Which Failed Expressway Would Help Traffic Today (Atlanta, Lawrenceville: house, buy)

[bu2]

Originally Posted by Need4Camaro

In this order...

#1 Outer Perimeter - Free for trucks and funded by a general fund by Trucking Industry Lobbyists to remove unecessary truck traffic from the inner city... Tolled for cars - strict zoning restrictions in the 'Northern Arc' proximity prohibiting development along its corridor.

#2 I-675 to GA400 as a submerged (sunken) freeway with capping and tunneled sections between GA-166**(see below) and GA-400 to disrupt as few residences and parks as possible...

#3 Freedom Pkwy to Stone Mnt Freeway as a no-hazmat tolled tunnel with intermittent capped sections for the entirety of its route to avoid destruction to the local parks and residences.

#4 GA-166 ext (originally I-420) - Tolled between Douglasville and I-285 (Greenbriar Mall / GA-166) - Existing GA-166 Fwy to remain free... ...Tolled and submerged with caps between I-75/85 and I-20 ITP east side as a tolled E/W bypass for Downtown.

#5 Peachtree Ind Blvd with tolled overpasses over the major cross streets between the existing split of PIB and GA-141, all the way to Buford as a tolled alternative to I-85.

#6 GA-85 as a partial freeway/tollway, submerged and capped through Riverdale where the existing Parkway will remain surface level above the freeway to provide access to the existing businesses and residences along the route and a tolled tunnel to bypass Riverdale... ...south of Riverdale the tollway will return to surface level and continue as a freeway ending at GA-314 in Fayetteville.

#7 Truck lanes from the Outer Perimeter, down I-75, onto I-285 WB/SB, back onto I-75, to the I-475 split.

None of these will ever come to past.. ..but its always fun to use your imagination..

The chances for #2 and #3 are gone. #1 might still happen at some point.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by primaltech

I'd probably put that one at #2, actually. I voted for it here, because the Outer Perimeter wasn't a voting option.

It was supposed to serve the Emory area, which as a major jobs and activity center without any freeway access nearby (or even much arterial roads), is as a result a notoriously horrendous traffic area.

Decatur proper is also more difficult to get to by vehicle than it should be (luckily the MARTA access helps).

Freedom Parkway makes no sense. There's this massive interchange with the connector, just for a 2-mile little loop road back up to Ponce? Surely they can at least do something better with that.

I've argued extensively for grade separations and other improvements for the Scott Blvd corridor, and effectively making that the link between these 2 isolated segments of freeway, but of course that gets shot down as usual in the NOPE column, just like literally anything else that anyone ever suggests for transportation in that metro.

They are converting the Scott/Ponce area to traffic circles. I think it is being done to hinder traffic, not to improve it.

[primaltech]

Originally Posted by waronxmas

Don't have a opinion one way or another on the outer perimeter (I don't usually venture any further from ITP than Duluth unless I'm flying somewhere), but #2 would have been a travesty. I'm cool with more traffic given we wouldn't have literally dozens of great neighborhoods if it went through, or at least they'd be mere shells of what they are now.

That sounds to me a bit like nimbyism and selfishness. Kind of sounds to me like the people who blocked MARTA expansions because it would have affected pretty neighborhoods, and so the metro as a whole suffered.

Most of the planned Stone Mountain Freeway would have gone right along the railroad tracks corridor in the North Druid Hills area. Wouldn't have destroyed that area, just like the Stone Mountain area wasn't destroyed by the small portion of the freeway that was built.

Sure, some of the Candler Park area of it that was bought up and cleared but never built due to the revolt, ended up becoming a small park instead, and that's nice to have and all. But it's not like that area wouldn't have still been fine and great with the parkway built through there. Just like O4W and Inman Park aren't ruined by the portion of Freedom Parkway that was built.

Kind of goes back to the topic we were discussing in the other thread- not everything should have to be a superhighway, and like what ever happened to just regular roads sized freeways? Like with 4 lanes, 2 in each direction? Freedom Parkway is actually rather beautiful:

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.7611...7i16384!8i8192

I just think it would be cool, and very functional if that was the Stone Mountain Freeway, and it went all the way out past Stone Mountain just like that. With trees and greenery and pleasant drive.

Nothing wrong with having some roads, especially when there's freaking 6 million people trying to get around the metro, and hardly any transit either.

[primaltech]

Originally Posted by bu2

They are converting the Scott/Ponce area to traffic circles. I think it is being done to hinder traffic, not to improve it.

Roundabouts along Ponce instead of traffic lights, and some of those weird triangle intersections (E Lake Rd, W Ponce especially), would really help traffic flow along that corridor, I think.

Given that they'll never build the proper freeway as originally planned, I think they should at least figure out how to seamlessly connect Freedom Parkway into Scott Blvd somehow, then upgrade and improve Scott, and then it flows right into and becomes the Stone Mtn Fwy.

[Datdudebrah]

Originally Posted by waronxmas

Don't have a opinion one way or another on the outer perimeter (I don't usually venture any further from ITP than Duluth unless I'm flying somewhere), but #2 would have been a travesty. I'm cool with more traffic given we wouldn't have literally dozens of great neighborhoods if it went through, or at least they'd be mere shells of what they are now.

Agreed. Plus a lot of these highway projects just incentivize leapfrog development with people abandoning closer in areas to sprawl further and further out.

[DabOnEm]

Originally Posted by waronxmas

Don't have a opinion one way or another on the outer perimeter (I don't usually venture any further from ITP than Duluth unless I'm flying somewhere), but #2 would have been a travesty. I'm cool with more traffic given we wouldn't have literally dozens of great neighborhoods if it went through, or at least they'd be mere shells of what they are now.

Depends on how it was designed. I don't think you can say definitively that whole neighborhoods and walking districts would be destroyed. Besides, do the people in these neighborhoods like all the traffic that has to traverse through there due to their not being adequate limited access highways for a metro of Atlanta's size?

Right now Moreland Drive is top 2 or 3 IIRC most deadly roads in Georgia due to the weird mix of business and residential right on the street, and way too many driveways. I imagine it'd be safer if it was 675 instead. Only thing about 675 is it would have to be tunneled north of 20, but south of it could be at grade. The only thing of significance south of 20 is East Village, which can be worked around.

When I'm in ATL, I'm just amazed at how long it takes to get to places sometimes due to the fact there are few freeways and you're forced to take winding country roads.

[equinox63]

Originally Posted by Datdudebrah

Agreed. Plus a lot of these highway projects just incentivize leapfrog development with people abandoning closer in areas to sprawl further and further out.

^^^ Indeed

[DabOnEm]

Originally Posted by Datdudebrah

Agreed. Plus a lot of these highway projects just incentivize leapfrog development with people abandoning closer in areas to sprawl further and further out.

Originally Posted by equinox63

^^^ Indeed

But it happened anyway. Atlanta is literally the least dense major metro area in the world (over 5M people), so a lot of leapfrogging and spaced-out development already went on. That's just the general nature of a newer area declining and people wanting a brand new home a little further out in the "nicer" area. I don't see how an intown freeway would encourage sprawl. What it would do is connect the already built sprawl better with the city.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by DabOnEm

But it happened anyway. Atlanta is literally the least dense major metro area in the world (over 5M people), so a lot of leapfrogging and spaced-out development already went on. That's just the general nature of a newer area declining and people wanting a brand new home a little further out in the "nicer" area. I don't see how an intown freeway would encourage sprawl. What it would do is connect the already built sprawl better with the city.

Its actually encouraged sprawl along the freeways. Leaves lots of areas underdeveloped because there is not good transportation. Other cities fill in those closer areas because they have more complete transportation systems.

[equinox63]

Originally Posted by bu2

Its actually encouraged sprawl along the freeways. Leaves lots of areas underdeveloped because there is not good transportation. Other cities fill in those closer areas because they have more complete transportation systems.

^^^ True