MN Highway 610

Roads - Rails - Sidewalks - Bikeways
mnmike
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mnmike » October 16th, 2014, 2:46 pm

That is probably true, yes! I am not sure it would balance out the cost of public transit enough to make it the better option though! who knows.

mattaudio
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mattaudio » October 16th, 2014, 2:49 pm

People think I hate cars. I do not hate cars. I have a car. I use it many times a week. It's nothing about cars. It's about skewing preferences to the degree that it has changed/harmed/destroyed community, place, sense of pride, environment, public finances, and upward mobility in America.

IllogicalJake
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby IllogicalJake » October 16th, 2014, 2:51 pm

Ha, but I live in the city, and even I think that Matt is being extreme. I am assuming you are grouping me with the suburbanites because I dare question the "hate everyone that lives in the suburbs and drives" mentality.

As for Matts suggestion of passing along the full cost of roads/transit to the user...this would backfire horribly. Do you know how much fares would be on public transit?!??! It isn't just roads that are expensive. Public transit is heavily subsidized and bleeds money in almost all cities to make it affordable.

And yes, I am all for public transit expansion. And live in the city. Can you believe it? I don't drink the car hating kool aid:)
Haha, I really didn't mean to group people here into those, just that it's the way these road projects seem to play out.

The "let users pay full price" approach is crazy, should you collect money at the door every time anyone enters a public lobby to offset the costs of maintenance? And train fares would be in the mid double-digits.
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RailBaronYarr
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby RailBaronYarr » October 16th, 2014, 3:10 pm

Well, there have been multiple studies that show economic return of roads has dropped below rates you could get by simply investing the same amount of money in the market (overview of 2 studies here. Obviously there are some corridors (very few out of many) where this may not be the case. Unfortunately, I don't think this is one of them. We have a very robust freeway network in our metro, including out in the suburb/exurb gray area, so to me we really shouldn't be talking about any capacity additions until at least a lane on every freeway has received the MnPass treatment given the shortfall in funding for roads (a gap that is widening as time goes on, btw).

This link isn't about making getting goods around more efficiently (economy!) since only 7% of "urban" VMT is freight, this is (as posters here have noted) all about ensuring travel time to people's jobs without charging users more for the reduced time spent. I have little sympathy for people who choose to live in a place designed solely around the automobile and then find out that it isn't the open-road 65 mph+ world they see on TV ads. Especially when those people on the fringe can access more jobs in 20 minutes by car than folks in most parts of Minneapolis & St Paul proper can reach in 30 minutes by transit in (oftentimes by a factor of 5-10).

RailBaronYarr
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby RailBaronYarr » October 16th, 2014, 3:18 pm

The "let users pay full price" approach is crazy, should you collect money at the door every time anyone enters a public lobby to offset the costs of maintenance? And train fares would be in the mid double-digits.
http://www.minnpost.com/cityscape/2012/ ... ms-bargain

Urban local bus routes need very little operating subsidy (and have very small amortized capital costs to calculate in as well).

I would guess that if car drivers paid marginal costs that matched expenditures (instead of a high fixed cost via motor vehicle sales tax & annual tab/wheelage fees that don't correlate at all to usage), and also paid the full price of parking, and also paid the full price of the rest of the infrastructure that serves larger lot homes in use-based zoning, and even paid a shred of the external costs of driving ($50/ton carbon tax @ .0113 lifecycle metric tons of carbon per gallon of gas = $0.565/gal) we'd have a lot more 1 car households and places where at least some daily amenities were within walking distance or very short drives.

go4guy
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby go4guy » October 17th, 2014, 6:33 am

I know this is a completely bizarre concept for some of you, but maybe, just maybe, people who live in the suburbs actually work in the suburbs. I bet that number is a whole heck of a lot higher than the people that work downtown and commute from the suburbs. But then again, that would go against some of your ant-car agenda.

I live in the suburbs. So sue me. I commute to work in a car because there is not adequate public transportation for me to get to work.

mattaudio
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mattaudio » October 17th, 2014, 7:10 am

There is no anti-car agenda. Many people in the city commute, by car, to the suburbs as well.

twincitizen
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby twincitizen » January 15th, 2015, 2:00 pm

New 610 is showing up on Google Maps already, though without the new interchange at Whatevertree Parkway.
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.1350312 ... a=!3m1!1e3

EDIT: Lines only show in Satellite/Earth, not Map View

I wonder if they'll ever co-sign the Blaine stretch of US-10 (from 35W to MN-47/MN-610 interchange) to also carry MN-610 signage. Once completed, it seems to function as a fairly congruent east-west freeway. It's hard enough giving directions in this area with the two Highway 10s. Instead of telling people "take 610 east to 10 east to whatever", you could just say "610 east to whatever".

mulad
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mulad » January 15th, 2015, 2:32 pm

I think those lines have been there since before Christmas -- I satellite/earth view sometimes shows proposed/in-progress routes, but they don't distinguish them very well from existing routes. I didn't see any real evidence of construction when I went through over the holidays.

froggie
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby froggie » January 15th, 2015, 5:55 pm

It shows up in Map View if you zoom in far enough.

David Greene
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby David Greene » January 15th, 2015, 10:00 pm

Ugh. I just shudder at those Maple Grove shopping areas. I absolutely hate them, especially the one at the Fish Lake interchange. I absolutely dread driving up to my sister's place.

In my experience the Fish Lake interchange is *not* over capacity at off-peak hours but if it is, it just demonstrates induced demand. It wasn't that long ago that we did a major expansion of 94 there.

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mister.shoes
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mister.shoes » January 15th, 2015, 11:41 pm

IMO, it's never over capacity. It's just poorly-designed, what with the merging on the NB 94 and SB 494 legs. Add an auxiliary lane of sorts to Weaver Lake Road and Bass Lake Road and everything is fine.
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froggie
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby froggie » January 16th, 2015, 7:42 am

It wasn't that long ago that we did a major expansion of 94 there.
About 12 years ago, which expanded 94/694 to the east. 494 to the south and 94 to the northwest are effectively the same as they were when built in the late '60s and early '70s respectively.

Here's an interchange design I came up with a few years ago:

Image

Of note, I'd add HOV lanes on both freeways, with direct connections between 94 West and 494 South. I'd also realign westbound 94 and add a C/D road to get the weaving movements off the mainline.

mattaudio
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mattaudio » January 16th, 2015, 9:51 am

Interesting. So, the congestion I've seen... 494 northbound is congested, but frees up when the third lane adds right before the interchange. 94 westbound can get congested, right before the merge with 494 before Weaver Lake Rd., an issue of having only three lanes northbound after the interchange.

mulad
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby mulad » October 21st, 2016, 9:48 am

MnDOT held a ceremony yesterday for the MN-610 extension to I-94, though the roadway won't open until mid-November.

http://www.startribune.com/mndot-celebr ... 397730441/

Silophant
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Re: MN Highway 610

Postby Silophant » October 21st, 2016, 12:26 pm

Huh. When Minneapolis had that grand opening celebration for the Franklin Avenue Bridge, despite the eastbound bike lane/sidewalk not being complete, I thought about a tweet pointing out that we would never do something like that for a bridge where both vehicle lanes weren't open. Glad I was lazy and held off.
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