It's 2014 and I still can't believe that.....

[cjk374]

60.  that 2014 is only 3 months away from becoming 2015!

[Tom958]

61. That eastbound I-20 to northbound I-285 on the west side of ATL is still a one-lane loop ramp. 

EDIT:

62. That there's still no proper overhead advance sign for the I-85-GA 400 split. I know that the fact that the I-85 viaduct was built without provision for supporting a sign gantry complicates things, but today I found myself wondering today what happened to the gantry that used to span twelve lanes of I-85 a few miles north of there. Couldn't they have mounted it on some really tall posts and spanned the entire width of the viaduct? Or did it go in the dumpster?

EDIT: My bad-- the gantry is still in use for the northbound side. Sometimes my bad attitude toward GDOT gets out of hand. 

2nd EDIT: That gantry, now scrap, I presume:

[kkt]

The new S.F.-Oakland Bay Bridge east span project still isn't quite done.

[DeaconG]

29) E-ZPass still isn't accepted outside of the northeast and midwest.

Fixed it for you.

No E-Pass/SunPass, Geaux Pass or Peach Pass compatibility, maybe partial NC Quick Pass (which is interoperable with SunPass). We might get SunPass compatibility in 2018? Ugh.

[DaBigE]

63: We have all these sophisticated CADD packages and sign production programs yet quality control still seems to be lacking for newly-erected signs

[Laura]

2) original signage still exists on the US-40/former I-170 in Baltimore.

Why wouldn't it? Baltimore City has no reason to put a single cent more into improving the "Highway to Nowhere"

64) That US-40/former I-170 in Baltimore isn't permanently closed. It has been "temporarily closed" on and off for years now, and no one has seemed to notice...

[The Nature Boy]

29) E-ZPass still isn't accepted outside of the northeast and midwest.

Fixed it for you.

No E-Pass/SunPass, Geaux Pass or Peach Pass compatibility, maybe partial NC Quick Pass (which is interoperable with SunPass). We might get SunPass compatibility in 2018? Ugh.

With the amount of Northeasterners who now live in Florida, I'm surprised there hasn't been a push for interoperability between SunPass and EZPass.

[Henry]

65. ...the I-74 in NC will never connect back to the one in Cincinnati!
66. ...I-73 is on the wrong side of I-77 (and I-75, for that matter).

[adventurernumber1]

67) I-14 is not built yet.

[bassoon1986]

68) Baton Rouge has not fixed or begun an alternative to the mess that is I-10/I-110

69) Texas has not done more to convert/ build I-69. Oh wait.....that's Louisiana & Arkansas   

70) US 57 and US 96 have not switched spots in Texas

71) I-49 has not been completely finished between I-20 and I-30. (I am not complaining about this. I think it's great how close it is to being done. I just would have thought it would have been finished years before now.

72) I-10 is not more than 2 lanes in many places from Beaumont, TX to Mobile

[Pete from Boston]

73) There are still threads on "What Intestates are not up to standard?"

[Bruce]

74) The Alaskan Way Viaduct, damaged in the 2001 Nisqually earthquake, is still being used by motorists. Tear it down now and argue about its replacement later.

[kkt]

CA 17 I-880 through Oakland is still crumbling to bits, along with sharp curves, narrow lanes, insufficient sightlines, and deep standing water when it rains.  Seems like it's been that way since the 1960s.  Why didn't it get upgraded along with the rest of 880?

[english si]

This isn't the "this is really bad" thread, but the "unbelievable in 2014" thread. That the A23 is dire is understandable (as I expound below). That the M25 is awful between J15 and J16 with no plan for relief isn't - given widening elsewhere, Heathrow expansion plans improving the road network in the vicinity (Runway 3 now, but Terminal 5 before it), and that the widening done in the 90s was insufficient then and known to be so.

Apparently the issue with the M23 is that there's no way to widen the A23, the road it empties out on, and even if they simply rerouted it around part of it, it would still end on that substandard A23, merely moving the problem a mile or so north.

If you extend the M23, or upgrade the A23 you either do a pretty useless job at dealing with the traffic (though removing traffic through Hooley) or need 10 miles of M23 and another 4 miles of distribution at about Streatham - if not more.

And anyway, an upgraded '23 corridor won't make traffic flow freer or quicker without at least $50bn's worth of construction.

I could come up with a good routing. First thing would be to re-utilize the old bypass (rebuild it, obviously) and then route it east of the Hooley city center. North of that, it would squeeze over Hollymeoak Road and then plug into the Coulsdon Bypass.

Hooley a city??? It's a small village. Add in the fact that it's on a narrow ridge and going east of the village (as well as needing a massive rework of the M23 north of the M25) has the additional problem of the railway pretty much next to it at the same level and needing to cross that twice. A key reason why the M23 never got further north was that it would have been on a long and tall viaduct over the Chipstead valley.

Hooley isn't demanding a bypass, unlike many other places (including Coulsden in the 90s) and it's not really the bottleneck (arguably the entirety of south London is), just the start of it. Plus the insane cost per mile on the edge of London would wipe it out politically.

Let's not forget that TFL is no stranger to massive infrastructure projects...this wouldn't be that crazy. From what I could tell on my last visit, traffic was pretty well dissipated by the time we hit the Croydon Costco. IF we could sort of fix it up to that point, I think things would at least moderately improve.

Lets also remember that TfL's has never approved a bypass, flyover or road widening (for cars) on its road network - they institutionally dislike motor vehicles that aren't big and red. The Coulsden bypass was approved before its creation, the A13 is a DBFO dating from before its creation too and the only road widenings have been to add bus/cycle lanes.

That ring road is planned for 35 years time, was lambasted as insane on this forum, and is merely an attempt to try and remove as many cars from the surface as possible rather than increasing capacity or decreasing journey times. Expect similar for the A23 - like with the Coulsden bypass, a Hooley bypass' point would be so you sit in traffic away from where people do stuff outside of cars, rather than improve traffic flow.

Plus the A23 at Hooley is the preserve of the Highways Agency, who don't give a rat's ass about non-core trunk roads, not TfL.

[NE2]

69) Texas has not done more to convert/ build I-69. Oh wait.....that's Louisiana & Arkansas   

69a) I-69 is still a thing in Louisiana and Arkansas. Oink.

[jakeroot]

70)...we still use the FHWA typeface (---cowers in corner---).
70a)...we still use Series E Modified even after the phase-out of button copy.

[triplemultiplex]

71) automobiles still need dangerous animals to operate them

[TheStranger]

CA 17 I-880 through Oakland is still crumbling to bits, along with sharp curves, narrow lanes, insufficient sightlines, and deep standing water when it rains.  Seems like it's been that way since the 1960s.  Why didn't it get upgraded along with the rest of 880?

I presume that's what the ongoing construction between 980 and High Street over the last few years has been about.

Seems to be some right-of-way constraints there compared to the newer section to the northwest (from 1997) that replaced the old Cypress Freeway.

[ET21]

72) NW Indiana is still under construction after over 14 years 

[cl94]

70)...we still use the FHWA typeface (---cowers in corner---).
70a)...we still use Series E Modified even after the phase-out of button copy.

And I'm glad we still use FHWA fonts. Much better than Clearview. Plus, there is research to indicate that it is no better (sometimes worse) than FHWA fonts used with identical reflectivity, hence why the FHWA is no longer issuing interim approvals and might kill it off.

[jakeroot]

70)...we still use the FHWA typeface (---cowers in corner---).
70a)...we still use Series E Modified even after the phase-out of button copy.

And I'm glad we still use FHWA fonts. Much better than Clearview. Plus, there is research to indicate that it is no better (sometimes worse) than FHWA fonts used with identical reflectivity, hence why the FHWA is no longer issuing interim approvals and might kill it off.

Never said anything about Clearview. I'm just saying FHWA has been around for so long without any update, perhaps we need to give a new typeface another shot. (Like most things in this thread, there is obviously a financial barrier, but we can gloss over that).

[shadyjay]

73)   CT 9 still has traffic lights on it in Middletown, and not a thing has been done to get rid of them.  65 mph to a dead stop in 1/4 mile!

[US71]

73)   CT 9 still has traffic lights on it in Middletown, and not a thing has been done to get rid of them.  65 mph to a dead stop in 1/4 mile!

Sounds like US 64 at Vilonia, AR except the speed limit drops to 60 from 65 about 1/4 mile before

[Pete from Boston]

73)   CT 9 still has traffic lights on it in Middletown, and not a thing has been done to get rid of them.  65 mph to a dead stop in 1/4 mile!

This has been the case so long that to be incredulous about it is more odd than not.  What is harder to believe, given how these things work, is that the 65 hasn't been lowered 1/4 mile from a stoplight.

[TEG24601]

74) There have not been any serious discussions about how to combat the E-W traffic backups through Portland, OR.  No new E-W MAX, no suggestions to create limited access corridors, no suggestions to in anyway address the bottleneck that is I-84.


75) We don't yet have High-Speed Rail connecting major US Cities.


76) There are still drawbridge sections of the Interstate Highway System.