Bypass Routes as Bad as or Worse Than What They Bypass

[NE2]

I-405 in California and Washington were both built in already-developed areas on existing corridors.

[SSOWorld]

LA's a crapshoot when it comes to finding a bypass.  Your best possibilty is going on 138 to 15 from 5 - but that costs time - a lot of it if your going to San Diego.

405 is more efficient in spite of its traffic woes than the 5 is.  the latter goes through the East LA Interchange which is extremely outdated and undersized for today's traffic (the 5 follows 1 lane or shares with the 60) and the 5 is a six-lane (though not for long) south of there to Orange County compared to the 8+1 HOV that the 405 offers.  Locals obviously have figured that out, but both routes clog up easily due to the number of cars on the road on any given day combined with business in both areas.

[SteveG1988]

US301 between US50 and the Potomac River. Congested, would probably perfer 95/495 due to it being a freeway, despite the increased traffic.

[empirestate]

I'm sure there are occasions where this isn't true, but it seems to me whenever I've been through Syracuse that I-481 is a much longer bypass than I-81 through town.

Then there's the perennial discussion of whether the all-Thruway bypass of Albany is better than I-90 all the way. I have actually measured it out in the past and found the difference to be negligible time-wise, but of course I'm famous for always seeming to miss the notorious Exit 24 backups.

[thenetwork]

I always hated I-469 around Ft. Wayne if you were following it as through traffic for US-24 or US-30. 

Yes, it kept you moving vs. following the old highways through downtown or via Coliseum Blvd., but it took you so far out of the way.  I still think you make better time just going through town on the surface streets. 


And I-480 in Cleveland is such an easy target for this thread!  Using the busiest freeway in Cleveland just to shunpike some tolls on I-80/Ohio Turnpike?!?!?  Come on.

[NE2]

And I-480 in Cleveland is such an easy target for this thread!  Using I-480 just to shunpike some tolls on I-80/Ohio Turnpike?!?!?  Come on.

Since when is I-480 a bypass for I-80?

[SSOWorld]

And I-480 in Cleveland is such an easy target for this thread!  Using I-480 just to shunpike some tolls on I-80/Ohio Turnpike?!?!?  Come on.

Since when is I-480 a bypass for I-80?

indeed it's intent is to loop "through a city".  Plus, the tolls "bypassed as he says" won't amount to much at all.


(tl;dr) this.

[kkt]

I-405 in California and Washington were both built in already-developed areas on existing corridors.

Hmm?  I don't know about California, but the 405 route in Washington was one medium-sized bedroom community (with a small mall) at Bellevue plus a couple of other small towns with lots of rural area in between them.  405 certainly was intended as a bypass of Seattle.

[NE2]

I-405 in California and Washington were both built in already-developed areas on existing corridors.

Hmm?  I don't know about California, but the 405 route in Washington was one medium-sized bedroom community (with a small mall) at Bellevue plus a couple of other small towns with lots of rural area in between them.  405 certainly was intended as a bypass of Seattle.

Here's a 1940 map of Washington: note how I-405 replaced 2A and a few other routes.

[vdeane]

I'm sure there are occasions where this isn't true, but it seems to me whenever I've been through Syracuse that I-481 is a much longer bypass than I-81 through town.

Ditto.  I've found I-481 to have a rather high number of cars for a four lane road, keeping traffic to 10 mph below the speed limit most of the time south of the Thruway.  I-81, on the other hand, tends to move at or above the speed limit outside of rush hour.  This is why I don't like the boulevard option for I-81 (that, and I like I-81's mileposts just the way they are, and save for a conversion to mile-based numbers, don't want to change the exit numbers either).

[kkt]

I-405 in California and Washington were both built in already-developed areas on existing corridors.

Hmm?  I don't know about California, but the 405 route in Washington was one medium-sized bedroom community (with a small mall) at Bellevue plus a couple of other small towns with lots of rural area in between them.  405 certainly was intended as a bypass of Seattle.

Here's a 1940 map of Washington: note how I-405 replaced 2A and a few other routes.

Yes, so you're claiming that a freeway can't be a bypass if there was a country road in the vicinity that the freeway replaces?

[NE2]

No, I'm saying that it already served as a suburb-to-suburb connection in addition to a bypass.

[jhuntin1]

I always hated I-469 around Ft. Wayne if you were following it as through traffic for US-24 or US-30. 

Yes, it kept you moving vs. following the old highways through downtown or via Coliseum Blvd., but it took you so far out of the way.  I still think you make better time just going through town on the surface streets. 

I've always thought that I-469 doesn't really help anyone unless they're looking to get to the south side of Fort Wayne or New Haven. It's not good as a bypass since it's longer than staying on the parent. At least INDOT likes it because it allows them to save mileage by routing US 24, 27, 30, and 33 around Fort Wayne instead of through it.

[NE2]

I-469 is part of the St. Louis to Detroit corridor.

[english si]

Also, not every even 2di is meant to be a bypass - it could be a distributor/belt type route - which is the case with I-469, though that also provides access to the Fort-to-Port route (US24) and US30 - ie two bypasses forming a back-to-front C around the city.

[cpzilliacus]

US301 between US50 and the Potomac River. Congested, would probably perfer 95/495 due to it being a freeway, despite the increased traffic.

I have used U.S. 301, not so much to avoid the I-95/I-495 section, but to avoid I-95 between I-295 (Henrico County, Va., north of Richmond) and the Springfield Interchange in Fairfax County - a section that can be congested that entire distance, or about 102 miles, especially northbound on summertime Sundays and southbound on getaway Fridays and similar days.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

I-494 and I-694 bypassing MSP are really no less congested than I-94 through TWO city centers.

[froggie]

US301 between US50 and the Potomac River. Congested, would probably perfer 95/495 due to it being a freeway, despite the increased traffic.

In this case, US 301 was never built or (originally) intended as a bypass.  It's a different animal entirely, though there are those who use it as a "bypass" of the DC area.

I-494 and I-694 bypassing MSP are really no less congested than I-94 through TWO city centers.

494 was never intended as a bypass for 94.  You have a good point with 694, though 694 does have fewer chokepoints than 94 does.

[JREwing78]

I think the same can be said of highways like 294 in Chicago...

I beg to differ on I-294 around Chicago.  If you've ever had to deal with the heel of the Circle Interchange (on-peak or off-peak), I-294 is most definitely better than what it bypasses.

It depends entirely on the time of day and whatever activities are taking place downtown. I regularly visit family and friends in Michigan, and usually taking I-294 around Chicago is smoother and faster than going through downtown.

However, I occasionally can get away with following I-90 right through downtown and onto the Chicago Skyway - and when I can, that ends up being the fastest route. The Indiana Toll Road has the added bonus of a 70 mph speed limit on most of the stretch between the Skyway and I-94.

[Roadrunner75]

US301 between US50 and the Potomac River. Congested, would probably perfer 95/495 due to it being a freeway, despite the increased traffic.

In this case, US 301 was never built or (originally) intended as a bypass.  It's a different animal entirely, though there are those who use it as a "bypass" of the DC area.

My brother always used 301 as a bypass to go from the Richmond area to NJ, but I don't care for it due to the traffic and lights north of the Potomac to US 50 and the expressway gap in Middletown, DE (until they build the freeway to DE-1 which might happen sometime before my retirement age).

[cpzilliacus]

US301 between US50 and the Potomac River. Congested, would probably perfer 95/495 due to it being a freeway, despite the increased traffic.

In this case, US 301 was never built or (originally) intended as a bypass.  It's a different animal entirely, though there are those who use it as a "bypass" of the DC area.

I respectfully disagree.

From physical page 19 of this document (.pdf) is the following paragraph (emphasis added):

Greiner also designed the Potomac River Bridge (US 301) between Charles County, Maryland and King George County, Virginia. The bridge opened in December 1940 and enabled travelers from eastern and southern Maryland heading to Virginia and points further south to bypass Washington, D.C. where they had previously crawled through along US 1. Traffic engineers predicted the bridge would carry an average of 136,000 vehicles-per-year during the first five years. During 1942, the traffic volume surpassed 171,600 vehicles; four years later, the count  climbed to 453,900 annually. Traffic peaked at 3.2 million in 1964 but  dropped by a third the  following year after the opening of the Capital Beltway (I 495), which allowed southbound motorists to quickly travel around Washington, cross the Potomac River along the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, and continue south into Virginia (St. Mary"˜s Today 2004).  In 1968, the US 301 Bridge was renamed the Harry W. Nice Memorial Bridge to honor the governor of Maryland (1935 - 1939) during whose administration the bridge was planned and built.

[froggie]

MD may have considered it a "DC bypass", but Virginia didn't.  The Nice Bridge also replaced a ferry that had existed in that general vicinity.  Also of note, Maryland intended it for "eastern and southern Maryland" travelers to avoid DC...not really for through traffic from Baltimore and points north, though they could've used Crain Hwy to connect.

[cpzilliacus]

MD may have considered it a "DC bypass", but Virginia didn't.  The Nice Bridge also replaced a ferry that had existed in that general vicinity.  Also of note, Maryland intended it for "eastern and southern Maryland" travelers to avoid DC...not really for through traffic from Baltimore and points north, though they could've used Crain Hwy to connect.

Compared to U.S. 1 south from Baltimore through  Elkridge, Laurel, Beltsville, College Park, Hyattsville, and the District of Columbia, U.S. 301 was a massive improvement for drivers headed south, with many less signalized intersections.

[on_wisconsin]

I-894 around Milwaukee is roughly the same as its parent route.

[SteveG1988]

As a bypass of philly I-295 has one flaw, it gets mixed in with I-76 traffic, causing traffic jams, that makes it almost as bad as I-95 through philly during rush hour, due to that one bottleneck. It is being fixed, so overall it may be better than I-95 but once the traffic jam starts, it isn't much better.