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Washington

Started by jakeroot, May 21, 2016, 01:56:31 PM

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Kacie Jane

Quote from: jakeroot on January 14, 2019, 02:58:34 PM
I had thought that Washington had removed all its "420" mile-markers already. I believe SR-20 and US-12 are the only routes that qualify, and zooming around Eastern WA a few months ago, I don't remember seeing any on Street View. Obviously I missed something, however, since Pete's article is brand new.

It may be a new article, but it's not news.

This Spokesman-Review article from 2015 says the milepost on SR 20 had been replaced with a 419.9 one three years before.


Bickendan

Quote from: ErmineNotyours on January 14, 2019, 11:07:01 AM
Quote from: Bickendan on January 13, 2019, 01:01:29 AM
Quote from: ErmineNotyours on January 12, 2019, 11:56:13 PM
In driving to Astoria, Oregon along US 30 last month, I saw a Mile 419.9.  I think it's new because I couldn't find it on the Oregon Digital Video Log, to see if it really at 419.9 or 420.
I doubt it's ODOT - the zero for that segment of US 30 (ORH 2W/92 Lower Columbia River Hwy) is in Portland at I-405, and it won't be for US 101 (ORH 4 Oregon Coast Hwy), which zeros at the border on the Astoria-Metzgler Bridge.

While US 30 clocks in around 480 miles in Oregon, its mile 420 would be around Baker, but it wouldn't be mileposted as such (it'd either fall on the La Grande-Baker Hwy or on I-84/ORH 6 Old Oregon Trail).

Well, that would explain why I couldn't find it on Digital Video Log or Google Street View.  I remembered it westbound just before I got to a small city.  It's been a month and a half and I can't remember more exactly.

Edit: on second thought, it was a 68.9 milepost.
Now that would certainly qualify, though that would be closer to Clatskanie than to Astoria.

Bruce

With Paine Field opening for passenger service in just a month, I've been thinking of access to the airport. SR 96 should be extended all the way up Airport Road to meet SR 526, thus bringing the airport onto the state highway system.

compdude787

Quote from: Bruce on January 16, 2019, 07:28:13 PM
With Paine Field opening for passenger service in just a month, I've been thinking of access to the airport. SR 96 should be extended all the way up Airport Road to meet SR 526, thus bringing the airport onto the state highway system.

That's a good idea. Also, SR 96 on its eastern end needs to be moved off of its current alignment and onto Cathcart Way, since it has a higher speed limit and higher capacity than the roads that make up its present routing.

Hurricane Rex

Quote from: Bruce on January 16, 2019, 07:28:13 PM
With Paine Field opening for passenger service in just a month, I've been thinking of access to the airport. SR 96 should be extended all the way up Airport Road to meet SR 526, thus bringing the airport onto the state highway system.
Except every major airport in the PNW with the exception of Boise does not have a state highway to the parking lot like the proposal here. Plus 526 goes around the permimiter. This is not to say I disagree with it, I actually support this, but chamces are really low.

LG-TP260

ODOT, raise the speed limit and fix our traffic problems.

Road and weather geek for life.

Running till I die.

Bickendan

Quote from: Hurricane Rex on January 18, 2019, 03:19:32 AM
Quote from: Bruce on January 16, 2019, 07:28:13 PM
With Paine Field opening for passenger service in just a month, I've been thinking of access to the airport. SR 96 should be extended all the way up Airport Road to meet SR 526, thus bringing the airport onto the state highway system.
Except every major airport in the PNW with the exception of Boise does not have a state highway to the parking lot like the proposal here. Plus 526 goes around the permimiter. This is not to say I disagree with it, I actually support this, but chamces are really low.

OR 213 used to run to the terminal. I suspect it was pulled back to 82nd when I-205 got built and the Port of Portland assumed all of Airport Way between PDX and I-205.

Bruce

Quote from: Hurricane Rex on January 18, 2019, 03:19:32 AM
Quote from: Bruce on January 16, 2019, 07:28:13 PM
With Paine Field opening for passenger service in just a month, I've been thinking of access to the airport. SR 96 should be extended all the way up Airport Road to meet SR 526, thus bringing the airport onto the state highway system.
Except every major airport in the PNW with the exception of Boise does not have a state highway to the parking lot like the proposal here. Plus 526 goes around the permimiter. This is not to say I disagree with it, I actually support this, but chamces are really low.

LG-TP260

Sea-Tac is served by SR 99 (which coincidentally allows you to walk to the terminal without going through the light rail station). A state highway to the parking lot would be useless, but this is a pretty  logical connection, as SR 526 would not be serving people from the south and doesn't really get close enough to the terminal (at the center-east part of the airport property).

jakeroot

It's 2019...I guess we're still too good for arrow-per-lane signs? Sure, let's keep using the style that was disallowed numerous years ago...


KEK Inc.

Quote from: jakeroot on January 24, 2019, 06:06:47 PM
It's 2019...I guess we're still too good for arrow-per-lane signs? Sure, let's keep using the style that was disallowed numerous years ago...

Haha, I think the only APL I know of still in Washington is the 205/5 split in Salmon Creek.  (MM7 on I-5 SB)

Is that the final iteration of that sign?  It'll probably be revised 10 years later when the project is over. 
Take the road less traveled.

jakeroot

#509
Quote from: KEK Inc. on January 25, 2019, 01:50:11 PM
Quote from: jakeroot on January 24, 2019, 06:06:47 PM
It's 2019...I guess we're still too good for arrow-per-lane signs? Sure, let's keep using the style that was disallowed numerous years ago...

Haha, I think the only APL I know of still in Washington is the 205/5 split in Salmon Creek.  (MM7 on I-5 SB)

Is that the final iteration of that sign?  It'll probably be revised 10 years later when the project is over.

Now that I think about it, it's possible that this sign was drafted prior to the elimination of the option-lane down-arrow option. I think WSDOT only adopted that version of the MUTCD in late 2011. Future option lane signs in the area may come in the form of up arrows. I-5 in the other direction through Tacoma has a few APL-ish signs; it could be that up-arrow signs were drafted after the current MUTCD was adopted, having been the result of of the new regulations.

I suspect it may be the final iteration for a while. The HOV exit towards 16 won't open for a while, but the signage for that is covered up, several hundred meters down the freeway. So I don't foresee any changes at this exact spot.


Bruce

Remember that $15 billion roads package passed four years ago by the legislature? Turns out it wasn't enough, so a new bill aims to create a 10-year, $16.3 billion package funded by a 6-cent gas tax increase and some form of carbon taxing.

https://www.heraldnet.com/news/plan-knots-together-carbon-fee-gas-tax-and-new-us-2-trestle/

Projects include: rebuilding the US 2 trestle east of Everett; five electric ferries; the Vancouver-Portland bridge on I-5 (don't call it the Cross Columbia); widening SR 522 between Maltby and Monroe to complete the four-laning; and improvements to SR 9.

jakeroot

Assuming Oregon and the feds kick in the required amounts for the new Columbia River crossing, I would be fine with this. Not a huge fan of the locked in carbon fee, but it's a step.

I do find it annoying that Hans Zieger suddenly doesn't want anything to do with a tax hike, now that him and Stambaugh got their freeway to Tacoma. I would imagine that he would support a package that included money for 167's second stage, though (something I don't believe is included).

compdude787

Quote from: Bruce on January 26, 2019, 07:43:19 PM
Remember that $15 billion roads package passed four years ago by the legislature? Turns out it wasn't enough, so a new bill aims to create a 10-year, $16.3 billion package funded by a 6-cent gas tax increase and some form of carbon taxing.

https://www.heraldnet.com/news/plan-knots-together-carbon-fee-gas-tax-and-new-us-2-trestle/

Projects include: rebuilding the US 2 trestle east of Everett; five electric ferries; the Vancouver-Portland bridge on I-5 (don't call it the Cross Columbia); widening SR 522 between Maltby and Monroe to complete the four-laning; and improvements to SR 9.

I'm glad those projects are finally being funded. I also see that funding is being put forth to build the first phase of the Monroe Bypass--FINALLY!!!!!!!! It's only been fifty years since it's been needed.

nexus73

When does the last 4-lane gap on I-5 between PDX and Seattle get upgraded to 6-lane?  I could not find any info on WSDOT's website the last time I looked. 

Rick
US 101 is THE backbone of the Pacific coast from Bandon OR to Willits CA.  Industry, tourism and local traffic would be gone or severely crippled without it being in functioning condition in BOTH states.

jakeroot

I've been doing some research via the UW-Tacoma library for a school assignment on Chambers Bay, and have come across several articles from the early 50s that show several cool maps (which I found via the Newsbank website):

Tacoma City Planning Commission (TCPC) map of planned freeways | Oct 1950: http://bit.ly/2GyL60O (shows planned Hwy 7 Freeway and a rather "optimistic" plan for very urban routes)

TCPC diagram of Narrows Bridge intersection | Aug 1950: http://bit.ly/2RPREtI (shows old intersection of Olympic Blvd & 6th which no longer exists)
>> this article also has a blurb about a new "super-duper traffic light...which does the work of a battery of traffic cops" lololol

TCPC diagram of proposed Titlow Beach-to-Point Defiance Parkway | Jan 1955: http://bit.ly/2tdm6Ec (considered a distant hope -- they were right...would have been a western parallel of Schuster Pkwy)




I may update this post when I find more articles that I find interesting. Note that the articles mostly pertain to Tacoma.

Bruce

Mind posting screenshots? Not all of us have access to the UW system :P

jakeroot

#516
Quote from: Bruce on February 08, 2019, 10:32:04 PM
Mind posting screenshots? Not all of us have access to the UW system :P

Oh shit. I guess that explains why I had to login to access the website  :pan: :pan:

Hopefully this stuff is all public domain now...

(images in order above)






ErmineNotyours

On the SR-99 tunnel meet, we were looking for the WSDOT bridge badge on the tunnel.  All we found was the date 2015 stamped on concrete, and fractional mile markers on both ends, as well as fractional mile markers inside.  I mentioned finding an old badge on the Montlake Bridge, when it was signed as highway 1-J.  Before the 1960s restructure, Washington had just a few one and two digit state highways, with lettered branches.  1 was the US 99 corridor, though state highways that share US highways were not marked with their state number, in favor of the US highway.  The Montlake Bridge now conveys SR 513 from SR 520 to the southwest corner of Magnuson Park.  It isn't signed from 520, has only a few old trailblazers left, and isn't even marked on Google Maps any more.  It is on Open Street Map  Presumably this is the highway that would have been replaced by the Thompson Expressway, and now it's almost forgotten, taking traffic to a Navy base that doesn't even exist any more.  NOAA still has a campus there, some blocks after the north end of the highway designation.

WSDOT bridge badge, Montlake Bridge by Arthur Allen, on Flickr

jakeroot

Quote from: ErmineNotyours on February 09, 2019, 12:34:33 AM
On the SR-99 tunnel meet, we were looking for the WSDOT bridge badge on the tunnel.  All we found was the date 2015 stamped on concrete, and fractional mile markers on both ends, as well as fractional mile markers inside.  I mentioned finding an old badge on the Montlake Bridge, when it was signed as highway 1-J.  Before the 1960s restructure, Washington had just a few one and two digit state highways, with lettered branches.  1 was the US 99 corridor, though state highways that share US highways were not marked with their state number, in favor of the US highway.  The Montlake Bridge now conveys SR 513 from SR 520 to the southwest corner of Magnuson Park.  It isn't signed from 520, has only a few old trailblazers left, and isn't even marked on Google Maps any more.  It is on Open Street Map  Presumably this is the highway that would have been replaced by the Thompson Expressway, and now it's almost forgotten, taking traffic to a Navy base that doesn't even exist any more.  NOAA still has a campus there, some blocks after the north end of the highway designation.

At least WSDOT still takes care of it. I believe this bridge will be twinned soon.




Found a better map of the proposed Tacoma freeways.

According to the article, the unbuilt Highway 5 freeway (modern-day SR-7 replacement) was to be a "limited access freeway-type highway from the Roy Y paralleling Pacific Avenue to the east and feeding into the US-99 Freeway and with a probable expressway downtown". I always wondered where it was meant to go. Glad I now have some closure.

There's also some pretty lengthy explanations for other freeway routes too:


ErmineNotyours


jakeroot

#520
Originally planned to open mid-2019 (though paving will proceed until Spring):

https://twitter.com/wsdot/status/1096206678016421888

Bruce

The redesigned Northgate Mall, with new cross streets and Dallas-style garage enclosures.



Full PDF docket here: http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/AppDocs/GroupMeetings/DRProposal3031301AgendaID7085.pdf

Plutonic Panda

Is that originally a typical suburban style mall atm?

ErmineNotyours

Quote from: Plutonic Panda on February 21, 2019, 04:39:15 AM
Is that originally a typical suburban style mall atm?

Presumably this is the first shopping center where stores face each other across a pedestrian-only mall.  The are still keeping the very north end of the mall (2, 3, 4 & 5 on the map), but nothing lasts forever.  http://mall-hall-of-fame.blogspot.com/search/label/Seattle%27s%20Northgate%20Center

jakeroot

I suppose a massive garage system is inevitable in this mixed urban/suburban environment. Though I hope they are well hidden, and not dominating.

If not Northgate, I hope the Tacoma Mall will take after Burnaby. If there's no height limit, just go crazy. Although if the budget is too limiting, I would prefer a whole bunch of mid-rise buildings rather than just a few skyscrapers.



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