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Urban highways destroy wealth

urbankchoze.blogspot.com

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Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#11

Post by jesstaa »

chad_oliver wrote: post #4
nashashmi wrote: post #3

TL;DR version: - Urban highways cost more money than urban transit - They divide cities logistically. - Introduce pollution - Are very unsightly to neighborhoods - Steal traffic from roads in commercial zones and undermine regional commercial activity. - Put emphasis on car-first neighborhoods and businesses (which give little ROI). - Encourage urban sprawl and community inefficiency. My take: These points are unders…

What problem were they meant to solve? (That's a serious question. I'm interesting in hearing how other people view the purpose of an urban highway.)

Urban highways solve a political problem. When you have voters that spend a hour or so a day stuck in traffic it's really easy to sell them the idea that a highway will reduce traffic congestion without them having to change anything about their daily routine (ie. take public transport, bicycle, walk)

Since the highway will only reduce traffic congestion for a short time it's something you can sell to the voters again at the next election.

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#12

Post by jdminhbg »

GFK_of_xmaspast wrote: post #8
lnanek2 wrote: post #5

Having some trouble swallowing this paragraph: " The richest metropolitan areas in the US are San José, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Washington, Houston, New York, Portland, Hartford and Salt Lake City. Areas with relatively few urban highways are overrepresented in that list, with Houston being the one big exception. " When I need to get anywhere in New York, most of the time I am better off grabbing the west sid…

When I think of major US cities that are under-served with urban highways, the one that immediately comes to mind is Baltimore (granted, I-95 goes thru, and I-83 (81?) dead-ends near downtown, but otherwise good luck). For the ones he's mentioned DC's got big sections that aren't well served by highways, but there is still the beltway, the BW parkway/I295, I395, the southeast freeway. I don't know Hartford that well,…

> When I think of major US cities that are under-served with urban highways, the one that immediately comes to mind is Baltimore (granted, I-95 goes thru, and I-83 (81?) dead-ends near downtown, but otherwise good luck).

I-83 ends downtown. There's also 695 (the beltway), 395 (from 95 to the stadiums/downtown), 895 (Harbor tunnel), and 195 (BWI airport connector).

It's never felt underserved highway-wise to me, but I've never actually lived there, just visited a lot.

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#13

Post by HillRat »

chad_oliver wrote: post #4
nashashmi wrote: post #3

TL;DR version: - Urban highways cost more money than urban transit - They divide cities logistically. - Introduce pollution - Are very unsightly to neighborhoods - Steal traffic from roads in commercial zones and undermine regional commercial activity. - Put emphasis on car-first neighborhoods and businesses (which give little ROI). - Encourage urban sprawl and community inefficiency. My take: These points are unders…

What problem were they meant to solve? (That's a serious question. I'm interesting in hearing how other people view the purpose of an urban highway.)

At least in major Southern cities, the problem was often "the blacks." Highway locations were often chosen to cut off less-desirable neighborhoods from city centers and more upscale residential neighborhoods. (I-30 in Dallas and the proposed I-485 in Atlanta, and arguably Robert Moses' Cross Bronx Expressway all come to mind.)

Today, the need for highways hasn't gone away, but more enlightened urban planning and urban gentrification means that cities are finding ways to either relocate or ameliorate the effects of those roads -- though the expense is significant.

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#14

Post by jacobolus »

chad_oliver wrote: post #4
nashashmi wrote: post #3

TL;DR version: - Urban highways cost more money than urban transit - They divide cities logistically. - Introduce pollution - Are very unsightly to neighborhoods - Steal traffic from roads in commercial zones and undermine regional commercial activity. - Put emphasis on car-first neighborhoods and businesses (which give little ROI). - Encourage urban sprawl and community inefficiency. My take: These points are unders…

What problem were they meant to solve? (That's a serious question. I'm interesting in hearing how other people view the purpose of an urban highway.)

They were meant to get people from far out of the city into the city, fast, in a way that would only be accessible to professional-class whites, so that they could keep downtown jobs while moving their families to the suburbs and stop spending their property tax money on poor brown people.

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#15

Post by SFjulie1 »

nashashmi wrote: post #3

TL;DR version: - Urban highways cost more money than urban transit - They divide cities logistically. - Introduce pollution - Are very unsightly to neighborhoods - Steal traffic from roads in commercial zones and undermine regional commercial activity. - Put emphasis on car-first neighborhoods and businesses (which give little ROI). - Encourage urban sprawl and community inefficiency. My take: These points are unders…

TL; DR

$ person transported/km for highways >> subway

For all the cons you quoted.

Living in montréal, biking all year.

The problem is much more the diffusion of the flux (aggravated by graph partition and an asymmetry of rules making turning left strongly discouraged). They don't seem to have any engineers studying hydrodynamics, percolation, diffusion or geometry or physics in their offices. They reason in terms of big arteries and making car go consistently fast there (50) and construction costs and rely on magic for congestion and diffusion.

Riding a bike feels like you are gonna die every morning. Especially in winter.

They weirdly enough make expensive dangerous bike paths to solve the problem that are more likely to cause accidents than none. And they evaluate that a fall from a bike make cyclists safe with a 50 cm security distance (I am quite taller and when I fall, it is much more 1m20 margin).

Let's say that even if some jerks found it funny to scare cyclists and sometimes bump them, on the 99.99% distribution they are nice people but a tad forgetting to watch there mirrors when opening their 50 cm doors in my 80 cm "safe" space on the streets.

Had some bruises, fears, strong words and went to the hospital get my wife after some accidents.

Still alive, though. Still alive. Pretty proud of us and faster/cheaper than most transportations (car and subways included).

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#16

Post by DrScump »

lnanek2 wrote: post #5

Having some trouble swallowing this paragraph: " The richest metropolitan areas in the US are San José, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Washington, Houston, New York, Portland, Hartford and Salt Lake City. Areas with relatively few urban highways are overrepresented in that list, with Houston being the one big exception. " When I need to get anywhere in New York, most of the time I am better off grabbing the west sid…

With respect to San Jose, it's a crock. The only remotely "urban" area is downtown, and that is fully served with highways (880, 280/680, 87). Light rail is a joke, with routes having been chosen for political reasons rather than true demand, and it is useless for transporting goods.

This article, like many on the topic, also take a one-dimensional view of highways -- as people movers. The flow of goods and services (especially emergency services) is at least as important. Throughout the Bay Area, highways are critical infrastructure just to move goods and supplies, if nothing else. 880/17 in Oakland became a chokepoint after the 1989 earthquake took down the Cypress structure, for example, and that would have been even worse had 980 not been completed not long before.

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#17

Post by SFjulie1 »

chad_oliver wrote: post #4
nashashmi wrote: post #3

TL;DR version: - Urban highways cost more money than urban transit - They divide cities logistically. - Introduce pollution - Are very unsightly to neighborhoods - Steal traffic from roads in commercial zones and undermine regional commercial activity. - Put emphasis on car-first neighborhoods and businesses (which give little ROI). - Encourage urban sprawl and community inefficiency. My take: These points are unders…

What problem were they meant to solve? (That's a serious question. I'm interesting in hearing how other people view the purpose of an urban highway.)

Shortening the time it takes to go from north to south.

All island are plagued with the "points of entries and congestions". Montréal is 30x40km island. With limited bridges.

So by making a large artery that almost lead people from bridge to bridge (N/S) you may think you can create a traffic that will not interfere with the inter urban traffic... (laminarizing) thus getting rid of intra congestion. (Since it is in a trench and has bridges on top).

But it also creates opportunities (like with real estates part) that have adverse consequences. And vortex around the entry points.

It also create ruptures in the city that artificially recreates partitions. Thus recreating "islands" in the island. Maybe not for cars, I admit. It also generates more pressure on the outside bridge thus congestion at the edge of the city that are way more expensive to solve. Which make montréal famous for its traffic jam when commuters leave/come.

Regarding the inside near décarie : not all inhabitants have cars some are not rich enough. And it is destroying local area business (thus jobs for the guy already plagued). Thus parts maybe gradually abandoned (unused infra decay faster) in the blocks near Decarie, and ... well, it does not attract neither business, nor wealthy inhabitants. So it is like a decaying scorch in the city, infra that still require maintaining with less income ... slowly draining money by fiscal pressure (no perequation between districts) ... making people leave ... (vicious circle)

I am really puzzled by the way engineers model flux in the city. I would really like to understand the bug in their brain. Probably education + "a one best way and no need to measure"

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#18

Post by superuser2 »

jacobolus wrote: post #14
chad_oliver wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What problem were they meant to solve? (That's a serious question. I'm interesting in hearing how other people view the purpose of an urban highway.)

They were meant to get people from far out of the city into the city, fast, in a way that would only be accessible to professional-class whites, so that they could keep downtown jobs while moving their families to the suburbs and stop spending their property tax money on poor brown people.

He's not exaggerating: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight#Roads

Urban highways in the US are a facet of the American Dream vision of the suburbs as "a safe place to raise your kids," which is basically a euphemism for "far away from the scary minorities who live in cities."

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#19

Post by hoorayimhelping »

lnanek2 wrote: post #5

Having some trouble swallowing this paragraph: " The richest metropolitan areas in the US are San José, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Washington, Houston, New York, Portland, Hartford and Salt Lake City. Areas with relatively few urban highways are overrepresented in that list, with Houston being the one big exception. " When I need to get anywhere in New York, most of the time I am better off grabbing the west sid…

>I am better off grabbing the west side highway or the FDR rather than going through the grid and hitting traffic lights and gridlock constantly

And that's just Manhattan. There's also the BQE in Brooklyn and Queens, which doubly undermines the original point.

Re: Urban highways destroy wealth

#20

Post by hkmurakami »

DrScump wrote: post #16
lnanek2 wrote: post #5

Having some trouble swallowing this paragraph: " The richest metropolitan areas in the US are San José, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Washington, Houston, New York, Portland, Hartford and Salt Lake City. Areas with relatively few urban highways are overrepresented in that list, with Houston being the one big exception. " When I need to get anywhere in New York, most of the time I am better off grabbing the west sid…

With respect to San Jose, it's a crock. The only remotely "urban" area is downtown, and that is fully served with highways (880, 280/680, 87). Light rail is a joke, with routes having been chosen for political reasons rather than true demand, and it is useless for transporting goods. This article, like many on the topic, also take a one-dimensional view of highways -- as people movers. The flow of goods and services…

Excellent point. To that end it appears that 101 is much heavier on "move goods and services" than 280. (which makes sense because it is a much more direct route up and down the peninsula, whereas 280 is a much more pleasant drive.
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