I-95/I-10 Operational Improvements Conceptual Plans

[Riverrat]

Super cool shot of downtown Jax and the 10/95 interchange in the headline - where can you find the full uncropped photo?

[thelakelander]

It seems like 'rerouted truck traffic' is the all important buzz words right now. TBH, I don't think that Jax's truck traffic on the two-digit interstates, are a big deal; Nor do I think that Riverside's historical district is gonna be imperiled, because of some conjured, every growing twenty-two lane Fuller Warren Bridge that's destined to wipe out all of humanity...

When traffic gets heavy enough, WAY in the distant future, they'll eventually reroute the truck traffic. Believe me, Jax having a simple two lane 95 split (that some of yall loved apparently) like it's 1990 wouldn't be viable right now. Catch yall later.    

Reroute truck traffic to where? Let's just say you're IAW, Maxwell House, Swisher, Beaver Street Fisheries or North Florida Shipyards.  How exactly are you going to reroute truck traffic off I-10 and I-95? Do we really want additional trucks to go down neighborhood streets to access our industries and businesses instead? In Miami, they are doing the exact opposite to get port truck traffic out of downtown by building a tunnel off I-395 for trucks instead.  In Tampa, the same thing was done with the I-4/Selmon Connector to get trucks off the streets of Ybor City. Truck traffic isn't the problem with these roads. It's a development pattern that promotes new residential growth on the edges of town. Since those residents have no jobs or significant nodes of commerce in their neck of the woods, they end up clogging the limited access highways around town to access these services.

[thelakelander]

But not interstates?

Can you tell me what the operational difference is between an urban interstate and a limited access highway? Is SR 9A any different now because it's called I-295 East Beltway? Does travel on JTB operate any differently because it's not labeled an interstate? All of these are state maintained roads and have the same roadway design requirements. So in reality, all the I-95/I-10 interchange is, is a place where two limited access roads meet.

On a related note, what is the impetus for the highway removal and road diet movement that keeps getting referenced?

There's no energy behind either of I-10 or I-95 being removed or going on a road diet. That's wishful thinking at best.

We seem to be devolving to shakespearean theories of nomenclature. Or perhaps gertrude stein..... In this case: A rose is a rose, is a rose.  If its an interstate, then its an interstate.  Or at least last time i checked.

If we're to have a real discussion on this and not confuse people, we need to understand what we are talking about is limited access roads, expressways, freeways, highways with no traffic signals, etc. It doesn't matter if it's labeled a interstate number or not. The design and impacts on the surrounding neighborhoods aren't any different.

And I was asking about a broader question.  Why are cities removing the highways and creating road diets?

For a variety of reasons. To spur infill growth, save money, design for the human as opposed to the car, etc. are all various reasons. However, most limited access highway removals have been short spurs similar to the Hart Bridge Expressway.

[thelakelander]

The title of the thread is actually a specific operations project proposed for a specific highway interchange which also happens to an SIS facility. What we're discussing should probably be a separate topic altogether. I'll explain later but I have some things to do right now.

[thelakelander]

230.

[Dog Walker]

Thought experiment:  How much traffic would be diverted from the Fuller Warren Bridge if the signs at the intersection of I-295 and I-95 were swapped?  What percentage of traffic currently going over the bridge are vehicles that are simply going through Jacksonville, not trips originating in the greater Jacksonville area?

[Ocklawaha]

I-795 (and that's what 9-B will become) had some design purposes to reroute truck traffic to and from JAXPORT on a shorter route to our south. This effectively bypasses the perpetual bottleneck at I-95/295 south. No doubt sprawl will be effected around the Davis ranch, but FYI all of that land has been planned for development adjoining (roughly) Nocatee.
I-795 will become an extension of the St. Johns Parkway south and west of 95.

My only wish for the project is that they would have swung west along Greenbriar and effected a river crossing at Fleming Island as a link in the Outer Beltway. This would have made the Beltway useful to many more current residents of Clay and St. Johns and given the Clay people an alternative access to the Baymeadows/Beaches/Town Center areas.

Stephen road diets are for many purposes, they slow traffic, but they also have been shown to GREATLY increase retail. Stands to reason if your not blowing through town on a State or Union Street, traffic a bit more confined, stopped at a light... then you spot THAT store! They also increase pedestrian and bicycle safety making the space friendlier with wider (usually) tree lined sidewalks and local transit. These are things a freeway just can't do. In our continual quest to build a great city, imagine the Hart bridge ramps become our own version of Oklahoma City Blvd, or Portland's streetcar... or both.

[I-10east]

Reroute truck traffic to where? Let's just say you're IAW, Maxwell House, Swisher, Beaver Street Fisheries or North Florida Shipyards.  How exactly are you going to reroute truck traffic off I-10 and I-95?

My bad, you're right Lake.

[thelakelander]

"Rerouting" truck traffic is wishful thinking.  My brother is a truck driver. They have GPS to give them the shortest/best route for trucks to access to their destinations. So if you have a load headed to an inner city destination, you want that 18 wheeler on I-10, not Park Street. Besides, it's not trucks trying to get over to Roosevelt Boulevard. It's all those residents who moved to Clay County, Argyle, Oakleaf, etc.

Thought experiment:  How much traffic would be diverted from the Fuller Warren Bridge if the signs at the intersection of I-295 and I-95 were swapped?  What percentage of traffic currently going over the bridge are vehicles that are simply going through Jacksonville, not trips originating in the greater Jacksonville area?

I'd have to go back and look at traffic counts or O&D data but I'm pretty confident that most of the traffic on I-95, inside of the beltway, is local. A sign most likely accomplishes nothing with GPS and cell phones already providing the average person with the shortest route from point A to point B.

[Dog Walker]

Bet you that Google Maps or Garmin maps would route more people around Jax is the road designation changed.  Most of the route algorithms try for simplicity over efficiency; the fewer turns the better; don't confuse the driver!

[thelakelander]

If so, I-95 (for those going north/south) is a straight shot. Anything else will have you merging onto something else. How you propose getting Westside/Clay County people off Blanding and Roosevelt? Take that segment of traffic out and you probably don't have a problem at all.  But the majority of that traffic is local commuters.

[Keith-N-Jax]

Nice aerial view of the city on the top post.

I was thinking the same thing. We don't see that view to often.

[thelakelander]

Ock, I think you hit the wrong moderator button and edited my original post by including your own.  Here's your part:

To be precise, examples of limited access highways intersecting near rivers, bays, creeks, waterways, etc.  This country literally turned its back on urban waterways for most of the 20th century.  Find a major city with a river and 9 times out of 10, you'll discover a superhighway, two or three, nearby.

For example, most urbanist tend to hold Portland up as a model for places like Jacksonville to follow. Well, for all the LRT, streetcars, high density and all, it has a few examples of this surrounding its downtown...

True Lake, but Portland is dealing with more constraints then we ever will. Just to the east and west of the river the land rises sharply into the Cascade and Coast Range of mountains, respectively. The inner belt is really a glorified split of the north-south interstate 5. All parts of this are about as far from the middle of the CBD as is our I-95 in LaVilla.

What hasn't been said is that Portland scrapped the entire north-south 'Waterfront Drive' freeway and replaced it with a lineal park, with multi use trails and streetcar. The former freeway took up the space we would identify as between the riverbank and Bay Street in Jacksonville and ran the length of downtown. The second huge freeway project, 'The Mount Hood Freeway', was killed and replaced by light-rail. The result has been an economic boom from downtown east into Gresham (a few miles from where I used to live). Oklahoma City has now done the same thing with I-40 in downtown. The freeway that once rubbed up to the Cox Arena downtown is now a half mile south. Rather like Jacksonville doing all of this 'improvement' on a new I-95 alignment from the Emerson exit straight north crossing the river around A.P.Randolph and curving back into the old highway near the Trout River.

Here's some before and after shots:

PORTLAND:


Center of photo, the Mount Hood Freeway - project killed.


Mount Hood Freeway model, Portland to Mount Hood, replaced by MAX LRT (light-rail)


Mount Hood Freeway? Imagine this 25 years from now on JTA's BRT... HA!


Running from the lower right corner, note the freeway along the river.


Here's a post card from the Waterfront Drive in Portland.


This is a rendering of the planned change to the freeway.




Both photos above: This is 'Waterfront Drive' today.

OKLAHOMA CITY


Map showing the I-40 relocation.


The Replacement of I-40, OKLAHOMA CITY BLVD.


Crossing the Blvd, here we see the new Streetcar entering the core by the historic Santa Fe (Amtrak) station from the Ford Center northbound, Bricktown is across the railroad. 


Streetcar plan Zeta-A


God know's Jacksonville my love, we can only hope!

[thelakelander]

True Lake, but Portland is dealing with more constraints then we ever will. Just to the east and west of the river the land rises sharply into the Cascade and Coast Range of mountains, respectively. The inner belt is really a glorified split of the north-south interstate 5. All parts of this are about as far from the middle of the CBD as is our I-95 in LaVilla.

Whatever the reason, you have a common situation where freeways/interstates meet up with each other along the river. My argument has and still remains that Jacksonville's expressway system's routes in the urban core is not unique in America.

What hasn't been said is that Portland scrapped the entire north-south 'Waterfront Drive' freeway and replaced it with a lineal park, with multi use trails and streetcar. The former freeway took up the space we would identify as between the riverbank and Bay Street in Jacksonville and ran the length of downtown.

To be fair, some original concepts for the Hart Bridge Expressway, Acosta Bridge and Mathews Bridge had them extending through DT to connect to I-95. Luckily those died before becoming the reality that Waterfront Drive did.

The second huge freeway project, 'The Mount Hood Freeway', was killed and replaced by light-rail. The result has been an economic boom from downtown east into Gresham (a few miles from where I used to live). Oklahoma City has now done the same thing with I-40 in downtown. The freeway that once rubbed up to the Cox Arena downtown is now a half mile south. Rather like Jacksonville doing all of this 'improvement' on a new I-95 alignment from the Emerson exit straight north crossing the river around A.P.Randolph and curving back into the old highway near the Trout River.

I-40 was rerouted through Ocklahoma City but it didn't go away.  That wouldn't work for Jax. Our inner city neighborhoods are significantly denser and occupied than the area around I-40's new path.

[jaxinatl]

Is Jax the only city in the country that doesn't reroute except Atlanta? Serioulsy? First, semis arent allowed through Atl and have to go 285 unless they have business in the Perimeter. Jax doesnt do that. Since when did Orlando reroute traffic? Miami? Charlotte? Nashville? Dc doesnt necessarily reroute unless people chose to take the beltway.