EVEN MORE ON INTERSTATE CRIME
On the INTERSTATE CRIME string Charlie said:
“EMR: Regarding your first point, a lot of people would argue that this is what happened in Washington, and that is the source of traffic problems.”
Not really. The InterRegional strategy for roadways stops major limited access corridors at the Clear Edge, not the Zentrum (aka, the “downtown.”)
“Only two highways run downtown (66 and 395) — maybe 295 if you are stretching downtown a bit.”
True, some of the penetrations were blunted but that just left the Core inside the Clear Edge neither fish nor fowl. Stockholm and Paris are fish, Houston is fowl, or rather foul.
“Granted, since the Beltway was built, massive development has occurred outside.”
The InterRegional strategy has “beltways” but they are designed to serve far different land uses at the Clear Edge. You can still have “parkways” into the Zentrum as well. As noted below the issue is Balance.
“I’d argue the real beneficiary of that is not DC but the inside-Beltway suburbs.”
If anyone was a “beneficiary,” you are right, it was the Greater North Arlingtons, etc. but compared to a similar area in Stockholm or even Toronto it is not that great.
“Curious to hear your thoughts on the 66 expansion.”
I presume since it is on the front burner right now that you mean I-66 inside the Beltway. So here is my take:
“Anytime Agencies (fed, state, municipal) that control transport take actions to “expand” the capacity of a roadway without this expansion being part of a COMPREHENSIVE, Regionally endorsed and broadly understood strategy to BALANCE TRANSPORT SYSTEM CAPACITY WITH SETTLEMENT PATTERN TRAVEL DEMAND this action only postpones the day that the majority of citizens understand that Business-As-Usual will lead to Collapse.
In our Vocabulary this “enhancement” just reinforces the Large, Private Vehicle Mobility Myth (L,PVMM) spelled out for NMM below.
NMM said:
“I would suspect then that LA has poor settlement patterns OR poorly designed road system which would explain the traffic issues.”
NMM, you just cannot wing it on human settlement patterns. There are facts and there are Natural Laws that control the function of settlement patterns.
The Los Angles NUR does not have bad settlement patterns on a Regional scale based on the intensity of land uses inside the Clear Edge. And there IS a Clear Edge for most of the Urbanized area – ocean, steep topography – much of it in public ownership e.g US Forest Service.
The Los Angles NUR roadway system is not that bad either except that the interchanges take up huge amounts of land in areas that should be part of the Urban fabric and the “freeways” are impenetrable barriers between what are the logical components of Villages, Communities and SubRegions.
The traffic congestion problem in the Los Angles NUR is caused by the failure to evolve Balance at the Village, Community and Subregional scales. Period. Too many people trying to go too many places at the same time.
For the record the Los Angles NUR has the second highest AVERAGE density within the urbanized areas in the US of A. The New York NUR has the highest AVERAGE due to several very dense areas (but not ALL of “Manhattan”…).
The New York NUR is still half the AVERAGE intensity of the Toronto NUR and one quarter of that of the Paris, Stockholm, Wien NURs and other large NURs with far more functional distribution of Urban uses and Openspaces within the Clear Edge. Ever notice all those big forested areas from the Eiffel Tower?
“… The ultimate problem in this region may not be settlement patterns but road design and geographic problems (i.e. river crossing issues) Think about it of course there are going to be bottlenecks when the only way to get from Maryland suburbs to VA suburbs is over the American Legion Bridge due to the Potomac river.”
NO, NO, NO. The problem is Balance. It is not possible for everyone to live where they want, work where they want, seek Services, Recreation and Amenity where they want and then be able to create a roadway (or shared-vehicle system) so everyone can go where the want, when they want and arrive in a timely manner. (L,PVMM) IT IS NOT POSSIBLE. It is not just the settlement patterns, it is not just the River, it is IMPOSSIBLE to design or build a system to accomplish that in a large NUR.
By the way check out what TMT said about 83-million sq feet in the Zentrum of Greater Tysons Corner at 9:42 on the THANK YOU GROVETON string that started out dealing with school governance. You hear more an more planners these days admitting the L,PVMM is just that, a Myth.
EMR