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What metro area do you think has the best freeways and why?
I have not been to very many cities, most of them in the rust belt area which I am not a very big fan of, but of the one's I have been to the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex had by far the best freeways. There were plenty of them making it fairly easy to get anywhere in the area you wanted on the freeways. They do get backed up at times but that is going to happen in any big area. There were tons of interchanges and such but it was actually pretty easy to navagate and get around. We showed up on a Saturday and had never even been to Texas before and had a pretty good feel for the main freeways by Monday. For an area of that size, it's actually pretty easy to get around.
Phoenix. The freeway system was a long time coming, but now that it is built, it's state of the art. Extremely well light up at night, easy to follow the road with the reflectors put in the lanes, and easy to follow signs. Every several months they pave the freeways with rubberized asphalt, making it a really smooth and quiet drive. Parts of the system, such as the 101 through Scottsdale and north Phoenix having really good views of the desert mountains. Now, the actual drivers who are on the freeways is a whole different story.
I go to Plano for work and find the traffic to be horrible. However, the condition of the highways are very good. Believe it or not, I found LA's freeways to be nice too. Much better than Chicago's which get beat up from the combination of snow, salt and semis. Seems easy to get around Minneapolis too. The state of Wisconsin has good road. Smooth, not too crowded and free!
Chicagoland has two kinds of expressways: the older freeways in the city, and the newer/cleaner tollways out in the suburbs. The tollway system is well maintained. Because I'm from Michigan and don't believe in toll roads, I hate to admit it, but I bought an I-Pass anyway.
Michigan is replacing its rattle-inducing concrete freeways with grooved limestone (or something) pavement and also asphalt. Both are awful to drive on. Concrete is much nicer.
It took forever for Phoenix to build roads, probably because they needed to source the speed cameras at the same time. Such wonderful local/regional government ... don't call us when the drought happens and Arizona can't figure anything out.
Chicagoland has two kinds of expressways: the older freeways in the city, and the newer/cleaner tollways out in the suburbs. The tollway system is well maintained. Because I'm from Michigan and don't believe in toll roads, I hate to admit it, but I bought an I-Pass anyway.
Michigan is replacing its rattle-inducing concrete freeways with grooved limestone (or something) pavement and also asphalt. Both are awful to drive on. Concrete is much nicer.
It took forever for Phoenix to build roads, probably because they needed to source the speed cameras at the same time. Such wonderful local/regional government ... don't call us when the drought happens and Arizona can't figure anything out.
Um.. it took phoenix a while to build roads because 25 years ago it was a tiny desert city. Now it has over a million people. Chicago's toll ways didn't pop up over night. Personally I don't even think chicago would be capable of sustaining such a rapid population growth.And Arizona wouldn't call Illinois for their polluted water if they had a drought...theyd just get it from northern california's sierra nevada mountains, just like southern california.
Dallas has an excellent freeway system... one of the best I've seen.
Minneapolis had nice roads however, I found them to be a bit confusing. I got lost a few times driving around the Twin Cities.
Denver's freeway system isn't bad... the addition of a fifth lane on I-25 has greatly improved traffic flow for north and southbound commuters, but some sections are severely outdated and were not built to handle so much traffic.
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