Closing roads for construction

This would be a nightmare here. Can you imagine 475 traffic being redirected to the surface streets that are already in horrible shape?

I would rather take a 8 week nightmare than a multi-year, drug out project.

Spending lots of time on the east coast I have noticed they shutdown whole roads and people adjust. They also try to do alot of road work on major arteries at night/weekends.

If it actually was only 8 weeks I'd be willing to put up with it. The description of the TN project sounds similar to what we've got going on now and that was a 14 MONTH closure.

I do completely agree that we should have night and weekend work going on. Or more than 8 guys working at a time. Or actually working past 3 or 4 in the afternoon.

In that previous thread mentioned, I posted about the St. Louis I-64 project that closed down the central interstate artery in the city (look at a map--it bisects St. Louis) for 2 years to build everything from the dirt up, including new overpass/exchanges.

MDOT: The New I-64 official website

Idinspired--I was there during construction and "experts" in St. Louis predicted a traffic nightmare, gridlock, jams on the city streets, etc. 99% of the time, they were wrong. If there were jams, they were caused by the same thing jams are always caused by: accident, stalled car, malfunctioning lights, etc. Not the construction. Traffic was a little heavier on the belt road (I-270) and the other two interstates (I-44 and I-70), but basically, people adjusted. People are dynamic that way.

A project that would have taken, by MDOTs own estimate, 8-9 years to complete with traffic "orange barreled" through the construction zone took less than two. Everything--road, off-ramps, bridges--brand new.

IMO, with a dedicated crew working six days a week, Secor (from Dorr to Monroe) could be rebuilt in a summer (or two summers if you want to split the work from Dorr to Central, then Central to Monroe to minimize disruption). It's not like there are not north-south alternatives close by to handle the traffic (Upton, Westwood/Douglas, Richards to Talmadge--although the Ottawa Hills cops would have a ticket frenzy--, and Reynolds).

It could absolutely work. I think what prevents it are residents who don't want their lives disrupted for a few months (cue to the standard "woe is me...there's construction near my house TV news interviews...).

I can't help but wonder if Bernath Pkwy is planned to be repaved. Bernath is a residential street in south Toledo. Where it crosses Airport Hwy there are two restaurants: TGI Friday's (still open) and Lone Star (closed). The pavement does not have potholes but it seems to be settling in places.

.....after reading this, I threw my hands up into the error and issued a cry of terror.

error = terror, geez >.>

Didn't they do the same thing in Detroit on I-75 recently?

I can see how there would be an easier time of it on interstates, because you don't have residents or businesses that are affected by lack of access to their own properties. When Max & Erma's in Maumee closed, lots of people blamed it on mismanagement instead of the construction on Dussel. Given that they reopened shortly after it was finished, it seems the construction must have played some part in the closure.

As for the residents who wouldn't want their lives disrupted... I live near St. Catherine's where we've been dealing with gas line replacement and sewer separation for the past couple of years. I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

Valbee - They did...I think it was somewhere around 14 to 18 months (someone please correct me on the time frame). I75 was closed where the Ambassador Bridge is located. It wasn't that bad getting into downtown Detroit.

This is going on right now in my neck of the woods...Sylvania/Jackman/Tremainsville is closed for 3 weeks. I see nothing wrong with doing this either.

If my memory serves me correct, I think this was done in Columbus on SR 315 for a stretch too...What would need to happen is to make sure there aren't any other projects going on (like I475 over the Maumee) that would minimize other impacts.

That's my neck of the woods, too. That closure is on my route to work. I don't have an issue with it, since I have multiple options to get to work and three weeks is a short time--if it actually only lasts that long.

Can the businesses on the corners (Speedway, Family Video) still be accessed? I haven't forgotten it's closed yet, so I haven't been down that way. :)

Oldhometown-I'm all for fixing the streets-they need it badly. However I'm going to be one of those "woe is me" people right now. I live near Secor & Sylvania. I work near Bennet and Sylvania. Like Valbee, I've tolerated the gasline/sewer work that's been going on for over 1 (maybe 2?) years on Sylvania. Now the intersection is closed. That's fine. But my alternate method would be to take Berdan. However now they are paving Douglas, so the Berdan/Douglas intersection is torn up. My next route would be to take 475 to Phillips. Not only is the highway under construction, but the entrance ramp from Monroe is closed. I could take Monroe St. to Central to Jackman, but Monroe is torn up, as is Central at Upton. I guess I'll just look forward to having nice, new streets within the next few years...

I live at Douglas/Laskey and work at Secor/Central. I really have to go down Douglas or Secor to get to work. Secor is a nightmare with the hwy work and Douglas has been under repairs for months. Yesterday I saw that they closed Jackman/Sylvania intersection and were detouring people down Douglas. This made me happy because it means Douglas must be all open and normal again right? Drove to work this morning down Douglas. What a nightmare!
Thank you for listening to my vent I now return you to your previous topic.

Behind nearly all the road closings are financially suffering businesses. If there is an independant suffocating from orange barrels, and you can manage it, try to get to them. It will most certainly be appreciated.

Two things are worth noting:

1) When they do the widening, they normally don't widen them enough. We will be back at this point in fifteen years or so.

2) Widening the road doesn't actually fix the problem. By making a wider interstate, you have created a more pleasant ride and thus have increased the incentive to use the interstate. Usage then increases and you are--you guessed it--back at this point in fifteen years. The only traffic congestion that is mitigated is on the local and arterial streets, and those businesses then suffer.

I used to shop at the Phoenix co-op on Slyvania every week, but for the last year or so I refused to go there with all the construction.

I look forward to patronizing them again at their new location.

BB: I would disagree with your statement to this extent: adding additional lanes will help to allow traffic to proceed when an accident or other congestion ties up a lane or two. I will agree that the original design of 75/475 through Toledo was poorly done.

This will be especially true if and when they ever complete the two lane 75/475 ramps - which, have been shelved due to lack of $$.

Hmmmmmmm.......I thought that is what the gazillions of dollars of "stimulus" $$ was supposed to do.....I must have misunderstood the purpose of all that borrowed and printed $$.

Stimulus = slush fund

LLZ - why not just take Secor to Laskey and Laskey to Bennet? I live by Bowman Park and work on Executive Parkway and have started using Laskey lately and it actually seems faster on most days. It might be a little longer, but I would think it's easier to at least keep moving.

The problem with construction projects are they are rarely coordinated. If one intersection is going to be closed, then everything around it should be open. I actually think I read somewhere the city of Toledo actually thought through the repaving of Secor between Central and Monroe and are waiting another 2 years until the 475 project is nearly complete.

The whole sewer project there in West Toledo is just a pain...it just seems like they are taking so stinking long to get the residential streets back in order...2 years is WAY too long to tear up a street and leave it a mess...I just hope I'm out of my current house before they start going down my street.

Yeah, ain't that the truth. The complete and total assholes who run the city (into the ground) are trying to drive all the proprietorships on major thoroughfares into bankruptcy with the way this road construction is planned. Well, congratulations to Toledo city council. You morons have finally found something you're good at - causing businesses to fail.

Yes, I'm bitter about this and I hope it shows.

I've always found it amazing that President Eisenhower built the entire interstate highway in 4 years. Yet it takes us 2 years to just upgrade a small portion of any highway.

The initial cost estimate for the interstate system was $25 billion over 12 years; it ended up costing $114 billion (adjusted for inflation, $425 billion in 2006 dollars⁴) and took 35 years.

What do you mean, "planned"?

The FIRST problem is that they don't spend money to MAINTAIN the roads they've got. Preventative maintenance? Foresight and planning? What are those??!?

Just like the water plant. "Oh hey everything is fine and the fund is doing well, so let's raid it for money to spend on something else." (few years pass) "OH SHIT EVERYTHING BROKE DOWN AND WE DON'T HAVE ANY MONEY TO FIX IT, GOTTA DO IT ON EMERGENCY APPROPRIATION AND TEMPORARY BASIS!" Who the BLOODY FUCK did NOT budget a fund for X years down the road for upgrade/maintenance/replacement? Covering operating costs isn't enough, duh! You don't just budget enough money to cover gas and insurance for your car, you make sure you can afford tires, oil changes, and the occasional breakdown, along with the possibility of having to get a different car every X years.

Just like the latest bullshit in Perrysburg, the retirement fund was bigger than expected so they cut the tax, now it's headed towards the red so they have to jack it back up.