Best and worst interchange in the US

[kphoger]

Worst:
The Hillside Strangler (thankfully, being addressed)

Ughh, yes.

[kphoger]

Part of the challenge here is that a well-designed interchange may well go completely unnoticed.

[thspfc]

Worst:
US-151 at US-14 on the west side of Madison
US-151 at US-20 in Dubuque (this one could be much worse, though with decent signal, timing it works out alright)
I-39 at US-20 and I-39 at I-90 (they're so close you can almost count them as one interchange. Woefully insufficient to handle I-39 plus US-20's traffic on 4-lanes. The left merge from I-90 west to I-39 south is also not great)

I tried to come up with more good interchanges, but I couldn't. A good interchange that works well just isn't as memorable as one that sucks!

Disagree with Verona Rd and Beltline being one of the worst. It works quite well considering the available space and other circumstances. There are dozens of interchanges that cause far more congestion.

Calling the Dubuque one an interchange is a stretch.

I never thought the I-39/90 split was that bad, but I haven't driven I-39 south of there so I don't know the full story.

[Henry]

Both of them are on I-290:

Best--Circle Interchange
Worst--Hillside Strangler

[kphoger]

ehhh..  I'm not crazy about the Circle either.

[CtrlAltDel]

ehhh..  I'm not crazy about the Circle either.

Eh, maybe when it's done. Whenever that is.


Anyway, going purely by aesthetics, might I suggest exit 175 on I-70 in Kansas. It seems to me to have the perfect diamond shape.

[mgk920]

Best:
The Marquette Interchange
The NEW I-39/I-90/I-43/WI-81 interchange (While it's not as nice for I-43 traffic looking to continue onto WI-81, the fact that they essentially built a trumpet interchange on top of a DDI is impressive)

I had communications with the WisDOT local office in Madison when that one (The 'Beloit interchange') was being laid out.  I was most impressed with it in that WisOOT restored local street connections that were severed since the early 1960s as the former WI 15 progressively evolved into today's I-43.  I used WisDOT's own I-41/WI 29/WI 32/Shawano Ave 'Shawano' interchange in the Green Bay area as a model for my discussions of my thoughts at Beloit.  IMHO, the Shawano Interchange is even more impressive than Beloit.

There is one local street connection at Beloit that was not addressed at the time, but it is relatively minor and can be taken up at some time in the future.

Mike

[Ted$8roadFan]

The I-93/I-95 junction in Reading/Stoneham, MA us really bad.

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5006606,-71.116939,16.42z

[hotdogPi]

The I-93/I-95 junction in Reading/Stoneham, MA us really bad.

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5006606,-71.116939,16.42z

It's no different from any other cloverleaf, of which there are several in Massachusetts. The issue is the lane drop on I-95 northbound after the next exit (MA 28).

[Ted$8roadFan]

The I-93/I-95 junction in Reading/Stoneham, MA us really bad.

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5006606,-71.116939,16.42z

It's no different from any other cloverleaf, of which there are several in Massachusetts. The issue is the lane drop on I-95 northbound after the next exit (MA 28).

I guess I was thinking in terms of traffic volumes on both 93 and 95. Most cloverleafs in Massachusetts have long outlived their usefulness.

[thspfc]

Best:
The Marquette Interchange
The NEW I-39/I-90/I-43/WI-81 interchange (While it's not as nice for I-43 traffic looking to continue onto WI-81, the fact that they essentially built a trumpet interchange on top of a DDI is impressive)

I had communications with the WisDOT local office in Madison when that one (The 'Beloit interchange') was being laid out.  I was most impressed with it in that WisOOT restored local street connections that were severed since the early 1960s as the former WI 15 progressively evolved into today's I-43.  I used WisDOT's own I-41/WI 29/WI 32/Shawano Ave 'Shawano' interchange in the Green Bay area as a model for my discussions of my thoughts at Beloit.  IMHO, the Shawano Interchange is even more impressive than Beloit.

There is one local street connection at Beloit that was not addressed at the time, but it is relatively minor and can be taken up at some time in the future.

Mike

I don't want to sound like Carhorn, but WISDOT really does build good interchanges. They've done the Marquette, Zoo, Mitchell, I-41/US-45 in Oshkosh, I-41/US-10, I-41/Shawano Ave, I-41/I-43 in Green Bay, US-51/WI-29/WI-52 in Wausau, and the Beloit interchange in the last 15 years. All 8 were successes (albeit expensive).

[keithvh]

Someone has to say 101/405 in Sherman Oaks/Encino.  So I'll be that person.

Just awful - the reasons why have been listed on this forum tons of times before.

[Cerlin]

Both aesthetically speaking and from personal experience, I hate the I-35 and Indian Hills Road interchange in Norman OK. Having a 2 way service road on both sides is already tricky but you essentially have two places where head on traffic is only stopped by a stop sign and yield sign and it's coupled with access points to an interstate. The road markings themselves are super limited too. I've seen quite a few near misses.

https://goo.gl/maps/P39ZvswtpAtzuef96

Thankfully, this is the location of a future turnpike and will be replaced by a supposed 5 level stack, but it's quite counterintuitive.

[dvferyance]

Worst one in Wisconsin. I-94 and Mitchell Blvd hands down.

[Hobart]

Anyway, going purely by aesthetics, might I suggest exit 175 on I-70 in Kansas. It seems to me to have the perfect diamond shape.

I check (card term) with the most perfect cloverleaf I could find!

Call it the best of the worst I guess. It's at I-29 and I-90, in South Dakota. There's lots of room in the rural midwest to construct very good cloverleaves and diamonds.

[CtrlAltDel]

I check (card term) with the most perfect cloverleaf I could find!

Call it the best of the worst I guess. It's at I-29 and I-90, in South Dakota. There's lots of room in the rural midwest to construct very good cloverleaves and diamonds.

That's a good one. I like the creek in the middle. I have to admit though that my favorite is (the no longer extant as such) I-57 at I-74 in Champaign, Illinois:

[Hobart]

I check (card term) with the most perfect cloverleaf I could find!

Call it the best of the worst I guess. It's at I-29 and I-90, in South Dakota. There's lots of room in the rural midwest to construct very good cloverleaves and diamonds.

That's a good one. I like the creek in the middle. I have to admit though that my favorite is (the no longer extant as such) I-57 at I-74 in Champaign, Illinois:

I-57 and 74 would be absolutely perfect for a cloverleaf if the diamond ramps ran diagonally. Everyone kept flinging themselves off of those because the ramps don't go straight when they should, which definitely brings it down to my bottom third.

I remember driving out of there with my family for concert band competitions at U of I, and there'd be a ton of signage because "hey, the ramp isn't straight, for the love of god don't be the twentieth person to have flipped their car on the ramp."

It's the same issue I have with the Cline Avenue cloverleaf with US-20, just with a worse situation with better signage.

[CtrlAltDel]

I-57 and 74 would be absolutely perfect for a cloverleaf if the diamond ramps ran diagonally. Everyone kept flinging themselves off of those because the ramps don't go straight when they should, which definitely brings it down to my bottom third.

I remember driving out of there with my family for concert band competitions at U of I, and there'd be a ton of signage because "hey, the ramp isn't straight, for the love of god don't be the twentieth person to have flipped their car on the ramp."

It's the same issue I have with the Cline Avenue cloverleaf with US-20, just with a worse situation with better signage.

Huh. I used to take the I-74 E to I-57 N ramp on any number of occasions and never noticed any particular difficulty in negotiating the ramps. That said, they did add these little doodads in about 2015, so there must have been something going on, at least with trucks.

[ztonyg]

Worst:

I-35 / I-635 / US 69:  https://goo.gl/maps/RTMC49iBHVC4XTCG9

I understand they were trying to get it all in south of the railroad tracks but they have a decent amount of space to work with and they could've done better than this.

Best:

I-980 / I-580 / CA 24: https://goo.gl/maps/AbSSNT4NGa9w1L2v8

This is the best simply because they were able to build a decent, high capacity interchange in a dense urban area with a rail line down the median of one of the freeways. It's probably one of the best engineered stack interchanges in the state of California (certainly in the era it was built) with only potentially I-10 / I-15 beating it (that's the nicest stack in SoCal). 

[wanderer2575]

I-57 and 74 would be absolutely perfect for a cloverleaf if the diamond ramps ran diagonally. Everyone kept flinging themselves off of those because the ramps don't go straight when they should, which definitely brings it down to my bottom third.

I remember driving out of there with my family for concert band competitions at U of I, and there'd be a ton of signage because "hey, the ramp isn't straight, for the love of god don't be the twentieth person to have flipped their car on the ramp."

It's the same issue I have with the Cline Avenue cloverleaf with US-20, just with a worse situation with better signage.

More irritating to me are straight diagonal ramps where you still have to slow down to 30 mph at the merge point because of ridiculously sharp curves.  Exhibit A is I-75 at US-10/M-25 in Bay City, MI:



https://goo.gl/maps/mLQiyZsDcJ3cNrMRA

[webny99]

Aesthetics aside, I think PA's twin cloverleaf interchanges on I-80 at I-180/PA 147 and US 15 should be in the running for "best" because of the lane separation between mainline and weaving movements, shown here. It functions pretty much the same as it would with a C/D road, but without the expense of separate roadways. It makes a lot of sense and I'm not sure why it's not done more often.

[XamotCGC]

I64/I 265 in Louisville KY. 

[webny99]

I64/I 265 in Louisville KY.

For best, or worst? 

[MoiraPrime]

I think this intersection is absolutely awful in just how obnoxious it is.

The Intersection of I-10, Clearview Parkway, and Veterans Memorial Boulevard in Metairie, LA.

The intersection overall:


Close ups...

Veterans/Clearview:

Note, the orange/red parts of clearview are an elevated bridge over veterans.

I-10/Clearview:



Openstreetmap link:
https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=16/29.9992/-90.1543

[XamotCGC]

I64/I 265 in Louisville KY.

For best, or worst? 

Worst.  Cloverleaf interchange with a lack of Collector and distributor lanes.  They're supposed to be doing  reconstruction work that corrects the problem.