When one state has to clean up another state's mess

[Beltway]

How about Delaware and New Jersey having to build the Northeast Corridor freeway bypass of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania in the first place?  New Jersey Turnpike and Delaware Memorial Bridge.
No other state and major metro area got this kind of a benefit.

The NJ Turnpike and Delaware Memorial Bridge (US 40) were built before there was even an interstate system to speak of.  NJ was basically relieving the traffic off of US 1 in NJ.  It wasn't really intended to bypass Philly.

But it most certainly did provide a freeway bypass of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, long before any freeway route existed in Pennsylvania in that corridor, and any planner could see the obvious fact that it would provide such a bypass, taking traffic from Delaware to New Jersey and bypassing that major metro.

[sharkyfour]

MA is cleaning up some of CT and RI's mess by handling people who use I-84 to I-90 to MA/RI 146 to get from Hartford to Providence (of course, they're being reimbursed somewhat in the tolls collected).  If I-84 had been built as planned, no one would use this as the all-freeway route between the 2 cities.

And really it all started with RI cancelling their portion of I-84, and has also left CT cleaning up the mess...  Spot improvements to US-6 on the Bolton-Columbia stretch and to a lesser extent on the Windham-Killingly stretch that wouldn't have been needed had the parallel freeway been built.  Not to mention the economy in Willimantic that greatly suffers from having no highways into town.  I have no doubt my property taxes would be lower if we had a freeway coming into Windham to help diversify it's tax base.

[jon daly]

Have they fixed up downtown Willimantic? I drove through there yesterday and it looked more lively than I ever recall seeing it.

[sharkyfour]

Have they fixed up downtown Willimantic? I drove through there yesterday and it looked more lively than I ever recall seeing it.

It's had it's upswings and downswings over the last few years.  At the moment there is quite a bit going on downtown.  Main ST was repaved 2 years ago and most of the sidewalk along it replaced last year.  The town just built a bandshell on Jillson Square (the town green by the Thread City Crossing) and there's plans to build a new senior center where the movie theater used to be.  But, there's still a lot of buildings empty and in disrepair, and many of the small businesses that open close as quickly as they came. 

[mrsman]

How about Delaware and New Jersey having to build the Northeast Corridor freeway bypass of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania in the first place?  New Jersey Turnpike and Delaware Memorial Bridge.
No other state and major metro area got this kind of a benefit.

The NJ Turnpike and Delaware Memorial Bridge (US 40) were built before there was even an interstate system to speak of.  NJ was basically relieving the traffic off of US 1 in NJ.  It wasn't really intended to bypass Philly.

But it most certainly did provide a freeway bypass of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, long before any freeway route existed in Pennsylvania in that corridor, and any planner could see the obvious fact that it would provide such a bypass, taking traffic from Delaware to New Jersey and bypassing that major metro.

Wish more of the interstate system were built this way.  2di roads criss-crossing the country heading in the general direction of the major cities, but never quite reaching into the area.  Use 3di spur connectors to make the connections to the city you want to reach.

The closest other examples that I can think of is I-12's bypass of New Orleans and pittsburgh, where I-79 and I-76 are not within the city and don't generally slow down during commute hours.

[sparker]

^^^^^^
Apparently that concept, utilized with the original Autobahns and also copied by Europe's "A" system of limited-access highways, was what Eisenhower had in mind when promoting the authorizing Interstate legislation; the "Yellow Book", which delineated the results of that legislation, was in no small part influenced by state and local political and economic needs -- hence the desire to route trunks through urban centers to (potentially) enhance the prospects of those areas (particularly in the face of the increased "suburbanization" in the '50's).  In hindsight, the Euro configuration might well have been a better approach -- but 60 years ago it couldn't have been "sold" in that day's political climate; the Yellow Book approach was at the time necessary to insure the legislation's passage. 

[Bickendan]

I would argue Portland/Vancouver CRC, as Washington is wanting to move the ball forward again, but Oregon doesn't want a new freeway unless there is no other option. Some would make a good argument to the freeway system in general.

Historical example: Vancouver threatening to sue Portland and ODOT while activists were trying to kill 95th Ave through Portland after the Mt Hood's demise.

[jon daly]

^^^^^^
Apparently that concept, utilized with the original Autobahns and also copied by Europe's "A" system of limited-access highways, was what Eisenhower had in mind when promoting the authorizing Interstate legislation; the "Yellow Book", which delineated the results of that legislation, was in no small part influenced by state and local political and economic needs -- hence the desire to route trunks through urban centers to (potentially) enhance the prospects of those areas (particularly in the face of the increased "suburbanization" in the '50's).  In hindsight, the Euro configuration might well have been a better approach -- but 60 years ago it couldn't have been "sold" in that day's political climate; the Yellow Book approach was at the time necessary to insure the legislation's passage. 

I found digitized versions of the Yellow Book and looked at the cities I'm most familiar with. I was surprised to see in Hartford that the E-W highway was mostly south of the city. But that seems like it was an outlier. Legend has it that it was rerouted downtown so everyone had to drive by G. Fox; the city's biggest department store.

[Rothman]

^^^^^^
Apparently that concept, utilized with the original Autobahns and also copied by Europe's "A" system of limited-access highways, was what Eisenhower had in mind when promoting the authorizing Interstate legislation; the "Yellow Book", which delineated the results of that legislation, was in no small part influenced by state and local political and economic needs -- hence the desire to route trunks through urban centers to (potentially) enhance the prospects of those areas (particularly in the face of the increased "suburbanization" in the '50's).  In hindsight, the Euro configuration might well have been a better approach -- but 60 years ago it couldn't have been "sold" in that day's political climate; the Yellow Book approach was at the time necessary to insure the legislation's passage. 

I found digitized versions of the Yellow Book and looked at the cities I'm most familiar with. I was surprised to see in Hartford that the E-W highway was mostly south of the city. But that seems like it was an outlier. Legend has it that it was rerouted downtown so everyone had to drive by G. Fox; the city's biggest department store.

G. Fox was more to blame for the lack of a direct ramp between I-84 EB and I-91 NB.

[bugo]

M-239, the "Cornfield Roadblock" that existed for many years until Indiana finally completed their section if I-94.  Conspiracy theories abound.

I've never heard of this. Do you have a link or any other information about it?

Nexus 5X

[GaryV]

M-239, the "Cornfield Roadblock" that existed for many years until Indiana finally completed their section if I-94.  Conspiracy theories abound.

I've never heard of this. Do you have a link or any other information about it?

Nexus 5X

Bessert does:  http://michiganhighways.org/listings/MichHwys230-249.html

[jon daly]

^^^^^^
Apparently that concept, utilized with the original Autobahns and also copied by Europe's "A" system of limited-access highways, was what Eisenhower had in mind when promoting the authorizing Interstate legislation; the "Yellow Book", which delineated the results of that legislation, was in no small part influenced by state and local political and economic needs -- hence the desire to route trunks through urban centers to (potentially) enhance the prospects of those areas (particularly in the face of the increased "suburbanization" in the '50's).  In hindsight, the Euro configuration might well have been a better approach -- but 60 years ago it couldn't have been "sold" in that day's political climate; the Yellow Book approach was at the time necessary to insure the legislation's passage. 

I found digitized versions of the Yellow Book and looked at the cities I'm most familiar with. I was surprised to see in Hartford that the E-W highway was mostly south of the city. But that seems like it was an outlier. Legend has it that it was rerouted downtown so everyone had to drive by G. Fox; the city's biggest department store.

G. Fox was more to blame for the lack of a direct ramp between I-84 EB and I-91 NB.

Ahhh. That makes more sense. Despite having Monday off, it's been a long week for me and brainfry kicked last night.

[Flint1979]

M-239, the "Cornfield Roadblock" that existed for many years until Indiana finally completed their section if I-94.  Conspiracy theories abound.

I've never heard of this. Do you have a link or any other information about it?

Nexus 5X

I've heard of that before. Actually though Indiana completed their eastern section of I-94 only after Michigan was done with their section of I-94.

[Occidental Tourist]

Don't forget Nevada taxpayers chipping in to widen I-15 between Victorville and Barstow on the way to Vegas.

[skluth]

Not as egregious an example, but the US-12 freeway at the IL/WI state line is a similar issue.  IL won't build the freeway, so the Wisconsin freeway just spills off onto a surface road via a pair of ramps.

But that's a mess that hasn't been cleaned up.  So how does it fit here? If Wisconsin did something about the problem then it would fit.

I looked at it as Wisconsin doing their share, and having to clean up Illinois's mess.  Illinois made a mess by necessitating that US12 barf all its traffic onto the surface streets, from this perspective.

But it's still a mess. There hasn't been any clean up done by Wisconsin.  Otherwise the highway would continue on into IL. In the example the mess of an incomplete I-95 in NJ is being resolved by PA by rerouting I-95. 

Say Wisconsin rerouted US 12 along WS 50 to I-94 and had US 12 enter IL on I-94.  Then Wisconsin would clean up the mess by doing something at least for US 12.  The dead end highway would still be there.  But that essentially would be equivalent to the example.

Wisconsin expedited the four-laning of WI 50 in large part to get commuter traffic from Walworth County to Chicago after being frustrated by the lack of progress by Illinois on US 12.  It was planned to be four lane eventually, but the fact that it was upgraded from US 12 to I-94 shows why it was needed then.

[roadfro]

Don't forget Nevada taxpayers chipping in to widen I-15 between Victorville and Barstow on the way to Vegas.

I'm fairly certain that money didn't come directly from Nevada taxpayers, but rather it was either a diversion of a portion of Nevada's federal highway funding or a contribution from the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority (whose primary income sources are hotel room taxes and operating profits from the Las Vegas Convention Center).

[sparker]

Don't forget Nevada taxpayers chipping in to widen I-15 between Victorville and Barstow on the way to Vegas.

I'm fairly certain that money didn't come directly from Nevada taxpayers, but rather it was either a diversion of a portion of Nevada's federal highway funding or a contribution from the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority (whose primary income sources are hotel room taxes and operating profits from the Las Vegas Convention Center).

Originally, the entire CA length of I-15 from the end of the 4+4 Cajon Pass segment in Hesperia to the state line was to be expanded with the assistance of this funding source; but Caltrans chose to start from the south end of the authorized segment.  By the time the Victorville-Barstow segment was complete, the 2007-2011 recession was starting and LV-sourced revenues were significantly lower than in previous years, with the result that the funding was suspended until the revenue stream had normalized.  The upshot was that CA got an improved I-15 as far north as the I-40 split in Barstow, which was of course beneficial to cross-country commercial traffic -- while LV traffic north of that point still travels on the same 4-lane (with truck climbing lanes on the Halloran/"Baker Hill" and Mountain Pass summits) facility that has been in place since the late '60's.  Whether the comprehensive 6-laning project will resume at any point is anybody's guess; somehow I imagine NDOT is none too pleased with Caltrans' priorities.

[MikieTimT]

I don't know much about the bypass, but from what I can tell it looks like Arkansas is making the mess and Missouri will have to clean it up.

It does look like that on the ground, but I think most people familiar with the story might say the mess-making goes in the other direction.  Arkansas was committed to building it while Missouri postponed construction and removed funding from its STIP a few years ago, putting Arkansas in the position of having to build an interim facility (two lanes expandable to four), while Missouri has built nothing except a ramp stub.

I think I actually just happened upon Missouri's stub ramp while browsing Street View in the area.
I get the impression, from news articles and other sources, that there are few Missourians that see the need for the facility, while there's been an understandably much stronger push from Arkansas.
I still wonder why Arkansas didn't just build four lanes from the outset; a full freeway would make the gap much more glaring, hopefully prompting (or perhaps embarassing) Missouri into taking action.

Arkansas for the most part is a pay-as-you-go state, which, given that it's almost always close to the bottom on wealth, means that progress has always been rather slow on projects here and tend to get done piecemeal as funds permit.  It has kept Arkansas from becoming the fiscal mess that other states have gotten themselves into, but has resulted in some slow progress on major projects in the past.  What has changed in the last couple of decades has been a couple of voter-approved bond issues where fractional cent sales tax increases have been enacted to retire the bonds, with sunset provisions on those taxes.  It has worked rather well in a poor state like Arkansas where we have actually taxed ourselves in return for getting to specify where that tax money went to, and an official retirement of that tax.  Rarely happens anywhere else, but it has resulted in some rather dramatic improvements to the Interstate system over the last couple of decades compared to where it was in the 90's.

What happened with the Bella Vista Bypass is that Missouri had the money to go to the state line when they were doing the grade separations on US-71 to have it promoted to I-49, but given the development around Bella Vista, everything south of the stub had to be new terrain through limestone hills.  Arkansas didn't have the money allocated at that time to meet them at the line, so they improved US-71 down to Bella Vista instead and left the stub.  Then they moved their money to other needs around the state.  Arkansas 2-3 years later got funding firmed up to at least get a Super-2 facility to the state line, which would still be a dramatic improvement over 9 stoplights in Bella Vista.  The Connecting Arkansas Program has enabled a lot of road construction in NorthWest Arkansas to finally catch up with the growth, so this corner of the state is finally getting some attention after decades of neglect from the powers in Little Rock.  The Fayetteville/Springdale/Rogers metropolitan area has rapidly grown to almost Top-100 now, so it's bleeding into the bordering counties along the federal highways now.  Lot's of folks in McDonald County, Missouri work for Wal-Mart/Tyson/JB Hunt and it makes rush hour in Bella Vista, which was originally a quiet little retirement village, very congested in rush hour.

Arkansas is now working on the other 2 lanes along where they have almost completed the Super-2, which is 3 miles shy of the border, so that embarrassing gap is getting pushed onto Missouri now.  And now it's Missouri who can't come up with any money and is having to rely on Arkansas putting in requests for federal grants on their behalf, although Missouri's residents working in NWA and thru I-49 traffic are the ones that are really the most in need for the bypass in the first place.

[Road Hog]

I noticed that McDonald County's population hasn't exploded like the Arkansas counties have. Is that merely a function of the poor transportation system, or are there real economic advantages to living in Arkansas vs. Missouri?

[Brandon]

M-239, the "Cornfield Roadblock" that existed for many years until Indiana finally completed their section if I-94.  Conspiracy theories abound.

I've never heard of this. Do you have a link or any other information about it?

I've heard of that before. Actually though Indiana completed their eastern section of I-94 only after Michigan was done with their section of I-94.

Well after Michigan completed I-94 in the early 1960s.  It took Indiana until 1972 to finally complete I-94 from Burns Harbor (Toll Road) to the state line.

[CapeCodder]

I noticed that McDonald County's population hasn't exploded like the Arkansas counties have. Is that merely a function of the poor transportation system, or are there real economic advantages to living in Arkansas vs. Missouri?

McDonald County was pretty depressed last I saw (about nine years ago, don't hold me to it) Terrain can be a factor. There's also a few canoe streams of significance for the area in and around Noel. I've seen jaw dropping poverty near there (makes you want to just question everything; including your own issues.) Oklahoma is right next door as is Arkansas, so people want to head there.

[ilpt4u]

How about Wisconsin designating I-41 and I-43, because Illinois/IDOT did not want to play nice, designating any of I-55, I-57, and/or I-65 North of their current ends in or near Chicago

I don't know if that is cleaning up a mess or creating one...

[ipeters61]

Have they fixed up downtown Willimantic? I drove through there yesterday and it looked more lively than I ever recall seeing it.

It's had it's upswings and downswings over the last few years.  At the moment there is quite a bit going on downtown.  Main ST was repaved 2 years ago and most of the sidewalk along it replaced last year.  The town just built a bandshell on Jillson Square (the town green by the Thread City Crossing) and there's plans to build a new senior center where the movie theater used to be.  But, there's still a lot of buildings empty and in disrepair, and many of the small businesses that open close as quickly as they came.

Oddly I kind of miss Willimantic.  I went to ECSU so I spent 4 years there and my time there was a little biased (since I met most of my present-day friends at ECSU), but it was the first "city" I lived in and it kind of formed a lot of my habits today.

But anyway, to answer the question, at least when I was there last about 2 years ago, Willimantic was still pretty depressed, unfortunately.

(also, why did I choose to respond to a question asked several months ago?  oh right...I'm an idiot  )

[jon daly]

^ I got my BA in Econ there back in '98.

[sparker]

How about Wisconsin designating I-41 and I-43, because Illinois/IDOT did not want to play nice, designating any of I-55, I-57, and/or I-65 North of their current ends in or near Chicago

I don't know if that is cleaning up a mess or creating one...

Back in the very early '70's, when it became clear that IDOT (at the request of the Daley administration in Chicago) would not accede to the original plans to replace I-94 through downtown Chicago with an extension of I-57 (via truncation of the former route at Milwaukee), WIDOT had a choice of a relatively broad pool of odd-numbered Interstate designations to use for the Milwaukee-Green Bay corridor authorized in the '68 Interstate expansion legislation; with US 51, 53, 61 and 63 existing within the state, any odd number in the 40's was still available back then.  A more regionally logical choice would have been 47 or 49; but WIDOT selected 43, as it was a short state route easily renumbered.  Of course, that had the effect of shifting the upper Midwest grid eastward, eventually resulting in the later ('84) corridor along US 51 being designated as the next lowest available odd number, 39 -- making the upper Midwest grid a total mismatch in regards to the N-S Interstate designations further south (I-49's north terminus is some 300 miles west of I-39's south terminus). 

The upshot is that in this case WI not only didn't "clean up" the mess that IL started but compounded the problem by taking a short-sighted and self-interested approach by designating I-43 back in '74.