Posted on 10/17/2018 7:42:33 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Maryland voters narrowly oppose adding express toll lanes to widen three of the states most congested highways, a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll finds, highlighting public skepticism about one of Gov. Larry Hogans signature transportation plans.
The centerpiece of the Republican governors proposal a $9 billion project to add four lanes apiece to the Capital Beltway, Interstate 270 and the Baltimore-Washington Parkway is even opposed by voters in the Washington suburbs, whom the plan is supposed to help. More than half of voters in the D.C. suburbs prefer to invest in public transit rather than building more roads.
The poll finds 44 percent of registered voters statewide favor adding express toll lanes, while 50 percent oppose them. Nearly twice as many strongly oppose the idea as strongly support it, 33 percent to 18 percent.
In follow-up interviews, even voters who said they would like to see roads widened to relieve severe congestion which slows traffic to 15 mph or less for several hours each day on some highways dont want to pay tolls for that relief. Several said they fear a repeat of Northern Virginias experience, where tolls on the nearly year-old 66 Express Lanes have exceeded $45 at times to travel the 10-mile stretch.
Hogans proposal to address gridlock in the Washington suburbs would add managed toll lanes through a public-private partnership. Tolls would fluctuate based on traffic costing more when it is heavier and less when it is lighter both to ensure traffic remains free-flowing and to encourage commuters to seek other options, such as transit. The existing free lanes would remain.
The plan is undergoing a complex federal review, including a study of whether to transfer the B-W Parkway from federal to state control.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
I live close to White Marsh and use the Beltway Inner Loop to drive home from Towson where I work five days per week. My property backs to I-95 and we suffered through the construction of the additional lanes. While the 95 expansion and on and off ramps are engineering marvels. all this expansion did was to increase the amount of traffic that hits the Beltway leading to more congestion. Like increasing a water pipe dimension from two inches to twelve inches the flows into the same two inch drain. I work in the eminent domain field of real estate and the cost to acquire the property necessary to expand these freeways would be staggering. However, from a strategic defense standpoint, the BW Parkway probably needs it the most.
“The solution is to live closer to your job.”
That’s great. Work in Hyattsville, live in Hyattsville.
Until, for whatever reason, the job in Hyattsville goes away. And your only choice is to take a job in McLean.
Widening roads does NOT relieve congestion. Longer off ramps and sympathetic traffic signals do.
I guess you have never driven on the New Jersey Turnpike or Garden State Parkway. The Turnpike is 12 lanes, 6 on each side, 3 car 3 truck/car so it is really 4 sets of 3 lanes. It used to merge down to a 6 lane highway in Cranbury, and the highway would jam up for miles, sometime 10-15 miles if it is peek summer/commuter when commuters and shore traffic double the amount of south bound traffic going to the shore. But that part of highway was expanded to continue the 12 lanes all the way down to exit 3. Now the congestion doesn’t happen on the Turnpike. Unless of course they close the Truck lanes for whatever reasons.
As for the Garden State, it is 10 lanes, 5 on each side from the Turnpike to I-78, then it sheds a lane on each side going to 280, then sheds another lane, and yes it gets congested as more lanes are shed. (going north bound) Lanes are added going southbound.
Adding lanes does help with congestion, but the roads connecting to these highways need to handle the capacity as well.
Mass transit is a dream of lefties, who want everyone else to take the loser cruiser to work while they all take their own cars. Problem is nobody wants to take the loser cruiser cause it takes forever. Trains can work, then you have rail congestion plus train stations are located in some of the worse places imaginable. Seacucus station is located in the middle of a swamp surrounded by refiners, why? It makes no sense to have a station far away from jobs and residential areas. But it exists, and it was recently built as well.
That would have been a nightmare.
The Turnpike is a long stretch of toll road with very few on/off ramps.
Nah. I’m from the Eastern Shore. Leave the Bay alone. Except clean it up.
Wish. I live on the Eastern Shore and commute to DC every day.
Move some agencies out of DC to other areas of the country.
Detroit needs jobs!
Yes that is correct, however the garden state is not
But it is a toll road.
Actually, the extension of the dual carriageways runs down to Exit 6, where the rerouted I-95 splits from the New Jersey turnpike to connect with the Pennsylvania Turnpike just across the Delaware River.
You are right, they combined it there and made it three lanes onwards to the bridge, instead of two.
I hardly go past exit 6, its been a while
They already have added 4 lanes on the Virginia part of the beltway, these would tie to those. I’ve cut 10-15 minutes of my drive to see my parents sometimes because of these lanes.
Are you talking about the toll lanes?
You don't imagine that's one of the features of an ever-growing federal gummint, do you?
Suck it up, bureaucrats and lobbyists. You are the ones responsible for the horrendous traffic jams on the beltway and elsewhere.
It's certainly not the tourists.
You can pay the price, so do it.
(There is a solution, of course: move the nation's capital to a less crowded place, say, Emporia, Kansas. Or Columbia, Missouri. That'd fix it.)
Yes. With my two kids, we can use the lanes as HOV. Or I can spend money and use them, sometimes I do that even when there is not much traffic just to get to drive over 65 MPH without worrying about a ticket.
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