Downtown Freeway Loops

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by homebucket

In Oakland, 980 from 24 to 880 is a section that has been explored for removal.

This one from Oakland is very good. Restoring the street grid, with highrise development is my favourite type of project, specially when it's adjacent to Downtowns.

Originally Posted by homebucket

And with the addition of a second Transbay Tube and Caltrain Downtown Rail extension, opening up the possibility of connecting Caltrain to the East Bay, and Amtrak to DTSF, that would help bolster the argument for removal of 280 in SF from 101 to SoMa, and possibly even the Hwy-1 (Daly City) to 101 portion.

The article posted seems to apply to the Santa Monica-East Los Angeles freeway as well. It won't be the end of Los Angeles if one day it would be removed. The city will probably profit of it.

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

The grade separated right of ways that reach (and often surround) downtowns is an excellent place to put suburban S-bahn networks! All you really need to do is install the rails and stations, then add the electrification. No worrying about finding a right of way, expensive tunneling, or worrying about NIMBYs complaining about the noise. A lot of the corridors are already wide enough to allow the networks to be quad track allowing both local and express services. And some are so wide they can still host a reduced number of vehicular lanes, perhaps limited to commercial vehicles. Would be perfect for a place like LA. The only real challenge is kicking out the cars.

Indeed. Los Angeles is already chopped by freeways. Very easy to build railways on their place for long-distance commutes. The only problem I see it's on cases freeways are part of state-wide connections.

[TWAK]

Originally Posted by plinko

Oddly though, in the 2002 regional transportation plan, there were still plans for new freeways (along with a bunch of new transit lines). Watt Avenue and Hazel/Sierra College were supposed to be incrementally upgraded to full limited access and Grant Line was supposed to be built as a fully limited access highway as well. Thankfully they built the transit and none of the highways.

Speaking of that they are turning Grant Line into a parkway.


source

The removal of CA275 to the Tower Bridge has made a huge difference in how that area of West Sac feels and has developed. They need to get rid of the utterly useless CA160 as well.

Yeah, whenever I used 160 while living in downtown there was never anybody on it. The area could benefit with a road like Del Paso blvd.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by The North One

As opposed to the cost of maintenance and reconstruction? That's really the biggest reason we're seeing some removals today. It makes no sense to keep dumping money to maintain them.

Sure, underused spurs, feeder ramps, and loop connectors are low hanging fruit and typically small enough to make removal financially feasible, but I can't see the city of Chicago removing the 28 miles of I-90 as it traverses the entire city from southeast to northwest.

[Doady]

I think the "suburban" freeways built in the outer parts of an expanding urban areas were more actually more damaging than the "urban" freeways built through pre-existing inner cities. Inner city neighbourhoods got destroyed to get these freeway into and through these downtowns and central cities, but at least they were built to minimize their disruption to transit riders, pedestrians, cyclists. They were designed to preserve existing local corridors.

In contrast, the outer freeways in the suburbs often actually replaced existing local corridors, or potential local corridors. No more local corridors, that means no more corridors for transit, walking, or cycling.

For example, the Queen Elizabeth Way in the west of Toronto replaced an existing concession road, removing a potential local corridor. That leaves a huge 4km gap between Dundas Street and Lakeshore Road, the two major east-west local transit corridors that remain. Imagine having to walk 2km just to take the bus.

People talk a lot about the Gardiner Expressway in Toronto's downtown, the damage it did to Toronto's urban form, but looking at the bigger picture, bigger scale and longer term, I argue that the Queen Elizabeth Way was far more damaging to urbanity in the Greater Toronto Area, far disruptive to growth of the transit ridership in Toronto and beyond. The transit ridership in Mississauga south of Dundas Street is basically non-existent, and it's all because of the QEW.

Imagine, instead of the QEW as a freeway, we had a normal local corridor, more like Lakeshore Road and Dundas Street. Imagine that corridor was lined multi-storey strip malls and apartment buildings instead of a noise wall, and it could be used by transit riders and pedestrians. Mississauga's local and express bus service along Dundas Street got a combined 18,685 riders per weekday in October 2019 with combined frequency of 5-6 minutes all day. Imagine if the QEW corridor had that kind of transit service and ridership. Imagine the consequences not just for Mississauga, but also further outward into Oakville. Studies are being undertaken now for a potential rapid transit along Dundas, BRT, LRT, subway extension, all possible one day, and never will be possible for the QEW.

Urbanization by definition is about more connections, increased permeability, places and people being closer together. Isolation, that by definition is the antithesis of urban. Did the Gardiner Expressway really isolate the people of City of Toronto and its suburbs more than the Queen Elizabeth Way did? Think about that. People talk a lot about the Gardiner Expressway, but perhaps they should be talking more about the QEW.

[JManc]

Originally Posted by homebucket

In Oakland, 980 from 24 to 880 is a section that has been explored for removal.



Here's what it looked like before:


What it could look like after:




https://sf.streetsblog.org/2019/04/1...kland-freeway/

This wouldn't impact 880 itself though would it? That's how I typically go into SF.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by JManc

This wouldn't impact 880 itself though would it? That's how I typically go into SF.

It shouldn't. This is just a connector from 880 to get to 24. It's not particularly busy either. 880 is a workhorse though and I don't think it could ever get removed, since it's the main artery for port traffic and cargo coming in and out of the Bay Area.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

What do you think would happen if it suddenly disappeared?

Your question is answered whenever LA freeways are blocked by accidents or shut down by authorities: gridlock.

Originally Posted by Yuri

The article posted seems to apply to the Santa Monica-East Los Angeles freeway as well. It won't be the end of Los Angeles if one day it would be removed. The city will probably profit of it.

According to the LA Almanac, the (pre-pandemic) Santa Monica Freeway's total volume of traffic for the year divided by 365 days is 149,000 eastbound vehicles from its western terminus at the Pacific Coast Highway, 237,000 eastbound and 194,000 westbound vehicles at Bundy, 263,000 eastbound and 262,000 westbound vehicles at Robertson, and 355,000 eastbound and 354,000 westbound vehicles at Vermont. Work day volumes are almost certainly higher than that 365-day average. The freeway carries too many cars and trucks to dump onto LA's already congested boulevards.

Indeed. Los Angeles is already chopped by freeways. Very easy to build railways on their place for long-distance commutes. The only problem I see it's on cases freeways are part of state-wide connections.

The "only problem" with removing such a busy freeway is that the city simply cannot get that many additional people door to door on public transportation. You can build a subway line or three to handle 700,000 east- and westbound riders a day under Vermont, theoretically, but you also have to build out a massive and comprehensive network of other trains and buses to get those hundreds of thousands of people to the subway stations--and also to where they are going. I think people often fail to understand how large Los Angeles is.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by craigs

Your question is answered whenever LA freeways are blocked by accidents or shut down by authorities: gridlock.


According to the LA Almanac, the (pre-pandemic) Santa Monica Freeway's total volume of traffic for the year divided by 365 days is 149,000 eastbound vehicles from its western terminus at the Pacific Coast Highway, 237,000 eastbound and 194,000 westbound vehicles at Bundy, 263,000 eastbound and 262,000 westbound vehicles at Robertson, and 355,000 eastbound and 354,000 westbound vehicles at Vermont. Work day volumes are almost certainly higher than that 365-day average. The freeway carries too many cars and trucks to dump onto LA's already congested boulevards.

The "only problem" with removing such a busy freeway is that the city simply cannot get that many additional people door to door on public transportation. You can build a subway line or three to handle 700,000 east- and westbound riders a day under Vermont, theoretically, but you also have to build out a massive and comprehensive network of other trains and buses to get those hundreds of thousands of people to the subway stations--and also to where they are going. I think people often fail to understand how large Los Angeles is.

But that’s doable. 4 subway lines in São Paulo handle over 1 million people/daily. I don’t have the numbers, but I believe there are many other lines that busy in Europe and specially in Asia.

No other metro area in the world have so many kms of freeways as Los Angeles has, and as such, it should be the easiest place to find potential removals.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by Yuri

But that’s doable. 4 subway lines in São Paulo handle over 1 million people/daily. I don’t have the numbers, but I believe there are many other lines that busy in Europe and specially in Asia.

Sure, subway networks can and do handle large numbers of commuters. That does not, however, prove that removing one of the world's busiest freeways from today's Los Angeles is a good idea or must necessarily work out for the millions of potentially affected residents. We do *not* have a million subway riders, because LA isn't built like some random city halfway around the world like Sao Paulo. People here drive.

No other metro area in the world have so many kms of freeways as Los Angeles has

Is that true? Source?

In any case, I'll bet we have fewer miles of freeway per capita than many US metros.

, and as such, it should be the easiest place to find potential removals.

You move from a premise that is not obviously true to a conclusion that does not follow--how would you get the several million people who use the freeways to and from their destinations without them? A new bus line on every boulevard in the entire region? Every other boulevard? Would people have to walk miles to the nearest subway station? How many transfers would it take to get them to their destinations--three? Five?

This thread is full of pie-in-the-sky advocacy combined with a significant lack of understanding of how things actually work on the ground.

[austlar1]

^^^Absolutely! LA needs most of its vast freeway network, and it needs a lot more light and heavy rail thrown in the mix. LA (and many large US metros) are vast conurbations (I love that word!) that defy any single transportation solution. The auto is always going to play an outsized role. Anyone who thinks otherwise is delusional.

[plinko]

The premise here seems like it would be most appropriate for a mono-centric metropolis with just a few other smaller centers. Most US cities fit this description (though a few surprisingly would not have their downtown as the pole), but Los Angeles is not that. It is poly-centric in a way that does not apply to any other US city, particularly when viewing the scale.

[jd3189]

Before LA can think about getting rid of any of its urban freeways, it will have to built alternatives in public transportation first that can take the extra traffic away from the freeways.

The car will always be dominant, but it doesn’t have to be the most predominant way to get around. It’s not even about dislike for the automobile on my part, it’s the unsustainability and health/social issues of car-centric urban sprawl that really makes me worry for SoCal’s growth in the future.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Yuri

But that’s doable. 4 subway lines in São Paulo handle over 1 million people/daily. I don’t have the numbers, but I believe there are many other lines that busy in Europe and specially in Asia.

Private autos are probably easily affordable to 90+% of LA households, and well under 50% of SP households. So putting aside the extreme land use and cultural differences, it's a poor comparison.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Private autos are probably easily affordable to 90+% of LA households, and well under 50% of SP households. So putting aside the extreme land use and cultural differences, it's a poor comparison.

I don’t know where you got your numbers, but unfortunately there are over 11 million cars (and I mean cars, not other type of motor vehicles) in São Paulo for a 21million population whereas the number of people/household is above 3. Above 70% of households own a car.

Crawford, there’s life outside the US, ok? There are plenty of things people do differently in other places and those things could be better.

São Paulo is a very autocentric city, it has freeways carrying 400k/cars daily, most travels in the city are made by cars and STILL has four subway lines carrying over 1 million passengers people.

So yes, it’s completely feasible for subway lines to replace freeways. In fact, if this I-10 were completely removed, Los Angeles would still be the number 1 in freeways by a large margin.

But obvious you’re not interested in this whole discussion. You clearly just quoted my post to have an opportunity to say my country/city/me is better/richer than yours/you.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by craigs

According to the LA Almanac, the (pre-pandemic) Santa Monica Freeway's total volume of traffic for the year divided by 365 days is 149,000 eastbound vehicles from its western terminus at the Pacific Coast Highway, 237,000 eastbound and 194,000 westbound vehicles at Bundy, 263,000 eastbound and 262,000 westbound vehicles at Robertson, and 355,000 eastbound and 354,000 westbound vehicles at Vermont. Work day volumes are almost certainly higher than that 365-day average. The freeway carries too many cars and trucks to dump onto LA's already congested boulevards.

This isn't really an impressive number if you compare it to a subway line. Even if all of those cars had 4 people per vehicle, you're maybe getting to the same numbers of people as NYC's Lexington Avenue subway. But of course the Lexington Avenue subway takes up zero surface space, while the Santa Monica Freeway is 10 lanes wide.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by JManc

This wouldn't impact 880 itself though would it? That's how I typically go into SF.

My condolences. That's one really awful freeway nightmare I've almost never had to drive on.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

My condolences. That's one really awful freeway nightmare I've almost never had to drive on.

Yes, by far the worst bay area freeway (sooo many trucks). 280 is by far the best (owing to being outside of built up areas for large portions of its route).

[Yuri]

I remember 10 years ago, when I moved here, São Paulo was quickly creating exclusive bus lanes (on the left or right, depending on the place) in virtually all major arterial avenues in the city. Here one example: https://www.google.com/maps/@-23.560...7i16384!8i8192

Drivers, as usual, didn't like the idea and saying gridlocks would be even more intense. That didn't happen, bus trips became almost as quick as subway and today 94% of people approve them.

São Paulo bus system carried 7.5 million passengers daily (2019) and is essential to keep city moving. It doesn't work as the subway/railway feeder but to create a redundancy.

It's been demonstrated several times new freeways don't improve traffic as they create more demand. And on the opposite direction, removal of lanes actually improve things on the ground.

[badrunner]

So we should rip out our freeways and replace them with subway lines and sacrifice our personal mobility so that LA can be more like Brazil. Yeah ok. That's one of the dumbest ideas I've ever read on this forum.

• Video Link

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by badrunner

So we should rip out our freeways and replace them with subway lines and sacrifice our personal mobility so that LA can be more like Brazil. Yeah ok. That's one of the dumbest ideas I've ever read on this forum.

Why don't you like Brazil?

There are also massive urban freeways in Brazil. Marginal Tietê (with Canada's Highway) is reputed to be world's busiest.

And in any case, if you don't like Brazil, you could pick any city in the world as a role model for Los Angeles as everyone of them has less freeways. In fact, Angelenos themselves are pioneers on opposing freeways. I gather you're not familiar with urban history, but freeway wars were very intense there.

So not enjoying freeways is not the same of not enjoying Los Angeles. There are plenty of freeway-hate there. It's even an integral part of pop culture with Michael Douglas' Falling Down.