Erskine Street: The Next NEEDED East-West Route In Lubbock

The more I think about it, the more I want to draw colored lines on an already-prepared map. There's always the thought of 'what if?' as I think about a piece of road that travels through the northern section of Lubbock, Texas. It's a street that should be a bigger player for the city than it has been.

Erskine Street in Lubbock is catching up to the times and the needs of residents only now. Its biggest presence occurs on that city's northwest side, where it's just been expanded from a narrow, two-lane asphalt country road to a seven-lane (counting the continuous turn lane that's the trademark of modern Lubbock side streets) concrete boulevard running from NW Loop 289 to just west of Milwaukee Avenue. Big improvement so far, if you ask me. The trappings of a major thoroughfare are being put in place. The trouble is, it doesn't go under Loop 289. Or over it, for that matter. Heck, it doesn't go through it. That's right, no access to speak of, and that's on both ends. I did see that the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal mentioned in a recent article that there are plans to fix that situation (just in NW Lubbock, not northeast) and TXDOT is looking into this.

So, Erskine needs to be a seven-lane side street, at least, from FM 179 to around University or Avenue Q. The problem is, there is development at Clovis Highway which prevents Erskine from going completely through to University Avenue. Solution? Tear it down and get the dang street built. East of Avenue Q, the road could then just be five lanes through Interstate 27 and Ash Avenue. From there and eastward, it gets tricky. It is possible that the city of Lubbock could reroute Erskine as a five-laner along the current Harvard Avenue to connect with the current Ivory Avenue in a diagonal through Municipal Street and continue along a separate stretch called Erskine to connect with Martin Luther King, Jr Boulevard (the short stretch known as Itasca could be changed). From MLK, there could be the option of a new alignment straight through instead of drivers turning southward from a dead-ended Erskine over to another alignment to the south. The aforementioned new Erskine link would go east and southeast from MLK and connect with the present Erskine, which, by the time you get to Zenith Avenue, becomes a dirt road through Guava Avenue. A new interchange ought to be built at NE Loop 289 for Guava and Erskine, and we should see Erskine be a five-laner to a proposed Olive Avenue extension north of U.S. Highway 82. Erskine could make a northeastward curve to Olive at 90 degrees to avoid its current intermingling with U.S. 82 (it'd be too dangerous if remade there), and then go back southeastward from Olive through 82 and go back east again until reaching a possible new section of Wood Avenue. Yes, it'd look funny on a map if completed as described, but it beats the albatross it is right now. What they should do is pave all of the remaining dirt roads still existing within the Lubbock city limits, don't you think?

So, there you are: My vision for Erskine Street as it should already be. Nonetheless, it is the vision of what it could become. North Lubbock travelers will be ever more grateful for any improvements made to it. It'd just be better for the Hub City's mobility and a harbinger for better things to come. Long live Legendary Lubbock!

Come on, city planners. You can do it. Let's get it done.