I read alot of Stadium fans responses about how stadiums shold be built off an efficient interstate...?
What are everyones's thoughts?
There is nothing worse than being stuck in traffiic 10 minutes before a game starts
Also, I'd Like the to hear the best tailgaiting experiences for Baseball and Football...
And, As well If taking the Interstate sucks going to games then what is the 411 about the best rapid transit...?
I'd like to hear thoughts, I'm gonna be a(n) urban developer/city planner one day...
And I'd rather hear A People's Response rather than a(n) Politicians....
Thoughts...?
Candlestick Park...
Say whatever you want about Candlestick itself, but it is easy to get to (which is a good thing, I wouldn't want to spend more than 5 seconds in Hunters Point/Bayview.
Miller Park maybe?
Safeco Field, Quest Field and I-90 :ded:
Stadiums are always problematic.
A free-flowing freeway lane can handle about 2,200 to 2,500 vehicles per hour.
If a whole stadium empties 10,000 cars within say, 30 minutes, you'll need 8 outbound free-flowing lanes, even more when controlled by traffic lights or other at-grade intersections.
I would have to agree with Miller Park, very easy in during rush hour, and easy out when everyone is leaving.
While good highway access is of course a good thing to have for a stadium, good subway access is better.
I mean, look at the New Jersey Meadowlands. It's right by the Turnpike, NJ 3, and NJ 17, but traffic is always horrid getting out of there if you stay to the end of the game. On the other hand, Yankee Stadium can be escaped relatively easily via the 4 or D train.
The sheer volume of people you need to move makes it a situation in which public transportation is superior.
Oh, and by the way, the plural of "stadium" is "stadia". It's Latin. :nod:
Oriole Park at Camden Yards and M&T bank stadium in Baltimore have direct access to I-395
Traffic around Heinz Field and PNC Park is not much of a problem before and after games since there are many options besides driving. Most people choose to park in downtown Pittsburgh or take mass transit. Since the subway ends at Gateway Center, people will take the subway then walk across either the Fort Duquesne or Roberto Clemente Bridges. Work to extend it to the North Side near the stadiums is underway, so eventually it will be possible to take the "T" all the way. Also the Gateway Clipper provides a water taxi service from Station Square.
For those who park around the stadiums, the terminus of the I-279 HOV lanes are right at the stadiums. General Robinson Street becomes one-way towards the Seventh and Ninth Street Bridges, another HOV on-ramp at Anderson Street, and PA 28 northbound. The on-ramp for PA 65 northbound and southbound is next to Heinz Field.
If you want to experience a real tailgating atmosphere, it's hard to beat the parking lot next to Heinz Field. People are always tailgating whether it is 70 or 7.
I don't get down to the Dome much, but it's served by the 3rd Ave freeway and I-35W/MN 55 close by. I-94 and I-394 are also reasonably close. I don't have many problems once I get on a freeway following a game.
It'll be interesting; the new Twins stadium will literally almost sit on top of I-394. I want to see how the freeway handles it because of the WB bottleneck (goes down to one lane) at the HOV reversible lane exit.
I agree That most effecient stadiums rely on mass transit (subways) to alleviate traffic, Which I think needs to be done more often. I'm really suprised that these Billion dollar stadiums are not thing about ways to connect better connect them to transit stations...
It will be a matter of time when gas goes back up to 4 dollars a gal...
Also Dolphin Stadium (Pro Player Stadium, or whatever Corporate Name you want to put on it) And Qualcomm Stadium are located in very open areas and relatively close to large interchanges
Another vote for Miller Park. When it was County Stadium, it was a bit of a clusterf%@k at times, especially with the left exit on 94 eastbound, but when I was back home in WI last year, I was surprised how free flowing traffic is.
Quote from: Duke87 on January 31, 2009, 02:30:43 PMOh, and by the way, the plural of "stadium" is "stadia". It's Latin. :nod:
Grammar Nazi :-P
Yes, Qualcomm in San Diego is placed at the northwestern corner of the I-8/I-15/CA-15 interchange, a major one in the region, but, the stadium is only accessible off the I-15 at Exit 7B, which can be a nightmare during football games or whenever an event is taking place at the stadium.
I like the view one gets of Turner Field from I-75/85. The lights in the old Olympic stadium are on long after night Braves' games.
Be well,
Bryant
Turner Field in Atlanta is very easy to get to (right at I-20/75/85 interchange) The Georgia Dome, that's another story, I always use MARTA for that.
Fenway Park is MISERABLE to get to from anywhere.
Cincinnati's stadiums are easy to access, I stayed in KY and crossed the Roebling Bridge to go to a Reds game once.
The access to the stadiums in Pittsburgh is OK, (nothing is easy to get to in that town) but what's really cool is taking the water taxi from Station Square across the confluence to the north shore, that is the best!
Cleveland Browns Stadium can be difficult getting to or from, mostly because the two major access roads are OH-2 and East 9th.
E 9th runs right through town to hit the I-77/I-90 interchange. It is horrible. OH-2 eastbound after games is logjammed. I usually cross the E 9th bridge over OH-2, and then criss-cross down Superior and other side streets to get over to an entry ramp to I-90 just east of the I-77/I-90/E. 9th nightmare. Once on I-77 south, you can get over to avoid the oncoming traffic.
As for tailgating, it's great, because you have the Muni lots all around the stadium open for tailgating. Although I've been in Cleveland at 6AM on gamedays and seen them packed, so arrive early.
Plus, with the huge lots, parking is a lot cheaper. I've been to games at Heinz Field, parking close to the stadium there is $40, while in Cleveland you can park right near the stadium (on the E 9th garage south of OH-2) for $10. That's also due to the obscenely high tax on parking in Pittsburgh, sa well.
Sykotyk
Although I like the concept of ballparks being located in downtown areas for the fact that there is so much to do before/after games (ex. St. Louis, Cincinnati), the fact of having some ballparks/stadiums out in the open and surrounded by acres and acres of parking lots adjacent to an interstate seems highly feasible in areas in which their interstate networks are vastly underdeveloped, and land is scarce (mainly areas in the northeast)
Well... Arlington, TX is about to find out how it is to deal with football traffic come this fall when the new Cowboys stadium opens. I-30 (E-W) and TX 360 (N-S) are gonna be pure hell.
The parking for the Washington Nationals is slightly different due to there being no parking at Nationals Park(except for a parking garage for season ticket holders). However, it is really easy to get in and out of RFK stadium's parking lot unless the I-395 congestion is in full swing(and the best part is that it's free although you have to take a shuttle from RFK to Nationals Park and vice versa).
I noticed That there is a Wal-Mart within Close Range of the New Cowboys stadium. That Gigantic spaceship of a stadium makes the Ballpark in Arlington look minature size...
Quote from: froggie on March 09, 2009, 10:19:17 PM
but it's a very inefficient use of land for football stadiums that only see 8 home games per year (plus, at best, 3 playoff games).
I guess you like racetracks even less since they are generally
much larger that football stadiums and have only 1 to 3 major events per year.
You wanna talk about hell getting into a stadium, try the Meadowlands and the Wachovia complex of buildings.
Stadiums are one situation in which easily deployable mass transit is absolutely necessary. The cf around Safeco/Qwest as well as Husky Stadium in Seattle is bad, but it would be even worse were it not for the mass transit. King County Metro runs several park and ride shuttles that run straight from the park and ride in various areas around King County to the stadium without stops. This works great for football as it fills otherwise mostly unused park and ride lots on weekends and they can use extra busses they don't need on weekends to devote exclusively to football shuttling.
When I lived in Tacoma and wanted to go to a Seahawks or Huskies game it would have been incredibly stupid to drive up- much easier to drive to Federal Way, park in the parking lot, and ride a FREE shuttle straight to the stadium (the shuttle having access to things like Bus Way south of the stadium allowing it to effectively bypass traffic)
Mariners games weren't so bad, there is usually free parking available along the railroad tracks in Sodo and if you took 599 up it was pretty easy to avoid the cf coming from the south, but again it was pretty easy to park in the Tacoma Dome P & R free parking garage and ride the one stop Sound Transit bus up
I'm not a huge mass transit advocate, but I firmly believe downtown stadia with effective mass transit access is the way to go
Should we include some arenas who are in use for hockey and basketball like the Civic Center aka the Igloo at Pittsburgh currently used by the NHL Pittsburgh Penguins or the Auburn Hills Palace home of Detroit NBA Pistons?
Quote from: froggie on March 10, 2009, 07:53:34 PM
QuoteI guess you like racetracks even less since they are generally much larger that football stadiums and have only 1 to 3 major events per year.
It's not that I don't like them. It's that they're a very inefficient use of land for the few times it's used. Where I find annoyance is when there's public financing involved (as is the case with most professional sports stadiums), with football being by far the worst offender in terms of the public financing-to-number of games ratio...
Well, unlike stick-and-ball sports stadiums, most tracks are privately owned and financed. Mass transit is often not an option given the distance of most tracks from the metropolitan area. The only track that I know of that has a mass transit option is Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, CA which is served by Metrolink. (That's ironic because attendance is anemic there.)
Now, back on topic. I've only been to a handful of racetracks (Talladega, Nashville, Pocono, Indianapolis, Watkins Glen).
The worst one is Talladega, the access road to the track parallels I-20 but I-20 is just four lanes in this stretch and the exit ramps are one lane. There are still traffic jams four hours after the race! But, as the track is out in the middle of nowhere, the State of Alabama probably doesn't want to spend to upgrade roads that will only be used for two weeks a year.
The best on of that bunch is Indianapolis. The track is a couple of miles from I-465 but with the help of the standard midwestern grid system of streets, access is relatively easy. Last year, traffic was cleared out less than two hours after the Brickyard 400 even though the capacity is larger than Talladega's.
Mightyace: On a local level, most of the racetracks in NorCal have very good highway/freeway access:
- Placerville Speedway is off of US 50 Exit 44B
- Petaluma Speedway is one block from US 101
- Sears Point is on Route 121
- Stockton 99 is located on old US 99 (thus the name!) a few blocks from the current Route 99 freeway; Madera Speedway is just off of Route 99 as well
Some are a few blocks more from the freeway (i.e. Silver Dollar Speedway in Chicago, about a mile from Route 99) or highway (Calistoga Speedway is about 6 blocks north from Route 29, while Sacramento Raceway Park is about a half mile north of Route 16 along Excelsior Road).
Worst access from a numbered route in this region IMO would be Marysville Raceway Park.
Altamont Raceway is located near I-580/I-205 but track access is not direct off of the freeways.
I don't do enough traveling around Miller Park when games are getting out, but it is an impressive sight while going down I-94. Contrast this with the ugly concrete hulk of NO's Superdome.
As for Minnesota, I haven't seen the new stadia (for the University or the Twins), but the Metrodome is very accessible from a public transit point of view with many bus routes and the Hiawatha Line light rail system, and the freeways don't clog too badly after games -- downtown streets are another thing entirely.
The Metropolitan Stadium/Met Center would be very well served by I-494 and the MN-77 freeway... if they were still around. :banghead:
Quote from: PAHighways on January 31, 2009, 03:11:42 PM
Traffic around Heinz Field and PNC Park is not much of a problem before and after games since there are many options besides driving. Most people choose to park in downtown Pittsburgh or take mass transit. Since the subway ends at Gateway Center, people will take the subway then walk across either the Fort Duquesne or Roberto Clemente Bridges. Work to extend it to the North Side near the stadiums is underway, so eventually it will be possible to take the "T" all the way. Also the Gateway Clipper provides a water taxi service from Station Square.
For those who park around the stadiums, the terminus of the I-279 HOV lanes are right at the stadiums. General Robinson Street becomes one-way towards the Seventh and Ninth Street Bridges, another HOV on-ramp at Anderson Street, and PA 28 northbound. The on-ramp for PA 65 northbound and southbound is next to Heinz Field.
If you want to experience a real tailgating atmosphere, it's hard to beat the parking lot next to Heinz Field. People are always tailgating whether it is 70 or 7.
Also here in Pittsburgh, you got the I-579(I-279) HOV lanes as well ending right @ the Mellon Arena. Plus you have direct access to I-579 going in both directions as well. Getting into the arena from I-579 from the North can sometimes backup, but leaving the arena once you get out of the parking lot, it's a lot easier. Especially with that direct ramp access to the HOV.
Though it's not an interstate, U.S. 59 goes right by Minute Maid Park here in Houston. If they roof is open, one can see the inside of the stadium.
The Hart Bridge Expressway in downtown Jacksonville also provides a great view of Alltel Stadium there.