US 54 Missouri

[3467]

http://abetter54.com/54.html

There is a new group supporting a 3 lane US 54

[kphoger]

Well, I'm certainly in favor.  I'm already a fan of México's A2 highways, which are two-laners with wide shoulders, the intent being that vehicles would ride the shoulder to allow people to pass down the center stripe.  What MoDOT is calling a Shared-4 has not quite the same capacity as that, but has much less opportunity for head-on collisions.

The truly retarded thing is calling it a Shared-4.  From what I see in the brochure and video, at no point is it four lanes, nor at any point do vehicles share the same lane.  So 'shared' is a misnomer, and 'four' is a misnomer.  Really, it's a Segregated-3.  Ireland calls this design a Super-2; why couldn't we just have called it a Super-3?

[J N Winkler]

The truly retarded thing is calling it a Shared-4.  From what I see in the brochure and video, at no point is it four lanes, nor at any point do vehicles share the same lane.  So 'shared' is a misnomer, and 'four' is a misnomer.  Really, it's a Segregated-3.  Ireland calls this design a Super-2; why couldn't we just have called it a Super-3?

Ireland got the idea from Sweden, where the Swedish term for these roads transliterates as "2+1 roads."  (The Irish NRA used to call them "2+1 roads" too--if they have now started calling them Super Twos, this is a new development to me.)  I agree that MoDOT should not have called them "Shared 4 Lane" but they had obvious publicity reasons for obscuring the fact that these types of roads do not provide continuous passing opportunities for both directions.

My concern about using a 2+1 cross-section for an expanded US 54 is that (1) it is inappropriate for any road whose traffic volumes are expected to continue growing beyond 12,000 VPD over the life of the improvement and (2) it is also inappropriate for any road which does not have control of access to a reasonably high degree.  The Irish have gone cool on the 2+1 cross-section partly because of rampant traffic growth on their network (Celtic tiger economy--at least until 2008--and all that).

US 54 is a freeway to Jefferson City and is in the process of being upgraded to full freeway in Osage Beach (a longtime bottleneck).  If MoDOT were adequately funded, the Osage Beach freeway would have been finished 20 years ago.  I believe there is a good case to be made for expanding US 54 in Missouri to full freeway, at least from the Kansas line to I-70 if not in its entirety.

[kphoger]

Ah, you're right, I was conflating the American term Super-2 and the Irish term 2+1 without realizing it.  Stupid Wikipedia, discussing them in the same article.  Yeah, that's right, I blame it on a webpage.

According to the link, the 2+1 design is on the table for US-54 between Mexico and Louisiana, not the western part of the state.  Only having driven 54 in the western part twice, and only from MO-73 eastward, I can't speak to that area of the state.  But, we used to use the portion from Kingdom City to Pittsfield (IL) fairly regularly as a Saint Louis bypass back when we lived near Chicago and visited family in Wichita and K.C.  That portion of the highway does see plenty of traffic, but I don't foresee the kind of growth one would expect in lake country.  I think a 2+1 design would serve the need there quite well.

Sweden and Ireland, I've noticed, tend to use a cable barrier between directions.  While this is obviously for safety purposes, it also allows motorists to think they're driving on a higher-capacity highway than they actually are.  Without a cable barrier, drivers in Missouri might have more of an open eye to entering and exiting vehicles.  Maybe.  However, I think the best way to alleviate conflicting movements would be to have wide paved shoulders throughout, as well as acceleration and deceleration lanes at major intersections.

[NE2]

the American term Super-2

Note that 'super-2' meaning two-lane freeway is a roadgeek invention.

[3467]

I checked the Mo traffic counts . The highest on this route is 4000. The hightest on MO 5 which MO claims as a sucess in this is 7600. That figure is interestingly the highest count on the currently studied routes for 4 laning in downstate Illinois.
The road design is wide enough to convert to a 4 lane undivided and still leave a small shoulder
The Mo 5 project was 1.5 million per mile. MoDOT says that is half of a 4 lane. I would like to know how MO could do it that cheaply. In Illinois its 6-12 million and up
I have seen super 2 used in all sorts of ways. How did it originate from raodgeeks?

[JREwing78]

I would prefer longer stretches of passing lanes - say, 2 miles per side, as a 1 mile stretch goes by pretty rapidly. It also ultimately will flow less traffic and be less safe than a divided 4-lane. But as a stopgap measure, it's not terrible.

It's interesting that the highways Missouri employs it on are fairly light in traffic; Michigan gets away with 2 miles of passing lanes every 10 miles on similarly busy rural 2-lanes.

[bugo]

the American term Super-2

Note that 'super-2' meaning two-lane freeway is a roadgeek invention.

I heard somebody who was not into roads calling a Kansas highway a "super 2" before there was an internet road community.

[NE2]

the American term Super-2

Note that 'super-2' meaning two-lane freeway is a roadgeek invention.

I heard somebody who was not into roads calling a Kansas highway a "super 2" before there was an internet road community.

It was probably a high-speed two-lane surface road. That is used by some DOTs.

[bugo]

the American term Super-2

Note that 'super-2' meaning two-lane freeway is a roadgeek invention.

I heard somebody who was not into roads calling a Kansas highway a "super 2" before there was an internet road community.

It was probably a high-speed two-lane surface road. That is used by some DOTs.

They were talking about K-96/US 400 in southeastern KS, which is a regular super 2 freeway in places.

[agentsteel53]

I heard somebody who was not into roads calling a Kansas highway a "super 2" before there was an internet road community.

It was probably a high-speed two-lane surface road. That is used by some DOTs.

"super" is a term that has been applied to roads of increased capacity for quite a while.  the oldest reference I can think of is 1953's "super 81" through Austin, TX, which we now call a freeway, and indeed has become a segment of the Interstate route network as I-35.

[NE2]

the American term Super-2

Note that 'super-2' meaning two-lane freeway is a roadgeek invention.

I heard somebody who was not into roads calling a Kansas highway a "super 2" before there was an internet road community.

It was probably a high-speed two-lane surface road. That is used by some DOTs.

They were talking about K-96/US 400 in southeastern KS, which is a regular super 2 freeway in places.

US‐400 Parsons Bypass — A $27 million bypass built in 2004 on a new alignment that re‐routes US‐400 around Parsons' downtown through formerly agricultural land north of Parsons and completes a fully‐upgraded "Super Two"  route between Parsons and Wichita to the west and Missouri to the east.

Here super two refers to the whole thing, freeway or not.

[J N Winkler]

Following 3467's example, I have studied MoDOT traffic count maps.  In MoDOT's Central District, US 54 does not register a traffic count below 10,000 VPD anywhere between I-70 and Camden County AA (just west of SRs 5 and 7 at Camdenton).  Much of this length, but by no means all of it, either has been or is in process of being upgraded to full freeway, and the part that hasn't been is now four-lane divided with interchanges at isolated important intersections and with a fairly high degree of access control.

The general rule of thumb is that widening to four-lane divided (not necessarily full freeway) is warranted if the two-lane road carries more than 10,000 VPD in level terrain.  (This value can drop as low as 5,000 VPD in mountainous terrain because curves and grades limit passing opportunities.  These standards are based implicitly on level of service, and for rural two-lane roads the ruling criterion for LOS is proportion of time spent following other vehicles.)  West of the Camdenton vicinity, US 54 has no rural lengths which meet the 10,000 VPD warrant, but there are counts above 6,000 VPD near Nevada and up to 4,000 VPD at various locations, which translates to a fairly mediocre LOS.  (In Kansas, by comparison, it is not uncommon for roads to be built as four-lane divided--or even freeway--on the basis of sub-10,000 AADT, the US 54 Kingman Bypass being one example.  A 1975 study, Kansas Highway Needs and Corridor Analyses, calls for four-lane divided for AADTs as low as 3,800!)

In regard to the length of US 54 between Mexico and Pittsfield, I'd consider widening to 2+1 to be a plausible solution based on the traffic numbers quoted, but the degree of access control and the historical trend in traffic growth would also need to be taken into consideration.

P.S.  I grew up in Kansas and I also remember hearing the term "Super Two" used for any rural two-lane highway designed to function as a high-speed primary route with 12' lanes and full-width paved shoulders, including lengths of US 54 west of Wichita which have never had comprehensive grade separation and are only just now starting to be upgraded to expressway and freeway.  "Super Two" has also been applied to lengths of US 75 and US 69 which were built in the 1970's as two-lane freeways, but they received this label on the basis of their cross-section rather than the provision of comprehensive grade separation.  (Most if not all of "Super Two" US 69, and long lengths of US 75, have now been upgraded to conventional freeway.)

[kphoger]

Similarly, the term supercarretera is common roadgeek parlance for an A2 highway in México, which is designated as such based on cross-section, not on access.  For example, when a 2-laner in México with no shoulders is widened to make an A2, it is called a supercarretera in any publicity and roadgeek forums you might find, even if access is not limited in any way to cross traffic–and even if said shoulders are not designed to carry slow-moving traffic (i.e., they are striped with a solid line and rumble strips instead of a simple broken white line).

[3467]

In a followup to JN Winkler the 1960s Illinois needs study which has been discussed in the Midwest under the supplemental Freeway system had routes as full freeways with segments under 1000 a day.That proposal left IDOT sort of frozen in time . At over 15 million a mile and in deep financial crisis I would be pleased with the 2+ 1 in this state.
Missouri faces similar problems as mentioned in their website. Northeast Missouri like most of downstate Illinois has intersections with low volume rural raods every mile and the occassional farm house entrance.
Illinois has a super standard of 60 mile plus curves and an 8-10 foot partially paved shoulder with a passing lane every seven miles. The cost is about a million a mile. I think Missouris is their 2+1.

Right now US 54 dead ends at the border ,the bridge is closed for repairs

[J N Winkler]

At the moment I am reading construction plans for a S2+1 road in Sweden for which Trafikverket has just issued a tender advertisement:  this is the Vimmerby-Toverum length of the Jönkoping-Västervik section of väg 40 (Trafikverket object number 87833258, tender documentation available for download free of charge from EU-Supply.com until the tender opening date).  It appears the S2+1 cross-section (at least in this project, and probably also more generally in Sweden) comes with significant access management as well as center cable guardrail.  Turning left is banned at most side road entrances, and left-turn movements off the mainline are handled by facilitated hook turns.  You are not allowed to turn left directly:  instead you must take a ramp to exit to the right, curve to the left until you are waiting at a stop bar, and then drive straight across the S2+1 road at a median opening.

I mention this project here, and not in a separate thread on the International Roads board, because I don't think the Missouri "shared four-lane" concept incorporates this degree of access management or safety provision, and might be significantly less competitive with widening to four-lane divided on a cost-per-mile basis if these features were added.  (It has to be noted, however, that object number 87833258 is an upgrade of väg 40 on its existing alignment rather than a new location.)

[agentsteel53]

Turning left is banned at most side road entrances, and left-turn movements off the mainline are handled by facilitated hook turns.  You are not allowed to turn left directly:  instead you must take a ramp to exit to the right, curve to the left until you are waiting at a stop bar, and then drive straight across the S2+1 road at a median opening.

this seems to me to be more a jughandle than a hook turn.

hook turn to me implies you are waiting in an orientation parallel to the traffic you wish to cross, while jughandle means you are sitting perpendicular.

am I correct in these definitions?

[NE2]

Hook turn is a jughandle-type movement without a separate roadway:

[agentsteel53]

Hook turn is a jughandle-type movement without a separate roadway:

here I had thought the differentiation was "parallel to traffic while sitting" vs "perpendicular"

but this also implies jughandle:

instead you must take a ramp to exit to the right

[J N Winkler]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jughandle

It seems väg 40 is to be equipped with Type B jughandles (using NJDOT terminology, as quoted in the Wikipedia article).

[kphoger]

I believe this is the type J N Winkler is referring to (a Swedish example):
http://g.co/maps/4ckzr

A jug handle implies a 270° turn in order to end up perpendicular.  This configuration has a short exit followed by a 90° turn.  These are somewhat common on four-lane highways, and even two-lane roads in México as well.

[agentsteel53]

I believe this is the type J N Winkler is referring to (a Swedish example):
http://g.co/maps/4ckzr

A jug handle implies a 270° turn in order to end up perpendicular.  This configuration has a short exit followed by a 90° turn.  These are somewhat common on four-lane highways, and even two-lane roads in México as well.

that looks to be a jughandle of Type B.  the 270 degree turn you refer to is a "reverse jughandle", or Type C.

[kphoger]

I believe this is the type J N Winkler is referring to (a Swedish example):
http://g.co/maps/4ckzr

A jug handle implies a 270° turn in order to end up perpendicular.  This configuration has a short exit followed by a 90° turn.  These are somewhat common on four-lane highways, and even two-lane roads in México as well.

that looks to be a jughandle of Type B.  the 270 degree turn you refer to is a "reverse jughandle", or Type C.

It's a hook turn, variant 1-A(2).  And no arguing.

[english si]

Ireland got the idea from Sweden, where the Swedish term for these roads transliterates as "2+1 roads."  (The Irish NRA used to call them "2+1 roads" too--if they have now started calling them Super Twos, this is a new development to me.)

Ireland don't call them super twos. I'm not sure they ever built any new-build 2+1 - upping the spec of those planned roads to a 2+2 road.

IIRC, they were to be the same width as a standard 2-lane road (with shoulders - common on the island of Ireland) and they realized that the barrier isn't a good thing for those on the '1' section so didn't convert roads.

[Alps]

I believe this is the type J N Winkler is referring to (a Swedish example):
http://g.co/maps/4ckzr

A jug handle implies a 270° turn in order to end up perpendicular.  This configuration has a short exit followed by a 90° turn.  These are somewhat common on four-lane highways, and even two-lane roads in México as well.

that looks to be a jughandle of Type B.  the 270 degree turn you refer to is a "reverse jughandle", or Type C.

It's a hook turn, variant 1-A(2).  And no arguing.

You're wrong. No arguing.