I-80 Sidney Nebraska Business Loop decommissioned

[corco]

I was bored today and went over to Nebraska to drive around, and noted that the I-80 business loop in Sidney no longer exists. It is still signed FROM eastbound I-80, but once you exit off you get a bunch of signs like this:

I-80 Business would logically take the right half of the sign post


Here's fairly empirical evidence as the "business 80" sign is taped over at junction N-19 and US-30


Is Nebraska doing away with business loops? I know they ditched Business N-71 when they opened the Scottsbluff bypass, so I'm wondering if this is further indication of that. As far as I know this is the only business loop that was EVER posted on I-80 in Nebraska, so it could just be a consolidation of some kind.

Besides that, most Sidney traffic is just going to Cabela's, and could easily just take the east Sidney exit (L-17J, former N-19) without having to drive through town, so maybe they deemed it useless

[Alex]

A shame about the Sidney Business Loop demise. Though we should not be surprised, as Nebraska does not really use business loops for Interstates otherwise. A few photos we took of the route are here.

Did they also remove the few signs for Business Loop I-80 at Pine Bluffs?

[corco]

Business 80 in Pine Bluffs isn't signed from westbound I-80 for sure anymore (or from eastbound on the Wyoming side for that matter), but I don't think it ever was. If I recall there's only ever been one business 80 sign in Nebraska for Pine Bluffs, at the northbound junction of L-53B and US-30, and I didn't pay attention when I was driving through there. In pictures I took of that area in January the sign was present.

[Alex]

It also was not signed in 2005 from either direction on the freeway itself.

[Revive 755]

I believe all business routes in Nebraska are city maintained, probably due to the brilliance of the mileage cap.  So it's probably up to the cities whether to keep or dump them.

There might be a Business NE 2 added for Lincoln if the South Beltway ever gets built.

North Platte could have an interstate business loop over US 83, 4th Street, and L56G.

[corco]

Interesting- but the Sidney Loop ran completely over state maintained highways (N-19, US-30, L-17J), so I wonder why they'd suddenly ask to have the signs taken down for the business loop

[Alex]

Normally a petition to AASHTO is required to decommission a business loop, right? I recall that Arizona put in requests to deal with two of theirs a few years back.

[corco]

Re: Pine Bluffs signage

There are currently two Business Loop 80 signs on the Nebraska side of the loop when I went through it today. One is viewable from the westbound offramp, the other at the north end of L-53B