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Baronjutter posted:PS I'm going to chime in here to say that it's not so much the size of the circle that matters when it comes to large vehicles, but what's in the center and on the outside. Professional truckers know how to navigate tight spaces and will ride up on curbs if they need to. As long as the entrances and exits are wide/gradual enough and you don't place objects on the inside and outside of the circle that could prevent them from getting through safely (IE concrete curb inlets inside the roundabout curb, a giant decorative planter in the center, Jersey barriers, etc.), a standard roundabout shouldn't need to be wider in circumference to compensate for the presence of large trucks. Increasing the diameter of the circle certainly couldn't hurt, but it might be an unneeded increase in the cost of construction. Ideally, the approach just needs to be wide enough so that they can line up an appropriate turn when entering, with the center containing either a painted asphalt or concrete apron with rumblestrip that they can just drive over if needed. That said, if you design something THIS small lined by trees, nothing longer than 35ft can safely use it:  Our resident traffic genius can explain the finer points if needed. Edit: Here's an example of a truck-route roundabout recently constructed in Tampa, FL and its angular cousin a few blocks down the road. The major street is a 4-lane truck route with a design speed of 40 MPH (40th St.), intersecting 25MPH urban roads (Yukon St. and Riverhills Dr., respectively). Notice how the approaches on the truck route make the route as straight as possible. There's also an escape zone on the inside of the circle, paved with red bricks as a visual aid.  
Varance fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Mar 22, 2012 |
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Mar 22, 2012 18:12
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DoctorWhat posted:I ride the 4/5/6 every day or so, and it is obscenely overcrowded, and the idea of the 2nd Avenue Subway isn't BAD per se, but the displacement of buisness, traffic problems, and mismanagement involved is cartoonish in its ineptitude. Varance fucked around with this message at 04:06 on Mar 26, 2012 |
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Mar 26, 2012 03:58
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Baronjutter posted:http://focusonline.ca/?q=node/357 This bridge?
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Mar 30, 2012 23:51
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Volmarias posted:Unfortunately, this still ends up happening when you've got the countdown timer for the ped phase; I'll look at the number in the pedestrian phase to help judge how much longer I have to go/wait. Edit: What's the best way to find out who's responsible for traffic lights in a given jurisdiction? I drive in and around the University of South Florida, and half of the traffic signals are functionally broken. For example, there's a T-intersection light that gives a protected left to the through street without giving a green to the through traffic (despite there being zero conflicts preventing it). 
Varance fucked around with this message at 18:32 on Apr 2, 2012 |
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Apr 2, 2012 18:17
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Cichlidae posted:If neither leg is a state road, then it's most likely the town/city who controls it. Find contact info for your Town Engineer or Town Planner and contact him/her. I'd be willing to bet that, in your particular case, there's a good story behind that phasing. Thanks for the tip. It's probably traffic calming and/or USFPD wanting to write more tickets (road goes down from 30 to 20 to 15 right after the light), but there's plenty of other well-intentioned traffic lights around campus that I want to complain about. For example, there's a signal with a ~1 second yellow phase where I'm basically forced to run a red or risk sending a few passengers through the front windshield of my bus when it turns (most vehicles on that particular route have standees or are crush-loaded with student traffic from 9AM to 9PM). 
Varance fucked around with this message at 00:19 on Apr 3, 2012 |
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Apr 2, 2012 23:34
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grover posted:I'm also in favor of banning all ^#$@!#$&#$ drawbridge lifts during rush-hour, even for commercial traffic. Especially for the tugboats who aren't actually transiting the intercoastal waterway, but choose to moor just on the far side of the drawbridge and call in bridge lifts every loving day so THEY can get home at 5pm, nevermind the thousands of commuters they've held up for 30 minutes. Hell, it should be done for environmental reasons alone, to reduce all the countless gallons of gas and tons of ozone dumped from all the congestion caused by the bridge lifts. Edit: Most of the bascule bridges on the Intracoastal only open at set times (usually on the hour and half hour). Here's a list for the Atlantic and Florida Gulf portions. Install Gentoo posted:There's absolutely no need to increase density along the corridor for LRT to work, so long as there's sufficient bike access and parking for cars, and, ideally, connecting bus service to the stations. Speaking of DRT, an increasing number of agencies are implementing DRT for exactly this purpose. Suburbanites will ride transit if you have a little cutaway shuttle that picks them up at their front door and takes them to a nearby transit hub. It works even better when you use 25/30-foot low floors, to avoid the "assisted living/paratransit bus" connotation. The downside is that it's not cost-effective unless you're either packing the shuttle or using non-union labor. Then again, spending $100-million to widen a 4 lane road to a 6 lane road isn't exactly cost effective, either. Varance fucked around with this message at 01:01 on Apr 4, 2012 |
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Apr 3, 2012 23:55
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Fragrag posted:What if a large boat needs to pass underneath? Then they should make that into a drawbridge. Not that the river underneath looks that deep, but it's an entertaining thought. Either that, or you design a series of locks and auxiliary waterways to turn the thing into the maritime equivalent of a partial diamond interchange, like the Magdeburg Water Bridge in Germany. Varance fucked around with this message at 01:22 on Apr 4, 2012 |
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Apr 4, 2012 01:16
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Baronjutter posted:Apparently that line is fairly popular for model railroaders to try to re-create or be inspired by due to it's uniqueness. It's always cited as an excuse why freight trains can run down the middle of a residential street. Or a busy downtown street.  
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Apr 4, 2012 19:20
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Gat posted:Designers are probably always influenced by what came before, so that might be why in general American things seem 'boxy' Eh, I think it's just a matter of perspective. For every box, there's something like this:  Also, Europeans have plenty of rolling toasters.  Edit: Bombardier (Canadian) and MPI (American) have both found a nice middle ground between box and curve and have been applying it to all of their products over the past decade or so. Really hoping more of that design style trickles down into the other major American suppliers.     Varance fucked around with this message at 21:16 on Apr 4, 2012 |
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Apr 4, 2012 20:37
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Why I casually study transit: railfanning was one of the few positive highlights of my childhood. My family was broken and poor and I had to entertain myself on a regular basis. Good thing I grew up a block away from a major intersection with streetcar, bus and trolley action plus a major rail sub a block over. My father has a degree in urban planning, so that probably rubbed off on me a bit as well. That said, I get creeped out by the average railfan. It's one thing to have a casual hobby or convert a hobby into what you do for a living. Being able to recite the entire historical roster of Union Pacific steam locomotives from memory might indicate that you have a problem. Varance fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Apr 5, 2012 |
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Apr 5, 2012 20:51
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Thundercakes posted:I'm not sure if this has been asked, but do you prefer concrete paving or asphalt paving? I'm a pretty new structural engineer (graduated a year ago), and I'm mostly dealing with bridge design at the moment, so as a disclaimer I just have an extremely basic knowledge about roadway design. From my viewpoint, it would seem like concrete would be the more durable and cheaper option. Is there some particular reason to use asphalt instead? Cichlidae talked about it a bit at the very beginning of the thread. Basically comes down to: Concrete has superior durability and lasts a long time, but is very expensive to put down initially and could be wasted if things change drastically over the lifespan of the roadway. Concrete roads also become rough over time as the slabs settle in different ways (bump bump bump bump). Truckers love it because concrete roads don't easily develop ruts, normal drivers hate it if proper maintenance isn't being done to minimize the bumpage. There's also climate and politics to consider: concrete roads take longer to degrade when not being subjected to freeze cycles, plus there's always someone who wants to make a profit off of roadway construction and will take steps to make it happen. In general, the only concrete going down these days is on bridges, interstates/major freeways already built with concrete and some large arterials that are unlikely to change over time; IE roadways that have physically expanded as far as land use allows and can't afford to be shut down or limited for repaving/construction due to lack of capacity on surrounding roads. New freeway projects are also good candidates for concrete paving, depending on what kind of PCPHPL (traffic levels) and traffic mix (trucks/buses vs cars) you're expecting to see on the roadway within 20 years. Each state has its own set of standards for how and when asphalt and concrete are used, with some systems featuring bias against one or the other in certain situations. Politics is a big issue, simply because roadway materials have to come from somewhere and those material suppliers know how to sell to the politicans. For example, Florida loves concrete roads in its urban areas. Our interstates are concrete, our toll roads are concrete, our US highways are concrete. Even our major arterials and primary state roads are occasionally built with the stuff when called for (truck routes). But why does Florida have so many concrete roads? We've got a hell of a lot of limestone production in our backyard, so we have a much larger incentive to pave our urban areas with the stuff (in other words, it's cheaper than other states). Of course, that also means there's a large concrete lobby that pushes the politicians to prioritize concrete roads more often. Hell, back in 2009 the concrete lobby tried to push the Florida legislature to mandate that 50% of roads needed to be built with concrete as a form of economic stimulus. It took a combined oil/asphalt lobby to stop that one. Oh yeah, one other use: Concrete can be a preferable alternative for BRT projects. A bunch of heavy buses using the same path every day will ruin improperly-designed/built asphalt roads in a matter of years. This is also one of the main reasons why bus bays and transfer facilities are generally built with concrete. An example: the transit agency I work for has this one stop outside of a major bus transfer center that uses an asphalt staging area as a bus bay. Since it was last repaved, the stop has developed these huge pothole-like ruts where the tires are normally situated during dwell time that cause buses to unexpectedly lunge forward/to the side if the driver doesn't enter the stop just right. That's not the sort of thing you want to see happening from a safety standpoint. This is also applied to airport runways/taxiways/aprons and roads frequently trafficked by heavy military equipment (tanks and the like). Edit: ... and then there's stuff like this that happens when people change their minds with future construction projects. Hillsborough Ave (US41/US92) in Tampa. Center lane in each direction is half-concrete, half-asphalt. You get to feel both the bumps AND the rumbles!   Varance fucked around with this message at 05:10 on Apr 7, 2012 |
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Apr 6, 2012 19:01
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EoRaptor posted:The point of the bags is to be really low cost and fast to deploy, and they are then removed by the patch crew that should turn up in a week or two and re-used. The whole thing seems strange, though. You could probably just roll the patch crew as quickly as you'll get someone out there to stick a bag in the hole. That said, it would be great for private roads and rural jurisdictions that can't maintain a huge public works department. Varance fucked around with this message at 18:44 on Apr 12, 2012 |
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Apr 12, 2012 18:41
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Crackpipe posted:They also have extremely strict enforcement of traffic laws. I feel like a lot of Americans would freak out if they suddenly got hit with an avalanche of tickets for the kind of stupid poo poo they get away with all the time. Idiot driver: Oh no, one of my headlights is out. I'll just drive around at night using my hi-beams in an urban area.  Me, driving a crush-loaded 40ft transit bus in front of the guy: 
Varance fucked around with this message at 07:39 on Apr 21, 2012 |
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Apr 21, 2012 04:46
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Dr. Witherbone posted:Yeah, but city council has totally turned on him and he's been reduced to a pitiful husk of a wannabe despot. All of his plans are being dismantled around him, and now he's in court for a conflict of interest trial. With his illusion of power broken all that fat blob of malevolence can do now is cry his tears. Delicious delicious evil politician tears For background: Rob Ford is a far-right city councilor known for fighting against the "War Against Cars" and the "Downtown Mentality," and also throwing temper tantrums in city council meetings when he doesn't get his way. The Toronto suburbanites elected him mayor of the city based on promises of wider roads paved with gold, magical rainbow subways to nowhere and a push to find the "gravy" that resulted in higher taxes typically shouldered by people outside of the core who own white picket fence houses. He did a good job pissing everyone off, to the point that a record 300+ individuals showed up at a city hall meeting last year to speak out in front of city council against practically every cut Ford had proposed (some 40+ hours of deputations). That's not what broke his back, though. As part of his plan, Ford appointed Karen Stintz as head of the local transit commission board, thinking her to be someone he could trust to carry out his transit plans (gently caress street-level transit, gently caress BRT/LRT, subways EVERYWHERE - even if we'll never have the money for it). Unfortunately for him, Councillor Stintz lived up to her reputation as a solid, respectable leader. She got invested in her position, even going as far as participating in Canada's version of Undercover Boss in an effort to get a better understanding of the transit system and the issues it faced. Meanwhile, Ford was telling her to do things that ALL of her advisers and a large chunk of city council were against - and started making threats to remove her when she wouldn't back him. In response, she made backroom deals with a majority of city council to turn against the guy. And once a mayor pisses off city council in Ontario, they're rendered completely useless. The only thing the guy can do right now is act as a (politically-biased) mediator at council meetings until he wins back the trust of council. Varance fucked around with this message at 20:22 on May 8, 2012 |
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May 8, 2012 16:06
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Cichlidae posted:Awesome, DDIs are spreading! I can't wait until I get to design my first one. The University DDI is a clusterfuck, as there are two major intersection on either side (I think both of them have 2-3x left turn lanes for all directions). Because of this, engineers went with a splintered and braided design. The left/right/straight lanes are all median-separated, with the straight traffic crossover being handled with overpasses instead of an intersection. Traffic can back up inside the DDI without having an impact on the opposite flow.  The DDI at Myakka is replacing a Parclo, of all things. Also a splintered (but signalized) design. 
Varance fucked around with this message at 04:30 on May 9, 2012 |
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May 9, 2012 03:58
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The local university just replaced huge chunks of the street lighting with LED (on the prime inbound roads) and Induction. Makes driving at night through campus a pleasure.
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May 15, 2012 16:46
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Here's the difference between lights. I apologize for lovely cell phone quality, it's all I had on me on the way home. High pressure Sodium: (The typical orange-ish road light)  HID Metal Halide: (Like above, just more blue-ish and not quite as bright. Some newer cars have these for headlights.)  Induction: (A "reversed lightbulb" that uses electromagnetics instead of filament to produce light.)  LED: (These particular ones are low mast, since the roadway is entirely covered by tree.)  Induction lights use 1/3 the power of sodium lamps and go about ~10 years before needing a replacement bulb. Not as efficient as LED, but the light they put out is almost the same as daylight, doesn't degenerate over time and doesn't have that subtle "shining" effect you get from LED lamps. Until some of the kinks involved with LED lighting are worked out (dimming, voltage flux burnout), Induction is the best product on the market. Varance fucked around with this message at 03:45 on May 16, 2012 |
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May 16, 2012 03:30
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NihilismNow posted:I've never seen induction but i love LED lighting and from current trends it seems like it is going to win. CFL bulbs using a magnetic ballast are basically the same thing in a smaller package. And yes, both types of bulbs contain mercury. Not as big of a deal with street lighting since it's outdoor, housed in a purpose-built fixture and only changed by professionals. Varance fucked around with this message at 20:50 on May 16, 2012 |
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May 16, 2012 20:47
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NOBEARD posted:On some stretches of road in Norway they are experimenting with small LED lights on the barrier between lanes. Not to illuminate the road, just to mark the barrier and where the road is heading. An alternative to no lights at all and full illumination. I could see this happening with road reflectors within the next 10 years. Too expensive right now (about $7-8 per reflector, compared to $2-3 for traditional), but wider adoption of solar and LED technologies should drive the price down. Can't afford to put street lighting on every road when the costs associated with paving are going through the roof.
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May 22, 2012 21:24
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Install Gentoo posted:That's not really accurate (to say they're "a level below interstates"). I mean a US Highway can be a narrow two lane surface road or a full on freeway.
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Jun 6, 2012 04:44
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Baronjutter posted:What the gently caress. Those are some of the most hosed up suburbs I've ever seen. They don't even seem to be the suburbs of any specific place, like they don't really radiate or relate to an urban centre. Boston is a ways away but it's just like scattered clusters of houses in the middle of forest and field. What the hell I've never seen anything like this. I'm used to the perfect blankets of awful sprawl like you see in Calgary or Dallas. This is really something new and scary. This is exactly what's happening in many areas of North America: people wanting the small town feel (and lower property tax rates) while still living in range of the big metropolises. Toronto, Vancouver, Seattle, Tampa Bay, Orlando, Jacksonville, etc. are all sprawling like this. This is also why commuter rail is either a linchpin of regional design or at the top of the priority list for areas under this model - traffic is quickly becoming an expensive nightmare and traditional transit modes don't work. Toronto is one of the older examples and a commonly-followed model. The GTA (and Metro Toronto itself) is a combination of 20+ cities (not towns, 250k+ population cities with unique centers) that grew into each other over time. In Toronto's case, they run 200+ 2000-passenger commuter trains between the outlying cities and downtown core daily during the work week, with most of them running full. The province has been dumping billions into Metrolinx to buy out all the commuter rail corridors for expansion/electrification because the 400-series highways (think Interstates) are already up to 14+ lanes in some cases - they have to start bulldozing neighborhoods or double deck to squeeze out any more capacity.   You could also say New York, but that's kind of a special case because of how radically different their infrastructure is from most American/Canadian cities. For example, New York was one of the first cities to build subways and has the most extensive network in North America. Toronto didn't get into it until the late 50s and still only has 3 lines (4 if you count the SRT, which is closer to light rail than a subway). It's much easier to relate to TO because it's basically what every other city will become in about 20-40 years time, with the same problems as its smaller brethren. On that note, gently caress CSX. The ONLY reason Tampa Bay doesn't have commuter rail is that CSX is only willing to go all-or-nothing on the use/sale of their rails (instead of a more palatable one sub at a time), plus they demand continued access to them with the state covering any liabilities for derailments and whatnot. gently caress 'em. Varance fucked around with this message at 14:10 on Jul 18, 2012 |
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Jul 18, 2012 04:23
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Ryand-Smith posted:Related to the CSX thing, isn't it because that Amtrak already takes up a large portion of a lot of that region's rails, and as such, CSX, which is more concerned about keeping their flordia runs open for thier own trasports trying to do the logical thing? I mean, only 20 years ago these companies nearly died if not for massive deregulation! Uh, no. Tampa Bay has Silver Star service once daily via a double-track mainline. That's it, everything else is CSX traffic. CSX's Bone Valley tracks are quite profitable right now (tons of Phosphate trains roll around the Tampa area), but most tracks are in disrepair because they're either not used regularly or are used at low speeds that allow them to get away with doing only bare minimum maintenance. They know that they'll have to sink upward of a billion into infrastructure and track to bring the rails up to passenger standards, which is why they want to offload it in bulk - they're sure as hell not going to put that kind of money into the rails when the phosphate mines will inevitably tap out. Why not make the state do it, with the added bonus of maximizing the amount of profit they can get from the sale of the lines before they become useless? I don't blame them for being business-minded, but they won't even negotiate - hell, they won't even spend the $400 mil they're contractually obligated to spend on rails after the state bought out the Orlando mainline under the same terms I mentioned above. After the deal was done, they applied for tax breaks on their $400 mil obligation. Varance fucked around with this message at 23:08 on Jul 20, 2012 |
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Jul 18, 2012 19:47
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Cichlidae posted:The closest I've seen are markings in the shoulder every 1000 feet or 1 mile, used for the latter purpose. They look like this: An example from Interstate 4 outside of Tampa, Florida: http://binged.it/LTdadn Varance fucked around with this message at 03:05 on Jul 28, 2012 |
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Jul 28, 2012 02:55
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SurgicalOntologist posted:Isn't that for the driver to illuminate if the bus is hijacked? As a driver, I've had to use it before. It works really loving well in a situation where you don't have a gun to your head (IE a medical emergency where I have to administer CPR and don't have time to have a conversation with dispatch). If you do have a gun to your head, an inconspicuous emergency signal from a mobile terminal works better (as a reflection can give you away). Generic dumbass with a knife? Sign works fine. Varance fucked around with this message at 04:20 on Aug 2, 2012 |
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Aug 2, 2012 04:13
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Choadmaster posted:Here in California we use gravel for our runaway truck ramps, too. Seems a hell of a lot cheaper; I wonder if there's any advantage to the metal straps thing. Works better in snow? As the fish mentioned, it does a better job of preventing driver injuries compared to standard emergency ramps and helps protect the cargo in the trailer (which is usually worth way more than $100k). They can also be installed in situations where a full length ramp would not be feasible, like the ramp at US44 and Rt10 in Avon, CT. Can't demolish a historical landmark, now can we? Varance fucked around with this message at 11:07 on Aug 8, 2012 |
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Aug 8, 2012 10:38
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Cichlidae posted:Narrow lanes, raised intersection, curb bump-outs, mini-roundabouts, speed tables... there are probably hundreds of things, some much better ideas than others. Even putting utility poles closer to the edge of the road (or in the road!) will slow people down, but it'll certainly increase your accident rate.  
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Aug 10, 2012 04:22
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Chemmy posted:I get the idea, but desensitizing drivers to children playing in the road seems like a terrible idea. Hedera Helix posted:Wouldn't these cause drivers to suddenly stop and/or swerve, thus potentially causing more accidents than before? But you're right in that there are other less socially polarizing and potentially dangerous ways to affect driver behavior. Here's an example from the Chicago lakeshore before a particularly dangerous curve:  Ultimately, it doesn't matter what you put in the road, people will get used to it and drive even crazier after mastering the mechanic. We've got these roads in Florida that are so thin, you need to keep wheels on both lines to keep a transit bus in its lane. Still doesn't stop people from driving through at 20 above the speed limit, sometimes taking the mirrors off the side of the bus. Without enforcement and meaningful penalties, people will continue to drive like they own the road. Varance fucked around with this message at 06:50 on Aug 10, 2012 |
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Aug 10, 2012 06:27
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I used to work on the railroad at Busch Gardens in Tampa. Yeah, yeah, it's a theme park railroad - but they have 6 protected crossings along the route. Not little skinny arms, either - full on Class 1 railroad crossings with proper arms, lights and signage, same exact install and design that CSX uses around the country. I can't tell you how many times I had to emergency stop as a result of people ignoring the bells/gates at less than 7 MPH. And by that, I mean the front end of my train would already be in the crossing and they're still trying to go through. The bottom line is that, unless the train operators were negligent in their horn-blowing duties, any fatality that happens on a railroad crossing is almost always the result of blatant stupidity borne out of impatience or a belief that one's personal belongings are worth more than their life. As long as people are greedy and/or stupid, they will continue to die at railroad crossings (protected or not). Varance fucked around with this message at 03:53 on Aug 21, 2012 |
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Aug 21, 2012 03:43
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Install Gentoo posted:The best are the people who manage to drive onto the tracks while the gates are going down and get stuck on 'em. Most (read: all) crossings like that should have High Point signage indicating that there's a possibility of bottoming out on the crossing - in that case, you're supposed to stop before going through the crossing for the same reason. If dumbass gets stuck and that sign's up, the accident is 100% their fault. 
Varance fucked around with this message at 04:51 on Aug 21, 2012 |
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Aug 21, 2012 03:56
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Volmarias posted:Huh! So is that why school busses are supposed to always stop at railroad crossings? I just assumed that some driver managed to plow into a train and now they all stop. Edit: here's a state-by-state rundown of the crossing rules. The other type of vehicle that usually has to stop by law is something like a lift truck or crane that isn't typically operated faster than 10 MPH and/or would easily bottom out on a crossing. The only times you're allowed to blow through a crossing without stopping are if there's a cop at the crossing, if there are specific traffic signals dealing with the crossing (IE a crossing tied into a nearby intersection) or a crossing has an exempt sign posted - and in the latter two cases, school buses must still stop.  Exempt signs are typically posted at signalized or disused/low-traffic crossings. Varance fucked around with this message at 07:54 on Aug 21, 2012 |
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Aug 21, 2012 04:16
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The downside to rail trails, especially in urban areas, is that you're sacrificing potential light/commuter rail right-of-way for a mixed use trail. Good for the local community, not as good for the region. And in most cases, you can't build both due to the ROW not being wide enough (or land acquisition costs being too high to make them wide enough). The city of St. Petersburg, Florida is lamenting something hardcore about not being able to run light rail down the Pinellas Trail corridor, as it makes the cost of a starter light rail system at least three times more expensive. Varance fucked around with this message at 15:13 on Aug 26, 2012 |
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Aug 26, 2012 15:09
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Cichlidae posted:Why can't they run track there? I know there's no precedent for converting trails back to rail in the US, but we're told with each project that we can always switch back later. Anyway, this is the same cadre of politicians that are threatening to sue the City of Tampa if they even talk to the Tampa Bay Rays about a new stadium, despite the fact that The Trop is a depressing shithole that will force the team to move if they can't get a better/more centralized facility. They also refused to pay for maintenance upkeep of their half of the Friendship Trailbridge (a disused span of the Gandy Bridge/US92 over Tampa Bay), which is now closed and slated for demolition over safety concerns. A new trail is opening up across the Courtney Campbell Causeway (SR60) next year, but that's 15 miles away on the Pinellas side - made longer by the lack of bicycle accommodations over the Bayside Bridge. E: The expressways they propose are US A19 as an extension of I-375, Courtney Campbell as I-475, US 19 as I-575 and Bryan Dairy/Gandy as I-775. In other words, they want the county to be even more like Detroit, with all the wealth continuing to drain into Tampa and Sarasota. Varance fucked around with this message at 17:33 on Aug 26, 2012 |
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Aug 26, 2012 16:57
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Volmarias posted:I thought that stadiums generally weren't profitable for a city that pays for half of it, since it requires massive transit infrastructure, without really having those people actually spend money anywhere other than the stadium. Ownership of the Rays and Lightning have already bought all the land they need for a stadium in Downtown Tampa, right next to the Forum, with plans for BRT/LRT corridors to both facilities (the first of which, the MetroRapid BRT Green line from USF to Downtown, is already under construction). kefkafloyd posted:Those normal express trains should still be a lot faster than a trip on the Acela, though. I think having bullet BOS/NY/PHI/DC trains are a smart idea, though I don't think a stop in Hartford would be too detrimental to that train's timing. Varance fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Aug 27, 2012 |
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Aug 27, 2012 01:16
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Cichlidae posted:Where shipping is a concern, tunnels are typically a better option, provided the ground is stable enough to support their construction. Fun Fact: the Sunshine Skyway belongs to three separate counties. Pinellas County (St Petersburg) takes care of the Intracoastal Waterway bridge, Hillsborough County (Tampa) pays for the northern half including the famous cable-stayed portion of the main span, while Manatee County (Bradenton) pays for the south end. All of the other major bay crossings are a 50/50 split between Pinellas and Hillsborough. Varance fucked around with this message at 07:42 on Aug 27, 2012 |
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Aug 27, 2012 06:58
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Cichlidae posted:The Newport Bridge was built in 1969 and has 63m clearance and a 490m span, about the same as the Oresund bridge (2000). The Storbaelt bridge (1998) has 3 times the span with the same clearance, but it's a fixed link and includes a tunnel section. Vasco da Gama (1998) has 45m clearance and a 450m span. In the Sunshine Skyway's case, it's not big enough for New Panamax cargo ships coming across the Panama Canal or NCL/Disney cruise ships. Tampa is a far superior home port to Port Everglades or Port Canaveral for Gulf of Mexico/Caribbean cruises, plus we've got some of the best road and freight rail links heading up the east coast (plenty of cement-paved freeways with minimal grade and a direct rail mainline to CSX JAX). Until we address the Skyway issue, Tampa Bay is at a huge economic disadvantage. Speaking of Port of Tampa, we're in the process of dropping half a billion on a flying spaghetti monster, directly linking Port of Tampa with I-4 and the Selmon Expressway (which previously weren't linked due to running parallel to each other). It's also constructed in such a way that protects I-4's reserved high-speed rail corridor and has accomodations on the I-4 end for an elevated direct link between the Selmon and I-275, bypassing I-4 altogether. Once that project's done, replacing I-275 from downtown to the Howard Frankin bridge is top priority, followed by the Howard Franklin (I-275) and Gandy (US 92) northbound spans over the bay, then the Skyway.  Edit: The project before that was rebuilding the interchanges outside Tampa International Airport. Previously a clusterfuck of weaving, it's now a very convenient omni-directional interchange that can send you anywhere in the Bay Area, built next to the main north-south runway. SR60 connects with I-275 and the Courtney Campbell, going toward Downtown Tampa/St Petersburg and Downtown Clearwater, respectively. Veteran's/Suncoast Expressway heads through the majority of the suburbs to the north, while Spruce Street leads directly to Raymond James Stadium (only 5 blocks away, which is why the NFL loves having the Super Bowl in Tampa).  Edit2: The thing that sucks about having all these nice, non-clusterfuck roads is that we can't sell people on the need for public transportation. We've got plans upon plans for building a comprehensive multi-modal network, but nobody wants to hear it because the roads are too convenient. Varance fucked around with this message at 17:39 on Aug 27, 2012 |
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Aug 27, 2012 14:59
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Cichlidae posted:Speaking of HSR, you mentioned I-4's HSR corridor. I thought Florida burned all its HSR cash in a fit of Tea-Party-induced rage. Are there still plans, or is it just a distant dream at this point? Someone will probably make a commuter rail corridor out of it, if FECR's Miami to Orlando line becomes a success. That's the best we can hope for at this point. Varance fucked around with this message at 23:39 on Aug 27, 2012 |
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Aug 27, 2012 23:34
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Cichlidae posted:Edit: I've been thinking about it for a while now, and no matter what angle I view the situation from, his decision is incredibly short-sighted. Of course, this is Rick Scott we're talking about here, who watched his company defraud Medicare to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. The guy's definitely not a saint and is all about shady business practices and probably wants to invest in a private effort to re-introduce HSR, once he's out of office. I'd also venture a guess that he's got a financial stake in FECR's commuter line between Orlando and Miami. Varance fucked around with this message at 03:56 on Aug 28, 2012 |
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Aug 28, 2012 03:53
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Baronjutter posted:Ah ha!! thank you that seems so obvious. So the people in the bike lane would go straight or be able to turn right from that spot? Now that you mention it there's a a situation exactly like that near me and I see bikes go straight left and right from it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ze4K2W7S6Fs 
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Aug 30, 2012 04:35
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FFStudios posted:It's the little white line after where 125 ends. I understand that they built the new Route 16 as a faster route, but why'd they block off that one stretch? Varance fucked around with this message at 23:52 on Sep 3, 2012 |
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Sep 3, 2012 23:45
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Millstone posted:I hate it when people try and simplify traffic to "Canada". It's obviously very varied. And there are lots of "car-friendly" municipalities just like there are lots of right turn lanes. Even sprawlers like Missisauga and Calgary have nothing on most cities in traditionally red American states. Baronjutter posted:Yeah that makes no sense to me. Canada has massive cities and I believe the busiest highway in north america, just as america has vast underpopulated rural areas. Both countries have horrible sprawling nightmare cities as well as walkable transit paradises. Yes, nobody else in Canada has something like this that runs for kilometers and kilometers:  But then again, this is a rare outlier in one of the biggest cities on this continent. And also a colossal urban design fuckup, to boot. If it weren't for the collector-express system and generous use of parclo and stack interchanges, the entire thing would be a clusterfuck of epic proportions. Varance fucked around with this message at 16:41 on Sep 6, 2012 |
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Sep 6, 2012 06:42
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