bridge that crosses the Intracoastal Waterway to the Island itself (not the toll bridge, not the bridge further in the lsland).  There is no other way out unless it is boat.  (I got relatives that live near the island but work on the island.) 

[Brandon]

In Chicago it would be the Kennedy, Eisenhower, or Dan Ryan Expressways

You mean the Circle Interchange going down?  Probably.

Mike

You can at least go around the Circle.  Now the Tri-State on the other hand...

We already have our own "carmageddon" of sorts in Will County with I-80 under the knife as well as US-30 AT THE SAME FREAKING TIME.
   
Thanks a lot, IDiOT.

[ftballfan]

The Mackinac Bridge, enough said. Detours would involve going through either Chicago or Canada.