Worst Endings to a Highway

[Henry]

Majority of the freeways in Portland, OR.  While some of the earlier plans were overzealous, some, like the Mt. Hood Freeway, seemed like it would've helped, especially given the fact that moving east to west in Portland gives you only one freeway option.  84.

Portland is kind of NIMBY Gone Wild.

That's funny; I was just railing about the lameness of the Portland Anti-Freeway crowd only a couple hours ago.

I don't know that I share your feelings about the Mt. Hood Freeway.  It would've been very close to the already-existing Banfield Freeway.  They should've planned it further south; it would've been more useful and possibly wouldn't have encountered as much opposition.

While it never was as close to reality as the Mt Hood, the Portland-area freeway I would've liked to see would have been the West Side Bypass.  Had they built it back when it was first floated as an idea, land acquisition would've been fairly easy.  Now that the area is built-up, there'd be no chance of it now.

I know that planning groupies (and members of the "anti-auto vanguard" from around the United States) worship Portland (and Portland Metro, the regional planning agency and regional government) as some sort of Heaven-on-earth because of the huge sums of local, state and federal tax dollars that have been spent on light rail and residential densification (including this disaster along a light rail line in Beaverton) - and that includes the cancellation of a fair number of centerline miles of freeway.

I always thought San Francisco was the NIMBY capital of the world!

[tdindy88]

The worship of Portland is something that is very true in the planning world. I took a few urban planning courses in college (I was a geography major) and I had one professor who couldn't go more than one class without mentioning something about Portland. Every other class, he literally mentioned how the cutting out of the Mt. Hood Freeway was a good thing. I took everything he said with a grain of salt as I would rather get the opinion about the merits of that freeway from an Oregeonan (sp?) than from someone who was originally from Philadelphia. I even accompanied the same professor on a class trip to Portland where he could do nothing but gush over Portland. Granted, I had a nice time in the city and it looked like it was a fantasyland for everything planners were for. But I always assumed that I was not getting the full story and that everything wasn't peachy in Portland.

[OCGuy81]

Portland is a great city, and I enjoy my visits there a lot, but there are some horrible traffic issues, and this is coming from a southern California resident.   The freeways seem incredibly dated, the pavement is rough, and getting west-east or vice versa is quite a feat.  There is I-84....and that's about it unless you go across the Columbia and cut east on WA 14, which I did to get to the airport once when there was a wreck on 84 and I was staying downtown.

There are other traffic snarls that I attribute to lack of alternative freeways, and ODOT's apparent refusal to make anything more than 3 lanes in each direction.

OR 217, pretty much the entire freeway is bad.
US 26.  East from 217 into downtown Portland always seems bad.  Even at rush hour, it seems inbound is worse than outbound.
I-5 north from downtown to Vancouver, WA
I-5 near the Rose Garden (2 lanes)
I-84 Eastbound from 1 (or noon on Friday) until about 7.
I-5 Terwilliger Curves.  The approach heading out of downtown is steep, with trucks struggling to make it up, and then you're faced with substandard curves.  Ick.

And my last rant....how the hell do you get on US 26 eastbound to catch the Ross Island Bridge? 

Would've been interesting to see what would've happened if the Mt. Hood and/or West Side bypass (I-605?) had been built.

Portland reminds me a lot of Austin, TX.  Both have a cool, diverse arts scene, laid back people......and are HORRIBLE to traverse from east to west!

[Alps]

I, too, interpreted it as spatial ends. I mean, why not post bad ends of any kind? One that satisfies both categories: the major artery of I-280 in NJ slams into First Street and dies, with NJ 58 barely continuing on.

[xonhulu]

To be fair, Henry's post was clear as poo.

I mostly fault the Subject line here.  "Decommissionings" or "removals" would've worked better than "endings."

[Henry]

To be fair, Henry's post was clear as poo.

I mostly fault the Subject line here.  "Decommissionings" or "removals" would've worked better than "endings."

Which is exactly what I was trying to get to!

[jp the roadgeek]

2 that I can think of.  First is the west end of Woodhaven Rd in Philly.  Second, which will be fixed soon, is the magical disappearance of I 95 at US 1 and I-295 in NJ, and the magical appearance of I 95 on the NJTP at exit 6

[roadman]

I nominate the Lowell Connector in Lowell, MA.  55 MPH freeway that suddenly ends at a T intersection with a two-lane city street.  The huge church facing you as you reach the end of the road is one of the reasons the Connector, which was supposed to rejoin US 3 north of Lowell, was never completed.

[agentsteel53]

Mexico federal highway 15D (a high-quality expressway) ends at Nogales at... the US border, complete with US border patrol. 

[1995hoo]

The Richmond Parkway on Staten Island might qualify for both "worst end" in terms of cancellation (because of the resulting traffic impact on I-278 due to traffic having to go up NY-440 and then all the way across on I-278 instead of cutting off about half of the latter's mileage) and in terms of "how" it actually ends (it dumps traffic onto its western service road, which then ends at Richmond Avenue, but the parkway itself continues for a short distance over unused pavement and abandoned overpasses to an abrupt end at Richmond Avenue). Other thing is, if you follow the most logical route from the end of the parkway, you wind up going so far back to the west that you haven't cut off much of I-278 at all.

Image here. The parkway should be obvious in the middle of the screen. If you zoom it out or pan the image you can find the ghost ramps where the road would have ended at I-278.

[Henry]

Speaking of New York (and Long Island), I'm glad I don't live there, because it has a lot of bad ends! I-78 at the end of the Holland Tunnel, NY 495 and the east end of I-495 come to mind.

[cpzilliacus]

I-395 (Third Street Tunnel) in the District of Columbia comes to a screeching halt at a signalized at-grade intersection at U.S. 50 (New York Avenue, N.W.).

[hbelkins]

I think pretty much anywhere you might see ghost ramps where there are no plans to lengthen the highway, you might have a candidate for this thread.

The new end of the Cumberland Parkway at US 27 in Somerset doesn't count because they plan to expand that road eastward.

One of the freeway endings on US 219 in Pennsylvania might count.

[cpzilliacus]

One of the freeway endings on US 219 in Pennsylvania might count.

U.S. 219 at Somerset also features a breezewood-type non-connection to the East-West Mainline of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

[Doctor Whom]

I-395 (Third Street Tunnel) in the District of Columbia comes to a screeching halt at a signalized at-grade intersection at U.S. 50 (New York Avenue, N.W.).

In addition, that intersection is more complicated than it could otherwise have been because of the Bible Way bend.

[cpzilliacus]

I-395 (Third Street Tunnel) in the District of Columbia comes to a screeching halt at a signalized at-grade intersection at U.S. 50 (New York Avenue, N.W.).

In addition, that intersection is more complicated than it could otherwise have been because of the Bible Way bend.

It ought to actually be called "Mayor-for-Life Marion Shepilov Barry, Jr. Bend."

[hbelkins]

One of the freeway endings on US 219 in Pennsylvania might count.

U.S. 219 at Somerset also features a breezewood-type non-connection to the East-West Mainline of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

Yes, but there is now talk of extending that portion of the 219 freeway south toward the Maryland state line.

The one I was thinking of is much farther north -- north of Ebensburg (had to look it up on a map.) It's obvious that the freeway was intended to go farther north from there.

[national highway 1]

Both stubs of I-710 in Los Angeles.

[Alps]

Speaking of New York (and Long Island), I'm glad I don't live there, because it has a lot of bad ends! I-78 at the end of the Holland Tunnel, NY 495 and the east end of I-495 come to mind.

On the other hand, you get a GREAT experience traveling the roads here. Old signs, old alignments, old bridges, freeway stubs, anything you want.

[roadman65]

I-49 in Lousiana at both ends.  The northern end goes from freeway around a curve (intended to be a future ramp) and then ends at a stoplight.  The southern end drops from a high speed freeway (70 MPH) to a 50 MPH arterial in a short distance inside the I-10 cloverleaf very abruptly.

The north end of PA's I-476 with its 180 degree turn into a toll plaza counts.

I-69 going from freeway to Binford Boulevard near Indy which does so quite abruptly ends unusually.

[cpzilliacus]

The north end of PA's I-476 with its 180 degree turn into a toll plaza counts.

Indeed it does. 

Though  I think  someone pointed out that this curve is there because original plans had the N.E. Extension continuing north along the path taken by "free" I-81. 

[theline]

The Richmond Parkway on Staten Island might qualify for both "worst end" in terms of cancellation (because of the resulting traffic impact on I-278 due to traffic having to go up NY-440 and then all the way across on I-278 instead of cutting off about half of the latter's mileage) and in terms of "how" it actually ends (it dumps traffic onto its western service road, which then ends at Richmond Avenue, but the parkway itself continues for a short distance over unused pavement and abandoned overpasses to an abrupt end at Richmond Avenue). Other thing is, if you follow the most logical route from the end of the parkway, you wind up going so far back to the west that you haven't cut off much of I-278 at all.

So what's the story behind that cancellation? It looks like finishing the road made a lot of sense.

[1995hoo]

I believe people rebelled over the loss of parkland, primarily. I agree with you, I always thought it was very logical for connecting the Outerbridge to the Verrazano.

[ssummers72]

I nominate I-65 at its Northern Terminus:

1. You crest a bridge over the I-90 ramps at 55MPH

2. Within 1500ft you come to a factory entrance on the left and a traffic signal at US-12/20

3. Then it turns into a 2 lane road (Tyler Street) at a set of railroad tracks

[mgk920]

Howabout the east end of I-490 in Ohio, or is this one better for the 'stub ends' thread?



Mike