[mayhem]

All discussion about the connector, possible rivers, and armies of jackhammering people should go here.

[dante2308]

Cover it in parks! Big Dig anyone?

[hoosier]

This might be slightly off-topic but I just recently learned that despite the large number of freeways in Atlanta currently, even more were initially planned!!

I did not know that the Lakewood Freeway was supposed to carry I-420 south of central Atlanta, nor did I know that U.S. 78 was intended to hook up to the downtown connector.

Does anyone have maps of the proposed Atlanta highway network with these routes included?

Would Atlanta have been better off with these additional expressways in your opinion?

[Hybrid0NE]

Would Atlanta have been better off with these additional expressways in your opinion?

No.

[Fiorenza]

No, certainly not the Va-Hi destructor. However, it's too bad the interstate to Memphis never got built. It would have begun at I-20 I guess, just east of AUC, run north and then northwest through NW Atlanta, South Cobb, Paulding (Dallas), south of Rome, Huntsville AL, and on to Memphis. It had too many enemies.

[hoosier]

No.

Did you read that report released by the Reason Institute late last year that called for the construction of a toll freeway tunnel connectng GA 400 and I-675 among other things?

It seems that all the Reason Institute advocates to address congestion problems is MORE highway construction!!

[hoosier]

No, certainly not the Va-Hi destructor. However, it's too bad the interstate to Memphis never got built. It would have begun at I-20 I guess, just east of AUC, run north and then northwest through NW Atlanta, South Cobb, Paulding (Dallas), south of Rome, Huntsville AL, and on to Memphis. It had too many enemies.

U.S. 78 is being upgraded to freeway standards between Birmingham and Memphis. So if someone in Atlanta wants to drive to Memphis, all they have to do is drive to Birmingham and take the new Interstate 22.

[Fiorenza]

I'm thinking more of Huntsville and the Tennessee Valley. Atlanta and Huntsville would benefit greatly from a direct connection, and continuing on to Memphis would provide us and them a connection to the nation's center - Missouri, Kansas, the upper midwest, etc..

[Andrea]

I'm copying this here at mayhem's request. For context see the original thread: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=128936

OK, OK, fine Andrea. I get it. The highway was built, the suburbs grew. Then the city declined. Now suburbanites merely pass through the city, leaving the city shortchanged. I agree with you on all of this. But I also think your few scattered population figures and CBD job counts aren't sufficient to explain the full impact of the connector on central Atlanta. Frankly, I don't have a set of tables to come back and use to prove my side. But it isn't always about numbers. There are a host of intangibles involved.

1)Atlanta actively engages the connector by virtue of the way is has grown up along it. Each year the dialogue increases and changes as new developments emerge in Midtown and Atlantic Station. The city is slowly bridging the gap, creating a very interesting and highly unique spatial environment. I guess you believe that freeways can't add character to a place but in Atlanta's case this is highly wrong. Some of the vistas you get along the connector provide the most urban sensations you can experience in the whole Atlanta area.

2) Removing the connector and sending all suburban traffic around 285 will only exacerbate sprawl and increasingly isolate the central city. Contrary to your belief, even through-traffic is a positive thing for the city. Traffic, quite frankly, is the single most important factor in determining an area's stability. Whether it's foot traffic, or car traffic, crowds actually build vitality. Believe me, having 300,000 cars on the connector each day means that Midtown, Downtown and Atlantic Station are billboards reminding suburbanites that "HEY! Atlanta is flashy! Come check it out!" If there was no connector I GUARANTEE they'd be less likely to come to Atlanta because A) it'd be so much harder to get to and B) they'd have no grand entrance into the city

3)I can't reiterate enough that I think one day in the future this may be a good thing. Right now, however, the connector holds everything together and it is the single greatest piece of advertising the city has going for it (because I'll let you in on a little secret, everybody - including SSPers and die-hard city fans - loves the allure of a dynamic urban promenade at 80mph.


Come now, realm. You think the ten-year U.S. Census is a "few scattered figures"? The reality we are dealing with -- whether people like to imagine it is something different or not -- is that Atlanta grew by leaps and bounds before the connector was built, and declined drastically in the 40 years thereafter. That's reality. The city lost a quarter of its population -- and no telling how much of its business -- AFTER the connector was completed, despite the addition of the radial freeways and despite repeated and massive widenings. That's hard fact. I realize folks would sometimes prefer to lay these hard facts aside in order to make arguments based on "intangibles", but in the cold light of reality that won't change what we have to deal with in the here and now.

It's a little difficult to understand the specifics of your assertion that freeways clogged with suburban "through-traffic is a positive thing for the city." If that's a marquee for excitement and for showing that, "Hey, we do things big and flashy, come check us out", you frankly have to wonder why Spaghetti Junction, I-75 in Cobb County, GA 316 and and the entire top-end Perimeter aren't the hottest urban tickets in town. Again, reality bites -- people aren't coming TO these freeways anymore than they are coming TO the Connector and Downtown. They are passing THROUGH, or at least attempting to do so. If they actually wanted to get into downtown, it's much easier to do so on the many surface streets.

With regard to the notion that Atlanta has "engaged" the Connector, you might take note of the extremely limited way in which it engages Midtown. On the northbound side, for example, once you pass 5th Street it's next stop Buckhead. It's been that way for nearly 60 years. Offhand I can't think of any building in Atlanta which was constructed for the purpose of being located adjacent to the Connector. It's the boundary to construction rather than an invitation. The reality is that intown Atlanta's growth has followed its arterial streets and boulevards and has been forced to work around the Connector and struggle with the lack of connectivity it creates.

I agree that companies like to put their logos on buildings near freeways, but that is hardly justification for putting a suburban cut-through in downtown Atlanta. Of course most corporate headquarters are not downtown to begin with. That's why you see so many corporate logos on buildings around Cumberland, Perimeter, all along 285 in the Platinum Triangle, around the airport and up and down GA 400. But the advertising value of putting corporate logos along suburban freeways hardly addresses the complex realities of locating a major suburban snafu in the midst of our recovering city.

You're saying a concrete gulch filled with cut-through commuters from the outlying suburbs is the best advertisement Atlanta could have. I suggest that we can do far, far better than that.

[SteveD]

I actually spoke "Andrea Connector" over the weekend...I was giving a friend directions to my place and I said "...you can come down Moreland Avenue or you can take the Andrea Connect....er, I mean the downtown connector..."

I was on this site at the time and had just read it a couple times so it was on my mind...:haha:

[atlantaguy]

LOL! I'm in the process of re-educating my circle of friends. Once I explain it, they latch right on to the new & improved name!

[Andrea]

:haha:

What I want to know is who's gonna get me out when the Department of Concrete Canyon Complacency declares me an enemy combatant and ships me off to its secret Asphalt Gravel detainee camp?

[atlantaguy]

Don't worry, Andrea. We'll cover your back. I'll even organize a motorcade down to the secret prison in Perry to snatch you from their clutches.:cheers:

[Andrea]

Thanks, atlantaguy. I had visions of them locking me in a cell filled with images of huge, inaccessible suburban freeways flanked by flashing corporate logos. "Admit it, admit it, you find this to be a pleasant urban experience!!"

:whip:

[sprtsluvr8]

I actually spoke "Andrea Connector" over the weekend...I was giving a friend directions to my place and I said "...you can come down Moreland Avenue or you can take the Andrea Connect....er, I mean the downtown connector..."

I was on this site at the time and had just read it a couple times so it was on my mind...:haha:


And was your friend headed for an intown destination? :)

[SteveD]

Well, I live in town, so, yep.

[HSVTiger]

I'm thinking more of Huntsville and the Tennessee Valley. Atlanta and Huntsville would benefit greatly from a direct connection, and continuing on to Memphis would provide us and them a connection to the nation's center - Missouri, Kansas, the upper midwest, etc..

This road will be built, over in the HSV thread you can see the proposed route, (I-28 maybe?)
It gets funding and ROW purchases may begin in a year or two:jester:
But unless your like 2 years old you may never ride on the completed
road unless changes are made in ALDOT (Alabama) method of doing business.

[dante2308]

No, no, everyone who wants to go in town gets off the highway system at 285 and backpacks the rest of the way. Its really a beautiful jog during the warmer parts of spring.

[MidtownMile]

No, no, everyone who wants to go in town gets off the highway system at 285 and backpacks the rest of the way. Its really a beautiful jog during the warmer parts of spring.

Yes. The hazy fog rolling in off the Cingular (is the new AT&T) signs is quite beautiful.

[Andrea]

Y'all are being ridiculous if you think the only alternative to barreling along (or, if you're in Atlanta, crawling along) on a limited access highway is backpacking. That's about like saying, "Well, if every building can't be a 60-story tower then I guess we'll have to live in pup tents."

I realize there's a certain element of joking going on here, but the mind-set it reveals suggests how profoundly suburban the attitudes in this city are. It's a shame we can't have a serious, considered and intelligent discussion about how to modernize our roads to make them more compatible with a genuinely urbanized city.

[stitchuno]

Of course these people are going to have a suburban mindset: THEY LIVE IN THE GIANT SUBURB called Atlanta.

I like to think of Atlanta as city, but it is more like a patchwork of suburbs with a few historic neighborhoods mixed throughout the region. Any sort of historic density that could have existed in the past (pre-autocentric design) just doesn't exist to give people a different perception of their surroundings.

It is really tough for people to see outside of their current environment and imagine what could be. When you live in an area where you are used to driving everywhere (because it's built that way), of course people aren't going to find it reasonable to have their freeway taken away. It is a part of the culture here and we see it even when we discuss the Peachtree streetcar: "Oh no! Please don't take a precious lane of travel away! What a traffic nightmare it will be!"

The fact is people are coming from every which way in the region and they are doing so by CAR. They are using the connector and the thought of removing it is like asking them to drive less. How could they survive without it?

[sprtsluvr8]

So it's highways are are important only in Atlanta? I'm pretty sure there are overcrowded major highways in virtually every urban area in the U.S.

There are more than a few historic neighborhoods throughout Atlanta, there are probably more than 100 of them. Have you been downtown in Atlanta? There are dozens of historic turn of the century highrises, and you'll find good historic density in Fairleigh-Poplar and in other areas. The discussion of Atlanta's lack of urban density and other such labels has gotten old. Atlanta may not be the exact model of the historical urban center, but it is still a real city...just because it doesn't fit the traditional model doesn't mean its all "a big suburb".

[GTviajero81]

Of course these people are going to have a suburban mindset: THEY LIVE IN THE GIANT SUBURB called Atlanta.

I like to think of Atlanta as city, but it is more like a patchwork of suburbs with a few historic neighborhoods mixed throughout the region. Any sort of historic density that could have existed in the past (pre-autocentric design) just doesn't exist to give people a different perception of their surroundings.

It is really tough for people to see outside of their current environment and imagine what could be. When you live in an area where you are used to driving everywhere (because it's built that way), of course people aren't going to find it reasonable to have their freeway taken away. It is a part of the culture here and we see it even when we discuss the Peachtree streetcar: "Oh no! Please don't take a precious lane of travel away! What a traffic nightmare it will be!"

The fact is people are coming from every which way in the region and they are doing so by CAR. They are using the connector and the thought of removing it is like asking them to drive less. How could they survive without it?

You know, I sit here in my flat outside Frankfurt, Germany seeing someone say that all of us who think that the Connector should be worked with have suburban mindsets. How so untrue. I see firsthand DAILY what it's like to not have a freeway go directly through a city. It is definitely not fun. For those who aren't up to snuff on their European WWII history, Frankfurt's medieval city centre was heavily bombed therefore when the war ended Frankfurt ended up constructing a city centre that looks very much like those back in the US, with towering skyscrapers and wide roads. The nearest Autobahnen to the city centre are the A648 and A661, and those are both about 1 mile away from the centre. Now let me tell you, the traffic is INTENSE to get from one to the other as one has to drive through the city. This is not good because a lot of people are driving from one side of the city to the 'Industriegebeiten' (industrial areas) on the outskirts of town. Of course, Frankfurt's metro system is quite adequate so this helps, but throw in bad weather with heavy traffic and voila! It's another Atlanta. But this does not diminish the appeal of Frankfurt to newcomers in the least bit. We just deal with it.

Like I brought up in an earlier thread, Montreal does a fabulous job of incorporating a freeway into the fabric of the centre city by placing it underground. This brings in people to the centre city in an easy fashion. City growth is enhanced greatly by accessability from the outside. It must be understood that once a road becomes a vital regional transportation link, as the Connector has developed to what it is today, one cannot just do away with it. For one, the development of alternate routes and upgrading current thoroughfares to support to extra traffic would prove an astronomically costly. Atlanta's current growth has been around the Connector simply because we are a city that, although auto-oriented, really wants to have mass transit, ergo being among (if not) the first Southern city to have rapid transit. And the argument of population decline in the 50's and 60's due to demolition of neighbourhoods and the building of the connector? I must say there is little correlation. With richer post WWII populations seeking the "American Dream", suburban development was bound to happen -- consider it a microcosm of Manifest Destiny. Coupled with 'white flight' from city centres in the 60's and 70's and naturally we have a decline in population in urban areas and an increase in suburban areas. This happened all over the country therefore the idea of this being a 'Connector issue' is hard to fathom.

If there is any freeway that really got things bad with regard to traffic, we ought to look at the connection of GA400 to I-85. Not since that connection was complete did the northern suburbs really take off. I still remember when almost all the exits off of 400 in N Fulton were small two lane interchanges... and I clearly remember when the construction boom to enlarge them took place and hence, the traffic became egregious. Let's not forget that the idea of the urban highway is to take those who would otherwise not go through the city off of the city streets and direct them elsewhere. That is why bypasses are built (I-285 and I-675).

[Hybrid0NE]

If we get into nick-naming major Atlanta thoroughfares after forumers, I've got FIRST dibs on Peachtree! Anyone hear about that new 70-story condo going up on the Hybrid? :D

P.S. Andrea, I've got connections to a free jackhammer, if you're ever overcome by insanity. ;)

[dante2308]

Y'all are being ridiculous if you think the only alternative to barreling along (or, if you're in Atlanta, crawling along) on a limited access highway is backpacking. That's about like saying, "Well, if every building can't be a 60-story tower then I guess we'll have to live in pup tents."

I realize there's a certain element of joking going on here, but the mind-set it reveals suggests how profoundly suburban the attitudes in this city are. It's a shame we can't have a serious, considered and intelligent discussion about how to modernize our roads to make them more compatible with a genuinely urbanized city.

You're absolutely right. As you have said no one uses your connector to get downtown. Everyone coming down 400, for example, gets off at exit 3 and does the next 15 miles using city streets. Its a good thing no one is on the connector but people going to the suburbs or the highway would fill up during Braves games and I would just hate that.

Anyway, if the connector was six lanes smaller, it wouldn't make a difference and no one would argue that a city like Atlanta doesn't have enough traffic going into it to warrant a highway. Lets not pretend 480,000 people have no use for a way to connect directly with the other 5 million people in the area and those 5 million have no reason to go to the entertainment center of the region. Even if all the jobs aren't here, there are several reasons why anyone would want to go from the suburbs into the city heart and all those people use the highway even if only because a lot of people are not familiar with the surface streets as well as us in-towners. (Not to say that that is the only reason someone would use the connector to get in-town)

You've had this conversation with tons of people to the point that we have named it the Andrea Connector and dedicated an entire forum to it. Your point of view is quite unbending when it comes to this issue so it isn't really a debate or discussion. I find a little comedy breaks a few of the barriers of conversation and makes people a little more receptive to other points of view.

Simply-put, all I am saying is that it is impossible that the connector isn't used or useful for more than going from a suburb to another suburb. There will be drawbacks to uprooting it. I also think that we can't go back to the 50's and right our wrongs. 60 years is a long time so we can't expect the city of Atlanta to suddenly revert back to what it would have been if the connector had never been cut through the city.The fact is, our CBD has been paved over with more parking lots than structures. Our core has lost population at a steady rate for decades. Our city itself is very segregated and racism has found its way into planning policy over and over again. Lets find an alternative to simply doing away with it. Can we not continue the process of covering it? What loss is there in covering the highway and connecting east, west, north, and south?

[DonTallPaul]

Just bury the f'er then the city is reconnected and the suburbanities have their trophy freeway. I can't imagine that solution is any more expensive than future expansion or tearing it down.

[Andrea]

You're absolutely right. As you have said no one uses your connector to get downtown.

How absurd. I've never said any such thing.

Your comments, Dante, are a perfect example of using false and ridiculous hyperbole in an attempt to silence any meaningful discussion. Shame on you.

[dante2308]

How absurd. I've never said any such thing.

Your comments, Dante, are a perfect example of using false and ridiculous hyperbole in an attempt to silence any meaningful discussion. Shame on you.

Nice of you to ignore everything else. Do not judge me. You have no right, not until you have replied to even 5% of what I said. I think that may be half of why you wont listen to anyone else about this. You never heard them to begin with.

[Andrea]

Nice of you to ignore everything else. Do not judge me. You have no right, not until you have replied to even 5% of what I said. I think that may be half of why you wont listen to anyone else about this. You never heard them to begin with.

You don't get to set me up to be a straw man, Dante, by attributing absurd statements to me that I've never made. I've been trying to start a civil discussion about the real world issues involved with Atlanta's freeways, and what I get in return from you and some others is sophomoric braying and false attributions.

Let me makes this crystal clear. I have never said that no one uses the downtown connector. Of course they do. If you build a road, people will use it. What I have said is that it's not the appropriate nor the optimal road into downtown Atlanta under today's conditions. It is primarily used as an inter-suburban cut-through, and in that respect it is little different from other suburban freeways.

Downtown Atlanta is in a different situation. It's not located in maze of low density cul-de-sac subdivisions and shopping malls which are surrounded by relatively abundant open land. It was at one time the central focus of the Atlanta area and it is again verging on becoming a truly vibrant urban area. It is not well served by a huge suburban cut-through, and it should not have to bear the burden of such a cut through. Instead, downtown is already served by a large network of surface streets, many of which are of a substantial nature. In my opinion, it would be far wiser to dispense with the suburban cut-through, and instead upgrade and improve the network of urban streets.

This would allow for more traffic in the city. It would allow the traffic to be dispersed over a much larger network. It would vastly increase connectivity within the city, and would actually make it more accessible to those who are coming in from other areas. This would foster more businesses within the city, greater retail opportunities, and enormously improved walkability. More land would be freed up for development.

I believe the entire character of the city would likely be moderated into a livelier, more human oriented environment as opposed to the insular, self-enclosed capsule world that is the product of suburban freeways. Yes, we can say that 250,000 vehicles pass through the downtown connector each day. Yet we know that the vast majority of them are single occupant vehicles, mostly with the windows rolled up. We also know that the occupants of most of these vehicles do not stop in downtown and do not interact with downtown or with each other.

Now, I'm more than willing to discuss any of these opinions, to reconsider them, change them, or abandon them if they don't hold up to scrutiny. But I'm not interested in absurd hyperbole or similar attempts to misstate, ridicule and stifle debate.

Capische?

[dante2308]

Its really up to you if you want to be civil. I cannot force you to be nor will I stand the ludicrous accusation you fill your responses with. If you refuse to have a polite conversation, then I cannot force myself to take the brunt of your personal attacks. Just do not pretend to take the higher ground against me. Just because you can't prove your points doesn't mean that you can divert energy away from the issues and against a person with a somewhat opposing point of view.

Your post proves that you still have not read or refused to understand my points. That is your decision. You don't even know what arguments to make against me so you cut and paste your radical views that aren't even in opposition to what I have said. We can stop this pointless back and forth and start addressing the issues. I actually respect a lot of what you say so don't make a negative issue out of this.

[Andrea]

Dante,

If you're going to reduce the connector to six lanes, why not simply replace it with several first rate urban boulevards like I've suggested previously -- two lanes in each direction, with a central turn lane, on-street parking, broad sidewalks, etc. Three or four of these boulevards would give you far greater capacity and connectivity than an old-timey expressway, which seeks to force everyone into the same narrow concrete channel.

Of course people from all around metro Atlanta may occasionally want to go downtown. (Although it's not, as you seem to suggest, that there are 480,000 people downtown -- the city's population is spread over a far greater area than the few square miles that make up downtown). But why do they have to travel on an expressway? Why can't they travel on broad, urban boulevards? And what is it about directions that can't be easily addressed with good signage and proper street layout? Frankly, I often find expressways more confusing than surface streets, since freeways are often marked in vague terms of "east" and "west." And due to the fact that you can't readily enter, exit or change lanes on expressways, their exits often have to be grouped and placed far away from the actual exit point.

As far as covering the connector, it simply strikes me as a phenomenally expensive program which still doesn't solve the problem of access into and connectivity within the city. It's probably better than simply leaving it as is, but if we're going to spend all that money why not get to the roots of the problem? The connector was designed 60 years ago for conditions which never came to pass, and which are even more irrelevant in today's world.

[holladay]

The connector is a valuable piece of Atlanta's architecture. Its conception and existence may be the result of flawed planning theory but now it actually functions as, dare I say it, a place-making enterprise.

Andrea, my main problem with your ideology regarding the connector is its overt moralism. You seem to denounce the connector because it keeps Atlanta from being the urban place it should be, whatever that means. You seem to deny that Atlanta has produced its own unique form of urbanism because you are lamenting the citys failure to grow according to some metaphorical high standard of American urbanism. Recently many forumers have been engaged in an ongoing debate about whether LA is 'urban or suburban.' I ask, does that question really matter? Isn't it more valuable to look at LA and recognize how the city has broken many urban molds and created its own heterogeneous, complex urban environment. An environment which, no less, forms a vast canvas for the city's multi-ethnic, multi-classed society to operate upon. Well, to that end, the same can be said for Atlanta. The last fifty years of life with the connector has distinctly transformed the city into a vast network of flows, a landscape of interwoven fragments of city, a polyvalent matrix of points and threads. Atlanta is a city with its own hyper-rich form of urbanism that is deserving of research and analysis. The city must be understood on a cultural and physical level and then evaluated on its own terms.

Secondly, to indicate merely the connector as principle cause of this emergent urbanism is also a bit short-sighted. In fact, Atlanta was a hodge-podge frontier town from the onset. The very fabric of downtown is composed of three overlaid grids, set in place by each of the competing railroad companies which controlled the town. Additionally, the fabric of the pre-WWII city is composed of divergent street-car suburbs and former mill-village neighborhoods. These neighborhoods are then criss-crossed and divided by railroad lines and depot yards, industrial areas, mills, and small commercial streets. Perhaps by way of its position as a trading post and rail crossroads, historically, Atlanta has never been a very dense city. Its growth has always been rather more haphazard and ad-hoc, with new buildings popping up gradually as need came along. Furthermore, the problem of the grid in Atlanta was never fully resolved. Stemming north from downtown, the blocks that make up most of modern-day Midtown are on a somewhat coherent grid, but this system was never applied to other quadrants of the growing city. Rather, the city allowed the free market to establish their own street networks, following the intial precedent set by the railroad companies in the 1830s and 40s.

Fans of modern Atlanta's multiple major skylines are well-aware that the city has not comformed to typical patterns of North American urbanism. Even though it is suburban, it is suburban in a distinctly different way. The city is both arterial and poly-nucleated, both scattered and centralized. The fact that downtown was once Atlanta's only concentrated area for most retail and office business does not negate the truth that today this no longer applies. It is as though the patchwork, ad-hocism of Atlanta's earliest development has made a consistent appearance throughout the city's history and today is responsible for the polyvalency of the entire urban region. The railroads and streetcar tracks of yesteryear have been replaced by the concrete ribbons of today's freeways. The random pockets of commercial shops in turn-of-the century Virginia-Highlands, Little 5 and Candler Park have been amplified and reworked as Buckhead, Perimeter Center, the Vinings, Midtown, Buford Hwy. Obviously the scales are different and the modern counterparts have their own problems, but the paternity test should prove positive. These new-age urban mutations are not foreign transplants that merely landed on North Georgia soil unexpectedly. But, rather, they are in the DNA of Atlanta.

This is why we must look at the connector and the burbs not as inherently flawed urban experiments but as sources of answers and ideas. It will tell us a lot about the city and the way we use it. The future of Atlanta doesn't involve the full destruction of its past. It involves the deepening of the dialogue between the present moment and the vast chain of past events in the city's history. One of the major failures of urban renewal, nationwide, was that no one understood the potential consequences that such a grand-scale restructuring would have on the future of American urbanism. Urban-renewal was deliberately anti-historical, and did not involve an in-depth attempt to understand the existing city before it commenced bulldozing it. Unless Atlanta wishes to make another cataclysmic leap of faith like it did fifty years ago, it would be in the city's best interest to watch things grow and develop for a few more years before it passes judgment on the future of the connector.

[sprtsluvr8]

I think it's obvious why the connector is needed and USED by people traveling to Downtown and Midtown...it's faster and more convenient than an urban boulevard. I don't think many people living in the city or the suburbs would support removing the connector. Sure it would be great if everyone commuting to work would move into the city, but they're not going to do that. They will continue to drive INTO THE CITY to work, party, and shop or whatever they want to do, using the connector.

Where do you think all of those cars are headed that you see sitting on every highway coming into the city? They are all trying to get INTO THE CITY, not trying to get to the next suburb. 75 South, 85 South, 400 South, 20 East, 20 West, 75 North, 85 North...all packed full and headed to intown destinations during the morning rush.

[dante2308]

Andrea,

Well, the point about reducing th size of the connector was really more of a sideways way of saying that the size of the connector isn't really the problem at hand. I will make my points directly here. I would not advocate reducing the capacity of the connector because the space gained would not be particularly be developable especially with the grade separation. The highway does have one positive effect on a lot of in town traffic though. Everyone on the connector is not on the surface streets. That aside, why I brought up that reduction is not an option is because it would solve nothing so shouldn't even be considered. This is not to say that elimination should not be considered. One should consider the immediate and long-term consequences of that situation though.

The 480,000 people I mentioned use the interstate system for trips to the outer ring of suburbs and elsewhere. I was not suggesting that they live downtown, but merely that they have uses for and use the highway system. The existence of nearly half a million people in any area would, at some point, merit the existence of a high-speed, high volume, way of getting people in and out of the urban center. That said, we need to look at the situation Atlanta is in. The highway infrastructure is a huge investment we made over decades and cannot make again given the current climate of construction costs, politics, and availability of funding. Lets not be too quick to do away with it.

The purpose of the expressway is that there are few entrances and exits. They exist so that people can move over long distances quickly. Just like the one-way streets downtown, they also take some getting used to. Now I don't want to sound as if I support the connector because I really don't. At least not entirely.

I think that with three connectivity projects coming in the coming years on top of the 5th street project, we will see the city connected just as well or better than in the 50's. Mayor's Park is actually the smaller of the projects being proposed. It makes sense to connect the two sides of the highway with developments. If we just root it out, what we have is a wide void of a gully. It would cost the same or more to root it out and put it at grade with some sort of road network and landscaping than the current plan. Slowly, but surely, the connector will disappear and it will happen at the pace of demand and development without getting rid of any of our infrastructure. It isn't as if development in Atlanta is so all consumingly fast that we can redevelop such a large area all at once. Give it some time.

[Andrea]

The connector is a valuable piece of Atlanta's architecture. Its conception and existence may be the result of flawed planning theory but now it actually functions as, dare I say it, a place-making enterprise.

realm, if you've read my posts you know I'm not moralizing. I'm basing my comments on the reality of the here and now. Atlanta was not designed in the fashion of older Northeastern cities such as Philadelphia and New York, and it need not aspire to them. They're not the holy grail of urbanism.

I understand your feeling that the expressway is a work of "place-making" urban architecture; that's your subjective appreciation of it and you certainly have the right to feel good about it for those reasons. Like all artistic judgments, of course, it is open to differing interpretations. As a piece of art, I can only say that I don't think it succeeds since it's place-making has really turned out to be conduit-making. We have an abundance of similar concrete mega-freeway constructions around Atlanta and as urban art I will simply have to say they are not my cup of tea.

I certainly agree that the defining characteristic of Atlanta is its many charming neighborhoods and the rich tapestry they create. I've written about this many times myself. However, it seems to me to be quite a stretch to give the Downtown Connector credit for creating this diverse urban fabric. It was directly responsible for the demise of many of our historic ethnic neighborhoods, such as Buttermilk Bottom, Peoplestown, Mechanicsville, and others.

What I'm suggesting is that it's time to start thinking out of the box. This "experiment", as you've described it, has been underway for over 60 years and its toll in dollars and destruction has been immense. I appreciate your artistic fondness for it, but the hard realities deserve some consideration, too. It is, quite literally, impossible to argue that the connector has been a positive undertaking for the city of Atlanta in terms of stability, growth, diversity, connectivity, or any other objective measure. We have given it a try, decade after decade after decade after decade after decade, and we have repeatedly made it wider and attempted to tweak it on an ongoing basis. And yet, while, it has certainly facilitated the rise and eventual dominance of suburbia, it has done little for the city itself.

Now that the city itself is beginning to rise again, isn't it time to start giving Downtown a fair shake? Don't we at least owe our city the obligation to stop thinking of the Connector as a sacred cow which can never be altered, moved, changed, downsized, reconfigured or even removed in some sections? Shouldn't we at least look to see how other cities have successfully carried out similar projects? Can we afford to treat a suburban freeway interchange as a sacrosanct "work of place-making urban art" and therefore ignore all other possibilities?

[Andrea]

I think that with three connectivity projects coming in the coming years on top of the 5th street project, we will see the city connected just as well or better than in the 50's. Mayor's Park is actually the smaller of the projects being proposed. It makes sense to connect the two sides of the highway with developments. If we just root it out, what we have is a wide void of a gully. It would cost the same or more to root it out and put it at grade with some sort of road network and landscaping than the current plan. Slowly, but surely, the connector will disappear and it will happen at the pace of demand and development without getting rid of any of our infrastructure. It isn't as if development in Atlanta is so all consumingly fast that we can redevelop such a large area all at once. Give it some time.

Covering the connector may make some sense, although I have serious reservations that it will actually be done. And of course any project to reconfigure the connector will not happen overnight. What is critical, however, is that we stop regarding it as a sacrosanct, untouchable thing which must be preserved at all costs.

That's simply not based on present day reality, nor is it foward thinking either. The city of Atlanta -- and I'm talking about giving the city itself a fair shake for a change -- needs roads and many other transportation upgrades. It's the one area of metro Atlanta that has a chance to become a truly vibrant and livable urban city. We owe it that chance, for reasons of its hisotrical legacy if nothing else. More imporantly, we owe it that chance for reasons of present day reality -- i.e., the many individuals, institutions and businesses who've expressed their deep committment to making the city happen. I know the suburbs have 90% of the population and most of the jobs, but we can't allow suburban needs to totally shape the character of the very core of our city.

[catlike]

Where do you think all of those cars are headed that you see sitting on every highway coming into the city? They are all trying to get INTO THE CITY, not trying to get to the next suburb. 75 South, 85 South, 400 South, 20 East, 20 West, 75 North, 85 North...all packed full and headed to intown destinations during the morning rush.

I posted a question concerning this a while back and didn't get a response. 75/85 Southbound at the north end of Midtown and beyond is jammed up just as much as the Northbound side during evening rush hour. Certainly all of these people are not headed downtown in the evening. Buckhead wouldn't produce this many reverse commuters from Midtown/Downtown. Where are they heading, then? Perhaps there is a substantial number of people cutting through downtown at certain times of the day.

[RobMidtowner]

I don't think anyone can deny that the connector isn't providing adequate levels of service during peak periods, hence the traffic jams. So from an engineering standpoint, something needs to be done to improve the facility so it provides adequate levels of service for peak periods. Possible improvements to the facility would have to either increase capacity or decrease demand or both. You can increase capacity by adding lanes through double-decking or adding a new bypass paralleling the connector, etc. Or you can decrease demand through transit, land development patterns that get people off the connector, or by shifting inbound traffic (I mean traffic going into downtown or midtown) onto improved surface streets and requiring through traffic (I mean traffic going from OTP to OTP on the other side of the perimeter) to use I-285, etc.

I think the main debate here is over what should be the purpose of the connector? To provide access to the city or access through the city.

I don't know the right answer, but it serves both purposes now. Maybe one or a combination of these ideas would improve the facility enough to provide adequate levels of service. These ideas along with others should be studied to develop a set of alternatives that can be evaluated to find the optimal solution. And they should be compared against doing nothing to see if the benefits outweigh the costs.

I think it's important to keep an open mind because if anything can be done to improve the current traffic congestion, wouldn't it be worth it to at least consider it?

Right now the connector is the most congested facility in Atlanta and provides the lowest level of service according to ARC....it's a fact.

[Andrea]

I posted a question concerning this a while back and didn't get a response. 75/85 Southbound at the north end of Midtown and beyond is jammed up just as much as the Northbound side during evening rush hour. Certainly all of these people are not headed downtown in the evening. Buckhead wouldn't produce this many reverse commuters from Midtown/Downtown. Where are they heading, then? Perhaps there is a substantial number of people cutting through downtown at certain times of the day.

From my post earlier in this discussion:

1. Check out the traffic counts.

2. Drive the connector and carefully note where people get on and off. You'll see with your own eyes that the vast majority of cars are passing through rather than heading to downtown as a destination. For example, if you're traveling northbound, you literally can't even get off the connector once you pass 5th Street until you get all the way to Buckhead. Or consider this photo and you'll note that almost all the southbound traffic is entering the Connector from I-75 and I-85 NORTH of Midtown. This is typical evening traffic -- these are not people commuting into work. They're commuters from the northern suburbs heading home to suburbs south, east and west of downtown.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/159/4...7010c321_b.jpg

The photograph is very telling. It shows typical EVENING traffic, which is composed primarily of southbound commuters coming from areas north of Midtown and Downtown, cutting through downtown on their way to suburbs south, east and west of the city. (I don't think anyone would seriously contend that these masses are people returning to their homes in Downtown after a day at work in suburbia).

The situation is reversed in the morning.

[holladay]

Andrea, I resent your implication that I have compared the connector to a piece of art as my principle defense for its existence. Certainly one could see it as a giant piece of land-art on a macro scale but that thought had not even occurred to me until you mentioned it in your rebuttal. That I see the connector as a place-making component of the city is not at all a way of describing its aesthetic value. It's a way of interpreting the movement and pulse of the city. Some cities have plazas and central squares. Atlanta has a freeway. That's what I'm saying.

I think we may be getting to the point in the conversation where we'll have to agree to disagree. I am as aware as you of the detrimental effects the connector has had on Atlanta but one of the ways we differ is that I've ceased to look at them as problems, and started to see the current conditions of the city merely as transient states that are constantly in flux. Even decay and abandonment are impermanent. I appreciate that you mentioned Mechanicsville, Peoplestown, and Buttermilk Bottoms in your reply. Today, these are neighborhoods that few people outside Atlanta's south side have ever even heard of, let alone been to. They have, indeed, fallen on hard times the last few decades. But, all across South Atlanta, neighborhoods are poised for change. Gentrification and revitalization are on the cusp, and with that comes the threat that many multi-generational residents may be pushed out. Escalating home prices in Sweet Auburn and Cabbagetown have already started to do this. So there is a flip-side to everything, which you certainly know. The way the city changes does need guidance and vision, and a lot of sensitivity to existing context and neighborhoods.

At any rate, Atlanta is going to continue to re-urbanize. This is happening in spite of the presence of the highway. My major point is that it may NOT happen if you remove the highway. Granted, nobody really knows that one, but on this issue we interpret the evidence to mean opposite things. Just because the connector played a significant role in the suburbanization of Atlanta over the last fifty years does not mean that its sole function today is to provide a suburban pass-through. The connector is a thread, it weaves the whole metro area together and provides the keystone linking communication between Atlanta and its suburbs. If you remove it you make Gwinnettians and Alpharettans and and Mariettans much less likely to come to Atlanta. Right now it is far, far too early to remove the connector. Inevitably, removing the connector will further isolate Atlanta from the suburbs and the ensuing condition will be the emergence of two distinct environments. You have to wait until the city is much bigger and much more self-sustaining and self-perpetuating before you can remove the artery that provides blood flow to the entire region. If you do not, the city will have a far harder time attracting a greater percentage of the region's growth. Atlanta is only ten years into a resurgence. It has barely gotten its feet wet. It must maintain the infrastructure that is enabling its resurgence at least until it has regained its position as a powerful, economically successful central city. This is why I keep saying give it twenty or thirty more years before you destroy it.
Fundamentally I agree that the future of Atlanta may be without a connector. But that is the future, not right now. Today's condition is an inverse of the 1950s. Having no connector today will be as destructive to the city as its construction was fifty years ago.

[RobMidtowner]

Realm, I dont think the idea is to make it more difficult to get into Atlanta (Correct me if I'm wrong Andrea). I think her idea is for the connector to serve people who's destination is Atlanta and not serve people passing through and anyone bypassing Atlanta will use I-285 (which it is designed for anyway). Is that unreasonable to consider?

[Andrea]

Andrea, I resent your implication that I have compared the connector to a piece of art as my principle defense for its existence.

Okay, my apologies. I only mentioned it by way of quoting your description of the connector as "a valuable piece of Atlanta's architecture" and your assertion that although "its conception and existence may be the result of flawed planning theory but now it actually functions as, dare I say it, a place-making enterprise."

I've provided a very detailed fact-based critique of the connector, both historical and modern, and have provided very detailed fact-based alternatives. So I actually wasn't too hot on your contentions that I was merely "moralizing" or tossing out scattered bits of historical data.

In any event, no, of course I don't expect the connector to disappear overnight. Frankly, I've just about come to the conclusion that you can't do anything involving the transportation system in this town without waiting many decades.

But it is a matter of setting goals and priorities, and the time to begin that conversation is now. Arguments that the connector is "just a fact of life" or that "it is the lifeline of downtown!" or that it is otherwise some sort of sacred cow are not only factually suspect, they also serve to reinforce the status quo. I appreciate your views about the connector being an important piece of architecture and a positive place-making tool, but in all candor I must respectfully disagree. There are far better means of creating an urban architecture and creating urban places, both from the aesthetic and functional standpoints.

I've lived with the connector for many decades, and can recall the days when it seemed like some super-duper newfangled invention from Disneyworld. Over the years, however, I've come to understand the damage it has done and the limitations it imposes on our city. We live in a very different world from the pre-WWII era in which planners envisioned downtown as the bustling hub of the city, surrounded by suburban workers who would commute in on modernistic concrete ribbons. To the extent that world ever existed here, it is long gone.

So let me put this plainly: It's not "moralizing" or historical snippets that form the basis for re-thinking the connector. It's the real world that we live in right now. It's also the world we're shaping for future generations. There are certainly many, many conversations that need to be had about how we will do this, but it doesn't help facilitate them when you treat them as trivial puffery. I have no interest in jousting over this, but I have a stake in this city and I won't be ridiculed, dismissed or silenced either. I'm more than happy to hear your views and to take them seriously, but I'd ask that you grant mine equal dignity.


:cheers:

[hoosier]

So what does everyone think about the cancelled freeways that would have gutted Atlanta even further?

Andrea, do you have any maps of the Atlanta highway system with the cancelled freeways shown?

[Andrea]

Realm, I dont think the idea is to make it more difficult to get into Atlanta (Correct me if I'm wrong Andrea). I think her idea is for the connector to serve people who's destination is Atlanta and not serve people passing through and anyone bypassing Atlanta will use I-285 (which it is designed for anyway). Is that unreasonable to consider?

Rob, yes, that is certainly part of what I'm suggesting. No one can speak in terms of absolutes when it comes to transit, of course, for there will always be multiple destinations and pathways. I would never suggest that some people don't have a legitimate need to pass through Atlanta. And of course there will be reasons for people who live in suburbia to come into the city and for city dwellers to journey to the suburbs.

But what I'm talking about is designing our roads, our busways, rail systems, bike paths and pedestrian pathways with their primary purpose in mind. In some places old-style freeways may be just the ticket. But a "one size fits all" is not a sufficiently nuanced approach to bringing back a city like Atlanta.

Right now I see Atlanta at an important crossroads -- things are beginning to urbanize quickly within some intown districts, and even in some suburban areas. We can foster that, or we can simply follow the precedent that has made us the global poster child for sprawl. But to choose the former course means trying to grow roses, not kudzu. And that takes an experienced gardener's subtle eye and judicious hand. Why not do everything possible to make our city flower?

[holladay]

Well Andrea, I see no reason why this conversation can't continue. I am rather enjoying the on-going dialogue. I have my doubts that we'll ever see eye-to-eye on this but it is nonetheless beneficial to both have the chance to hear your arguments as well as the opportunity to clarify and elaborate on my I own. I do appreciate your commentary on the subject at hand so forgive me if I have slighted you with the judgment that you were moralizing. While I still see that you are indeed, by some stretch, a moralist (i.e. urban purist) I can now see that you have a more thoughtful understanding of Atlanta than some other forumers. I, on the other hand, am very interested in collisions, abruptions, disjoints, ambiguities, networks, transitions, mutations, etc. I do not share in your seeming desire to make Atlanta altogether more wholesome or "complete." Our interests are perspectives on Atlanta are quite different but I think we share the same type of attachment and connection to the city. That said, I welcome your thoughts and hope we can keep the discussion going, as I think it has proven to be very stimulating thus far.

[dante2308]

Covering the connector may make some sense, although I have serious reservations that it will actually be done. And of course any project to reconfigure the connector will not happen overnight. What is critical, however, is that we stop regarding it as a sacrosanct, untouchable thing which must be preserved at all costs.

The plans are in motion. Here is a pdf (http://www.atlantadowntown.com/Plans%20and%20Documents/ImagineBrochure%20Final.pdf) of the new plan for the Downtown side of the connector. Compared with the current mass of parking lots and neglected streetscapes and structures, the plan is really almost more than anyone could ask for. As you can see in the pdf, the connector is no longer dividing anything and that is only the first set of plans.

[Cosmoboy]

This might be slightly off-topic but I just recently learned that despite the large number of freeways in Atlanta currently, even more were initially planned!!

I did not know that the Lakewood Freeway was supposed to carry I-420 south of central Atlanta, nor did I know that U.S. 78 was intended to hook up to the downtown connector.

Does anyone have maps of the proposed Atlanta highway network with these routes included?

Would Atlanta have been better off with these additional expressways in your opinion?

Here are some pages you might like:
http://www.southeastroads.com/ga-010.html

http://www.southeastroads.com/ga-166.html

http://www.southeastroads.com/ga-013.html

[hoosier]

^Thanks a lot Cosmoboy.:cheers:

[Toxostoma Rufum]

The connector is fine. We need to get interstate traffic away from Atlanta before it gets near 285.

[Andrea]

I do appreciate your commentary on the subject at hand so forgive me if I have slighted you with the judgment that you were moralizing. While I still see that you are indeed, by some stretch, a moralist (i.e. urban purist) I can now see that you have a more thoughtful understanding of Atlanta than some other forumers. I, on the other hand, am very interested in collisions, abruptions, disjoints, ambiguities, networks, transitions, mutations, etc. I do not share in your seeming desire to make Atlanta altogether more wholesome or "complete."

Hm. Well, if that's what you think then you obviously haven't read my posts. I'd like to continue the discussion, too, but it would be a lot more productive if we were proceeding on the basis of what I've actually said rather than some concocted straw man projection of what I've supposedly said. If you want to talk about disconnects and such, then we have something in common. Remember, I grew up in this crazy burg and actually choose to still live here.

:haha:

[sprtsluvr8]

I posted a question concerning this a while back and didn't get a response. 75/85 Southbound at the north end of Midtown and beyond is jammed up just as much as the Northbound side during evening rush hour. Certainly all of these people are not headed downtown in the evening. Buckhead wouldn't produce this many reverse commuters from Midtown/Downtown. Where are they heading, then? Perhaps there is a substantial number of people cutting through downtown at certain times of the day.


Many of them are going to different destinations in the city. A large number of them are headed for I-20, then either east or west to either an intown exit or to their home in the suburbs. But are they coming from a suburb? I doubt it. Who would use the clogged connector to make a 40 mile commute from one suburb to another? People also drive around in town for other reasons besides commuting...

[RobMidtowner]

Does anybody have any actual evidence showing what percentage of traffic uses the connector to go to the city vs. passing through the city? If not, then it's really pointless to make assertions about where we think people are going.

[RobMidtowner]

From my post earlier in this discussion:

1. Check out the traffic counts.

2. Drive the connector and carefully note where people get on and off. You'll see with your own eyes that the vast majority of cars are passing through rather than heading to downtown as a destination. For example, if you're traveling northbound, you literally can't even get off the connector once you pass 5th Street until you get all the way to Buckhead. Or consider this photo and you'll note that almost all the southbound traffic is entering the Connector from I-75 and I-85 NORTH of Midtown. This is typical evening traffic -- these are not people commuting into work. They're commuters from the northern suburbs heading home to suburbs south, east and west of downtown.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/159/4...7010c321_b.jpg

The photograph is very telling. It shows typical EVENING traffic, which is composed primarily of southbound commuters coming from areas north of Midtown and Downtown, cutting through downtown on their way to suburbs south, east and west of the city. (I don't think anyone would seriously contend that these masses are people returning to their homes in Downtown after a day at work in suburbia).

The situation is reversed in the morning.

Andrea, the link isn't working...

[Andrea]

Andrea, the link isn't working...

Try this, Rob. http://tinyurl.com/266aq2

I still think that if you really want to understand how the connector works, the best way is to study it with you own eyes -- i.e., drive it with a careful eye to where the majority of vehicles enter and exit. It will be readily apparent that most of them are cut-throughs. This is true of off-peak times as well as morning and evening rush hours. It's a bit of a pain, but worth it if you want to see what's actually happening.

Of course there are also abundant data in the form of traffic counts. The DOT website has extremely detailed information which you can download as spreadsheets, or you can view it in more abbreviated form at the STARS site.

http://www.dot.state.ga.us/dot/plan-prog/transportation_data/traffic_counts/index.shtml

http://www.dot.state.ga.us/dot/plan-prog/transportation_data/TrafficCD/2005_GA_STARS/GA_STARS.html

Another quick way to visualize it is to take a look at the traffic flow maps.

http://www.dot.state.ga.us/DOT/plan-prog/transportation_data/TrafficFlowMap_Online/index.shtml

I'd also suggest taking a look at this to help understand commuting patterns:

http://161.188.204.80/maps/charlotte/jtw51.asp?sql=&action=bg&map.x=349&map.y=143

Again, it's helpful read all this stuff and study it, but I still recommend doing your own first-hand empirical investigation.

[SteveD]

:previous: Andrea, that last one, which shows commuting patterns for Dubuque Iowa, is fascinating! Do you know if there's a nationwide source for such maps and data?

[Andrea]

:previous: Andrea, that last one, which shows commuting patterns for Dubuque Iowa, is fascinating! Do you know if there's a nationwide source for such maps and data?

Yeah, Steve, just re-center to Atlanta or wherever you want to go.

Also, if you want a quick take on Atlanta commuting patterns, take a look at the traffic flow map.

[Fiorenza]

It would be informative to study the trendline over time of cut-thrus vs. end-users.

[Andrea]

It would be informative to study the trendline over time of cut-thrus vs. end-users.

I haven't looked at the prior years data in some time, Fiorenza, but it is fairly consistent. As you know, 90% of Atlanta's growth in the past decades has been not only outside of downtown but outside the city limits (i.e., beyond Buckhead, Midtown, the airport and other intown centers) as well. Employment has become increasingly diffuse and the traffic patterns reflect this.

[RobMidtowner]

Try this, Rob. http://tinyurl.com/266aq2

I still think that if you really want to understand how the connector works, the best way is to study it with you own eyes -- i.e., drive it with a careful eye to where the majority of vehicles enter and exit. It will be readily apparent that most of them are cut-throughs. This is true of off-peak times as well as morning and evening rush hours. It's a bit of a pain, but worth it if you want to see what's actually happening.

Of course there are also abundant data in the form of traffic counts. The DOT website has extremely detailed information which you can download as spreadsheets, or you can view it in more abbreviated form at the STARS site.

http://www.dot.state.ga.us/dot/plan-prog/transportation_data/traffic_counts/index.shtml

http://www.dot.state.ga.us/dot/plan-prog/transportation_data/TrafficCD/2005_GA_STARS/GA_STARS.html

Another quick way to visualize it is to take a look at the traffic flow maps.

http://www.dot.state.ga.us/DOT/plan-prog/transportation_data/TrafficFlowMap_Online/index.shtml

I'd also suggest taking a look at this to help understand commuting patterns:

http://161.188.204.80/maps/charlotte/jtw51.asp?sql=&action=bg&map.x=349&map.y=143

Again, it's helpful read all this stuff and study it, but I still recommend doing your own first-hand empirical investigation.

Thanks Andrea, but I don't see how the traffic flow maps prove that the majority of people are driving through the city and not to the city. I mean it only shows daily volumes and nothing about the percentage exiting the interstate downtown. I'm not disagreeing with you, but I don't understand how these counts and traffic flow maps prove anything other than the connector having more daily traffic than any other highway facility...am I missing something?

[Andrea]

Thanks Andrea, but I don't see how the traffic flow maps prove that the majority of people are driving through the city and not to the city. I mean it only shows daily volumes and nothing about the percentage exiting the interstate downtown. I'm not disagreeing with you, but I don't understand how these counts and traffic flow maps prove anything other than the connector having more daily traffic than any other highway facility...am I missing something?

Rob! :haha:

Where do you think all those people in that photograph are coming from and going to? Surely you don't suggest they're returning to their downtown residences after spending the day working in suburbia?

By the way, if you want a clearer picture of where the vehicles are actually going, check the detailed traffic counts at the ramps.

[RobMidtowner]

Rob! :haha:

Where do you think all those people in that photograph are coming from and going to? Surely you don't suggest they're returning to their downtown residences after spending the day working in suburbia?

By the way, if you want a clearer picture of where the vehicles are actually going, check the detailed traffic counts at the ramps.

No I agree with you, there's no doubt in my mind that the majority of people on the connector are just passing through. But I'm just looking for concrete evidence because I think the foundation for some of the dissenting arguments for changing the connector is based on this not being true (i.e. some people arguing against doing anything to the connector don't believe your claim that it's primarily an urban cut-through).

[SteveD]

Yeah, Steve, just re-center to Atlanta or wherever you want to go.

Also, if you want a quick take on Atlanta commuting patterns, take a look at the traffic flow map.

Wow! Thanks! Good lord I could spend the entire day playing with that map...I wish I didn't have so much work to do!! :tup:

[Andrea]

No I agree with you, there's no doubt in my mind that the majority of people on the connector are just passing through. But I'm just looking for concrete evidence because I think the foundation for some of the dissenting arguments for changing the connector is based on this not being true (i.e. some people arguing against doing anything to the connector don't believe your claim that it's primarily an urban cut-through).

Oh, I see what you mean, Rob. A lot of that data can be obtained from photographic evidence and from the detailed traffic counts, and to some degree from the STARS map. I'm not sure anyone has done a study with that specific research goal in mind, although it would make for a good thesis if it hasn't already been done.

[dante2308]

Does it even matter to prove that a majority use it to get from north to south or vice versa? Doing something like ripping out the connector, regrading it, and building the streetscape would be the largest single engineering project in Atlanta's history. Even the connector itself wasn't a single project. It took decades for it to become what it is now. There is no way it will ever be feasible to get what you are asking. We don't even have enough private interest to develop the new area, so it would remain mostly vacant for years.

Why not leave the sucker and focus our attention on the connectivity parks and bridges. That way it wont matter who is on the road. Everyone wins. No one loses their cut-through and in-towners get exactly what they want. There is at least a way to generate enough taxes to cover the connector in phases. We don't even need to do it completely and we get the same effect.

Having a highway system below our street infrastructure itself is very impressive. Of the Sun-Belt cities, it would be the first of it's kind. People driving into the city for the first time from smaller southern cities would drop their jaw. Everyone has a road network in the city center, we would be one of the first to have a road network, heavy rail, light rail, streetcar, and an interstate highway seamlessly morph into a beautiful pedestrian streetscape.

I think that this is the future of Atlanta, not what we had in 1950.

[ThrashATL]

The connector isn't just locals either though, 75/85 extend WELL BEYOND the environs of Atlanta and much of the traffic is just passing through Atlanta from one state to another. The outer perimeter would have taken much of the inner Atlanta traffic off the roads (and off 285) but nobody wanted it done so we have to sleep in the bed that is made.

[Andrea]

I think that this is the future of Atlanta, not what we had in 1950.

Well, I doubt that anyone wants what we had in 1950. But we certainly don't want to be stuck with what we had in 1985 either, and that is basically what we have now.

It doesn't matter to me whether it's covered up or re-graded -- the point is to:

(a) quit using our core city for what is primarily a suburban cut-through that deters interaction with the city itself; and

(b) create a modern system of urban streets, which will bring increased capacity, real connectivity within the city and with the suburbs, walkability, attractive streetscapes, more business and residential opportunities, parks and transit options other than the single occupant automobile.

I'm not an engineer but it strikes me that covering up the freeway is a vastly more expensive and complex undertaking than simply reconfiguring it. People have been yakking about covering it up for the last 50 years, but the most we've seen is a few isolated bridges, most of which are little more than concrete slabs themselves, and constant widenings that make covering an even more remote possibility.

We know of numerous examples where cities have successfully mitigated old-timey urban freeways. The connector is a perfect candidate for that and the time to start planning for it is now.

[ReallyTired]

Well, I doubt that anyone wants what we had in 1950. But we certainly don't want to be stuck with what we had in 1985 either, and that is basically what we have now.

It doesn't matter to me whether it's covered up or re-graded -- the point is to:

(a) quit using our core city for what is primarily a suburban cut-through that deters interaction with the city itself; and

(b) create a modern system of urban streets, which will bring increased capacity, real connectivity within the city and with the suburbs, walkability, attractive streetscapes, more business and residential opportunities, parks and transit options other than the single occupant automobile.

I'm not an engineer but it strikes me that covering up the freeway is a vastly more expensive and complex undertaking than simply reconfiguring it. People have been yakking about covering it up for the last 50 years, but the most we've seen is a few isolated bridges, most of which are little more than concrete slabs themselves, and constant widenings that covering an even more remote possibility.

We know of numerous examples where cities have successfully mitigated old-timey urban freeways. The connector is a perfect candidate for that and the time to start planning for it is now.:yuck:

[ThrashATL]

Well, I doubt that anyone wants what we had in 1950. But we certainly don't want to be stuck with what we had in 1985 either, and that is basically what we have now.

It doesn't matter to me whether it's covered up or re-graded -- the point is to:

(a) quit using our core city for what is primarily a suburban cut-through that deters interaction with the city itself; and

(b) create a modern system of urban streets, which will bring increased capacity, real connectivity within the city and with the suburbs, walkability, attractive streetscapes, more business and residential opportunities, parks and transit options other than the single occupant automobile.

I'm not an engineer but it strikes me that covering up the freeway is a vastly more expensive and complex undertaking than simply reconfiguring it. People have been yakking about covering it up for the last 50 years, but the most we've seen is a few isolated bridges, most of which are little more than concrete slabs themselves, and constant widenings that make covering an even more remote possibility.

We know of numerous examples where cities have successfully mitigated old-timey urban freeways. The connector is a perfect candidate for that and the time to start planning for it is now.

If you live in Lawrenceville, you're not going to take an "urban street" to work in Buckhead and hit 729 stop lights.

[Andrea]

If you live in Lawrenceville, you're not going to take an "urban street" to work in Buckhead and hit 729 stop lights.

Er, Thrash, nobody's talking about the trip from Lawrenceville to Buckhead. And nobody's talking about the end of freeways.




P.S. Although this doesn't have anything to do with the connector, if you're talking about getting from Buckhead to Lawrenceviille via an expressway, you don't have many good options as it is. About the only freeway route I can think of would be to fight your way down Piedmont and then Sidney Marcus, navigate the chaotic non-intersection at Buford Highway/Lenox, then endure 18 miles of five-lane stop and go traffic on 85, then endure 8 more miles of two lane stop and go traffic on 316, and then endure whatever kind of snarls you hit when you get to Highway 20.

I have to make that junket at rush hour 2 or 3 times a month, and frankly I've gotten to the point where I prefer to take the surface streets, as bad as they are out that way. At least you've got a few options when things grind to a complete halt.

But again, this isn't related to the downtown connector issue.

[RobMidtowner]

If you live in Lawrenceville, you're not going to take an "urban street" to work in Buckhead and hit 729 stop lights.

The connector starts where 75 merges with 85 in midtown and ends where they split just north of the airport.

[whoDean]

I live intown and commute daily to Norcross, I am grateful for the connector which takes me quickly each way.

[holladay]

Andrea, I still don't buy that the "vast majority" of traffic on the connector is merely suburban pass-throughs. But even if your supposition about the traffic is true:
A.) why is it necessarily a bad thing to have suburban traffic on the connector? (just to clarify, this is where I tend to think you're moralizing.)
and
B.)if there is no connector in central Atlanta and everyone has been using it to pass from one end of the metro to the other, then what do you expect will happen once it's gone? People will start taking surface streets??? Bah, I hardly doubt it. What will most likely happen is that you will divide the metro area between city and suburbs. I've said this several times so far and you haven't addressed it but I think it's one of the most valid criticisms of your plan.

Now, on top of this, I'd like to know what your plan for this systematic redevelopment of Atlanta's arterials would encompass. What roads benefit in your scheme and which ones are left out. If you make Ponce a thoroughfare for the Eastside, for example, does that mean you have to widen it further and demolish buildings? Do you remove most of the signals and make it easier for cars to travel at higher speeds (and thereby endanger pedestrians on the sidewalk and at crosswalks?) Granted, I think you can reform the zoning to encourage denser development in order to enhance the corridor and support mass transit but I think you can do that anyway without trying to make the road a grand boulevard for cars. I'm all for surface-street improvements and neighborhood-strengthening but I am very opposed to street-widenings because of the errors of the past. Atlanta went crazy with widenings over the last few decades and now you have wide, empty roads like North Avenue in Poncey Highlands or Courtland St in Downtown that are desolate and completely boring. Adding medians and widening sidewalks and possibly removing lanes are great ideas, but all of these things are aimed principally at the pedestrian, they don't increase traffic flow for cars.

I think the connector needs to remain a valuable piece in the traffic flow of the city in the coming decades. The city simply CANNOT afford to pick up 300,000 cars on its surface streets every day. That would be a nightmare. I know you pointed out that once freeways in other cities were dismantled the traffic merely went away. Well, your case studies are in Manhattan and SF, two cities that are dense enough and important enough to stand on their own. And they are both linked to their suburbs in a highly effective system of mass transit that Atlanta can't compare to. So this should indicate that if the suburban traffic from the connector disappears it will be because suburbanites will frankly just stop coming to central Atlanta. They will not all of a sudden pile onto MARTA because neither Atlanta nor the rail system is built effectively to support that. And nor will they be willing to drive 30 miles from Lawrenceville to downtown on surface boulevards that will require 1.5 hours to navigate. If you want to kill central Atlanta, destroying the connector will do it. That may not be true in 30 years if the city is much more powerful then, but today, yes, it will die.

[smartymidtown]

The simplest way to stop suburban commuters from using the connector as a pass-through is to set up weekday tolls inside 285 somewhere on all interstates coming into the city. The extra money raised could be used to redesign parts of the interstate from Buckhead to downtown.

[dante2308]

Well, I doubt that anyone wants what we had in 1950. But we certainly don't want to be stuck with what we had in 1985 either, and that is basically what we have now.

It doesn't matter to me whether it's covered up or re-graded -- the point is to:

(a) quit using our core city for what is primarily a suburban cut-through that deters interaction with the city itself; and

(b) create a modern system of urban streets, which will bring increased capacity, real connectivity within the city and with the suburbs, walkability, attractive streetscapes, more business and residential opportunities, parks and transit options other than the single occupant automobile.

I'm not an engineer but it strikes me that covering up the freeway is a vastly more expensive and complex undertaking than simply reconfiguring it. People have been yakking about covering it up for the last 50 years, but the most we've seen is a few isolated bridges, most of which are little more than concrete slabs themselves, and constant widenings that make covering an even more remote possibility.

We know of numerous examples where cities have successfully mitigated old-timey urban freeways. The connector is a perfect candidate for that and the time to start planning for it is now.

I did not propose burying the connector. Covering it at important streets with a few parks thrown in here and there is vastly vastly less costly than trying to remove it and just as good. Be practical. The chances of the highway disappearing are so much slimmer than the chances of the highway being covered. There would be so many uses for the money. The tens of billions it would take to remove the system would be a commitment the city would have to make well before it actually happened and all the while, the city would be completely disrupted. Given the 5th Street project cost about 10.5 million. For one billion dollars, the price of redoing Peachtree Street, we could have 100 bridges over the highway.

If you want an "urban boulevard" where the interstate was, the costs would be several times higher than the Peachtree Street Project. Be realistic. I am an engineer but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that. With the bridge plan, all you need is a few million dollars commitment and you can piece together two sides of the interstate. With the removal plan, you need almost 1000 or more times as much committed to the cause before works can even begin.

[Fiorenza]

What's money got to do with it?

[RobMidtowner]

Ignoring your minor inaccuracies re: the DC highway system, I agree, but that's Andrea's (and my, I guess) point. It's desirable for expressways to bring people into the city, but they can do more damage than good when they slice through a city.

I-66 ends within yards of crossing the Potomac. I-395 ends within about 1-2 miles of crossing the Potomac (while tunnelling under or avoiding most of downtown), and DC/I-295 skirts to the east, mostly on the other side of the Anacostia River. None of these provide a direct route through downtown Washington.

Likewise, I-495 was cancelled in Manhattan, so while the Lincoln and Queens Midtown Tunnels bring people into New York, there is no freeway slicing across the island there as a through route.

Knowing what we know today, if I could have set up the Atlanta intown freeway plan originally, I would have kept the old two-lane dual carriageway I-85 routing in Atlanta (what is today the Buford Highway Connector) north of Brookwood and had it curve around northwest to make a continuous loop with I-75 (which would have remained a total of four lanes) back up toward the Perimeter. This intown I-75/I-85 loop would have been instead numbered as some interstate 3di loop like I-885. I-75 would have run along the Perimeter west of the city and I-85 on the Perimeter east of the city. I would have run I-20 instead on an alignment further south, perhaps where Lakewood/Langdord Freeway is now, eliminated the Connector north of about Turner Field, and also not built I-85 inside the perimeter south of the Connector.

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r112/jkatzen1/atlanta_noconnector.jpg

The northern intown loop (I-885 in my example) might have been built to allow only HOV traffic in the peak directions at the peak times (much like I-66 is HOV-only at certain times of day).

As a result, access to some of the more low-density areas north of Midtown would remain available in a freeway form, while encouraging carpooling and transit use during peak hours (if it had HOV restrictions). Commuters working in Midtown or Downtown would transfer off of the northern intown loop to arterial roads like Northside Drive (with excess capacity) and Spring and Williams Streets. Those looking to go south of the city could take the Perimeter around.

I really don't see how this would have been all that miserable of a solution had it been built that way originally. Now, as much as I personally would like to see the Connector eliminated (in a "Can I have a pony?" sort of way), I don't see it as feasible or practical now that it's there. If anything, I'd like to see it reduced from 14 lanes, perhaps, to 6-8, with both directions running on the existing western carriageway. The eastern carriageway could then be reclaimed for parks or buildable land. Perhaps even a serious boulevard could be constructed.

This was posted a while back by Joey when this issue originally came up and it helped me visualize what could be changed. As you can see, access is not being taken away from the city so it wouldn't be isolated from the suburbs, the interstates are just being rerouted so they don't go directly through the urban core.

[dante2308]

What's money got to do with it?

No one in the GDOT has the will or ability to scrounge together that kind of money for the purpose of removing a highway. Its nearly impossible. Tongue in cheek.

[smartymidtown]

What's money got to do with it?

Everything....

What I am saying is that someone is going from suburb to work in another suburb, they are doing nothing to contribute to the intown area except creating a clog of cars and pollution. I would suspect that if a toll where in place....a lot of these commuters would seek alternatives to their commute e.g. take I-285 or move closer to work.

There will be the few that still commute through the city and that is fine. With a toll in place they are at least contributing funds to help fix the problem.

This is a huge problem and it is only going to get worse. Unfortunately there is little state funding to address commuting needs, so I would suspect that in the future Atlantan's will see more tolls put in place.

[joey]

What I am saying is that someone is going from suburb to work in another suburb, they are doing nothing to contribute to the intown area except creating a clog of cars and pollution. I would suspect that if a toll where in place....a lot of these commuters would seek alternatives to their commute e.g. take I-285 or move closer to work.

I agree. I'd like to see a commuter toll system set up with toll booths on every highway as it crosses inside the Perimeter, perhaps only tolled in the peak direction during rush hour.

Unfortunately, current federal law forbids this, so it would be a huge hassle to do something like this, even if the state were behind it.

[Andrea]

I am an engineer but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that. With the bridge plan, all you need is a few million dollars commitment and you can piece together two sides of the interstate. With the removal plan, you need almost 1000 or more times as much committed to the cause before works can even begin.

I'd have to disagree with you on that, Dante. I don't think that "all you need is a few million dollars commitment and you can piece together two sides of the interstate." If I'm not mistaken the 14th and 17th street bridges alone were budgeted for around $200 million, and we're only talking about a couple of narrow ribbons of concrete.

Although I'm not an engineer I have some knowledge of the highway business and I believe what you're talking about would cost many billions of dollars and would take decades to complete. I can't imagine how you'd raise money of that magnitude for a project like that either. As I said earler, we've been talking about covering the connector for 50 years and haven't managed to come up with more than a few isolated bridges.

That's why I recommend the easier and much cheaper solution of simply reconfiguring what's there. In any case, folks can quibble over the best way to do it.

[Andrea]

This was posted a while back by Joey when this issue originally came up and it helped me visualize what could be changed. As you can see, access is not being taken away from the city so it wouldn't be isolated from the suburbs, the interstates are just being rerouted so they don't go directly through the urban core.

Exactly, Rob. Thanks for re-posting that and thanks again to Joey for preparing it.

What we're talking about here is a very specific and limited area -- the entire distance between 1-20 and Brookwood is probably no more than 3 miles or so. It's a very doable and intelligent project which would significantly enhance the central city.

It boggles my mind that an old style suburban freeway in the middle of town is regarded by so many as sacrosanct.

[Andrea]

Andrea, I still don't buy that the "vast majority" of traffic on the connector is merely suburban pass-throughs. But even if your supposition about the traffic is true:
A.) why is it necessarily a bad thing to have suburban traffic on the connector? (just to clarify, this is where I tend to think you're moralizing.)...
.

Why don't you explain to me what you mean by "moralizing", realm? I take it as dismissive and arrogant, but perhaps that's not what you mean.

And I'm not asking you to "buy" that the majorty of traffic on the connector is suburban cut-throughs. It's a fact, but I don't suggest that you are under any obligation to believe it.

As to the ability of a well designed network of downtown streets to handle traffic, I think you may be missing a couple of points. First, we don't have 300,000 people a day commuting into downtown as a destination; rather, most of them are passing through downtown on their way to other places.

Secondly, I believe you are underestimating the number of vehicles that a well-designed street can handle. For instance, Peachtree just north of Piedmont (in front of Terminus) handles between 45-50,000 vehicles a day, and no one would suggest that this was designed as a high capacity urban street. Even so, people get along fairly well and the intersection remains a popular route for people coming and going in all directions.

If you get a series of well designed urban streets working as a network, with well timed signals and good connectivity, you can significantly increase capacity beyond what can be jammed into the relatively few tightly packed lanes of an old style freeway. In addition, you get more land for development and park space, more interaction with the city itself, more shopping and living opportunities, and vastly increased pedestrian and public transit opportunities.

[Andrea]

Wow! Thanks! Good lord I could spend the entire day playing with that map...I wish I didn't have so much work to do!! :tup:

Yes, it is fascinating. Steve! Teshadoh showed it to me and I've really enjoyed playing with it, too.

[dante2308]

I'd have to disagree with you on that, Dante. I don't think that "all you need is a few million dollars commitment and you can piece together two sides of the interstate." If I'm not mistaken the 14th and 17th street bridges alone were budgeted for around $200 million, and we're only talking about a couple of narrow ribbons of concrete.

Although I'm not an engineer I have some knowledge of the highway business and I believe what you're talking about would cost many billions of dollars and would take decades to complete. I can't imagine how you'd raise money of that magnitude for a project like that either. As I said earler, we've been talking about covering the connector for 50 years and haven't managed to come up with more than a few isolated bridges.

That's why I recommend the easier and much cheaper solution of simply reconfiguring what's there. In any case, folks can quibble over the best way to do it.

You say reconfigure like you're suggesting we pick out a new shade of white for the lanes. Not so. The 14th and 17th street projects are budgeted at 170 million and most of it has to do with land acquisition and the fact 14th and 17th are also the widest portion of the connector. You would need land acquisition to redo the connector as well so it really comes down to the cost of the works which are much higher for removing the connector than building over it.

[Andrea]

You say reconfigure like you're suggesting we pick out a new shade of white for the lanes.

Dante, don't you think this conversation might be more productive if you talked about what I actually said rather than concocting a bunch of argumentative hyperbole?

[dante2308]

Dante, don't you think this conversation might be more productive if you talked about what I actually said rather than concocting a bunch of argumentative hyperbole?

Depends, how much do you like the words "straw man" or "hyperbole?" Anyway, I made a valid point. The cost-benefit of getting rid of the connector makes that plan almost pointless to pursue. No campaign to get people to think of the connector as useless will work either. Isn't that energy wasted?

[Fiorenza]

What he said.

Andrea, I respect your passion. Not only that, but you're onto something. I'm a Europhile; I think on matters of city planning and architectural design Europe is to be studied and understood. Not one single Eurocity allowed a freeway to be built through the center. It would destroy the soul and integrity of the city, like violating a virgin. Instead, the freeways stub out where the urban density begins, and the vehicles are channeled and dissipated along surface thoroughfares toward the center. Of course, there are ring roads to divert as much traffic as possible away from the center.

Having said all that, Atlanta is far from pristine. The rape has already happened - to put it crudely but succinctly. You, Andrea, are advocating something that will not happen in the foreseeable future. Yes, it's an interesting concept. Yes, it should have been as you suggest. But, they did it, it's done. Remember JFK's quote...politics is the art of the possible.

[holladay]

Fiorenza.. I agree quite a bit.

I actually lived in Paris while I was finishing my education and I've thought about the freeways there several times while we've been debating this. Paris has a circumferential freeway at the boundary between city and suburbs called the Peripherique. Several suburban freeways conjoin with it but access to the central city is via surface roads mainly. The difference, and why it works in Paris, is that the city is built at a uniform density of 70,000 sq. mile and it has more than 330 metro stations along 14 lines. In addition, the city is served by 5 RER (suburban rail) lines. Atlanta, however, is at the mercy of its connector at least until it densifies and becomes self-sustaining. I can't argue that enough.

[holladay]

Why don't you explain to me what you mean by "moralizing", realm? I take it as dismissive and arrogant, but perhaps that's not what you mean.

Secondly, I believe you are underestimating the number of vehicles that a well-designed street can handle. For instance, Peachtree just north of Piedmont (in front of Terminus) handles between 45-50,000 vehicles a day, and no one would suggest that this was designed as a high capacity urban street. Even so, people get along fairly well and the intersection remains a popular route for people coming and going in all directions.

If you get a series of well designed urban streets working as a network, with well timed signals and good connectivity, you can significantly increase capacity beyond what can be jammed into the relatively few tightly packed lanes of an old style freeway. In addition, you get more land for development and park space, more interaction with the city itself, more shopping and living opportunities, and vastly increased pedestrian and public transit opportunities.

Andrea, first, by saying you're moralizing I'm not merely dismissing you. I'm saying you are making unfair value judgments about the way the city moves and operates. You are essentially saying that suburbanites should not have the RIGHT to pass through the city. If someone wants to go from Jonesboro to Alpharetta, according to your logic, he should take 285 and go out of his way. Telling people what they should and shouldn't do is moralizing. One may not agree with the priorities of others but one cannot do something drastic like remove the connector because one wants to put a stop to the movement of suburbanites.

As far as your points about the traffic volume go, I agree. Having rethought what I initially said, yes I admit that all 300,000 cars will not show up on surface streets. Some traffic volume is likely to disappear. Also, I am aware of the 45,000 daily cars on Peachtree and realize that other streets can carry higher capacity than they do currently. So perhaps with proper signal timing and road improvements vehicular circulation may not be too burdened by the additional loads. Furthermore, I also agree with your list of benefits associated with such a plan. This is why I keep saying one day it may be a great idea to remove the connector.

My major point of disagreement, which you have not addressed, is that the city is premature right now and still needs the connector to maintain links to its metro area. It still has a very small amount of residential development and job growth relative to the burbs and relies heavily on suburban commuters for its work force. With no other means to link itself to the burbs the city is reliant on the connector to keep itself intertwined. The problem with increasing thoroughfares in Atlanta is that the city is composed of twisty two-lane former country roads. Many roads that link up to even close-in suburbs like Briarcliff, Lavista, Ashford-Dunwoody, etc. are too small to handle traffic increases that will likely occur once the connector is removed. They will all have to be retrofitted, land will need to be purchased to widen them, houses will be demolished, and the entire suburban landscape will change. Lastly, and this is no small concern, what will happen to congestion on 285 if the connector is lost. It's already 8-10 lanes. Will the state have to eventually widen it to 14-16? Plus, think of the congestion that will occur where I-75 and 85 meet with 285. Everyone will start having to take the flyovers and then merge 285 traffic. Can you imagine the nightmare? Plus, the worst part is, no matter how bad traffic gets, it hasn't forced people to move closer to work yet. Atlanta's average commute is already longest in the nation and it continues to grow. So if the connector is removed it still probably won't change people's minds about living in Cumming and Gainesville. In fact, it will likely reinforce their propensity to move further and further away from the city to try to 'escape' the traffic headaches.

The city may have lost to the suburbs because it built the connector. But now it stands to lose worse if it removes it.

[sprtsluvr8]

I still think that if you really want to understand how the connector works, the best way is to study it with you own eyes -- i.e., drive it with a careful eye to where the majority of vehicles enter and exit. It will be readily apparent that most of them are cut-throughs. This is true of off-peak times as well as morning and evening rush hours. It's a bit of a pain, but worth it if you want to see what's actually happening.

136,776 - Workplace population Downtown
40,000 - Students attending classes Downtown
64,500 - Workplace population Midtown
20,000 - Students attending classes Midtown

How many of these folks use the connector getting into Downtown or Midtown? By the way, the southbound afternoon traffic referred to earlier coming into Midtown on the North end of the connector...the backup begins around N. Druid Hills Rd. and stop-and-go traffic continues down to I-20. Maybe you consider N. Druid Hills Rd. suburban...but the majority of traffic is not coming from outside 285.

I don't need to try and figure out or prove where people on the connector are going. There aren't THAT many people crazy enough to use it as a "shortcut" or cut-through from suburb to suburb. Most people know that it's wise to avoid the connector, even if it means a route with longer mileage. The exits throughout Midtown/Downtown are often clogged with traffic entering and exiting the connector. Maybe they are just making a pitstop on their trek from Jonesboro to Alpharetta?

[SteveD]

My major point of disagreement, which you have not addressed, is that the city is premature right now and still needs the connector to maintain links to its metro area...

I have found this back and forth discussion fascinating, and I appreciate the thought and passion which has gone into many of the posts. Realm and Andrea, maybe you're not so far apart as you both think. I don't think I've heard Andrea advocating anything of an immediate nature. I've read her posts on several occasions convey that what she's advocating is that city leaders and transportation officials begin to think in a different manner now, and begin to perhaps plan for that outcome, so that it could be accomplished at some future date, at, which time, you might also agree that the downtown core would be able to sustain such a loss, or, even benefit from it. I believe the crux of what she's been conveying is for decision makers to begin to take the leap of imagination that is necessary to envision the downtown connector actually not being there, at some appropriate future date. That, I believe, is a paraphrase of the sentence I quoted from you above. My apologies in advance if I've put incorrect words in anyone's mouth. Having said all of that, it's difficult for me to make that leap myself. My family relocated to Atlanta in the mid 1970's, and Atlanta as I've always known it has had a superhighway going directly through it!

[RobMidtowner]

My major point of disagreement, which you have not addressed, is that the city is premature right now and still needs the connector to maintain links to its metro area. It still has a very small amount of residential development and job growth relative to the burbs and relies heavily on suburban commuters for its work force. With no other means to link itself to the burbs the city is reliant on the connector to keep itself intertwined. The problem with increasing thoroughfares in Atlanta is that the city is composed of twisty two-lane former country roads. Many roads that link up to even close-in suburbs like Briarcliff, Lavista, Ashford-Dunwoody, etc. are too small to handle traffic increases that will likely occur once the connector is removed. They will all have to be retrofitted, land will need to be purchased to widen them, houses will be demolished, and the entire suburban landscape will change.

Realm, if only a ~3 mile section of interstate is removed like the map I posted above there would be no lost connectivity with the city (i.e. the city would still be linked to the metro area). None of the two-lane roads you mentioned would have to be widened since people would still be able to access the city from the interstate. The only difference is that someone may have to exit the interstate and drive an additional couple miles to get to their destination.

136,776 - Workplace population Downtown
40,000 - Students attending classes Downtown
64,500 - Workplace population Midtown
20,000 - Students attending classes Midtown

How many of these folks use the connector getting into Downtown or Midtown?

Sprtsluvr8, the people you mention above could still access the city without the connector as I mentioned in my response to Realm.

By the way, the southbound afternoon traffic referred to earlier coming into Midtown on the North end of the connector...the backup begins around N. Druid Hills Rd. and stop-and-go traffic continues down to I-20. Maybe you consider N. Druid Hills Rd. suburban...but the majority of traffic is not coming from outside 285.

Can you prove this claim? Just because traffic backs up to N. Druid Hills Rd. doesn't mean the traffic didn't come from OTP. I used to commute from Midtown to Norcross and I would hit this traffic everyday on the way home.

I don't need to try and figure out or prove where people on the connector are going. There aren't THAT many people crazy enough to use it as a "shortcut" or cut-through from suburb to suburb. Most people know that it's wise to avoid the connector, even if it means a route with longer mileage. The exits throughout Midtown/Downtown are often clogged with traffic entering and exiting the connector. Maybe they are just making a pitstop on their trek from Jonesboro to Alpharetta?

While I appreciate your opinion and contributions to this discussion, I have to disagree with this statement because you provide no proof to back up your claim that the connector is not being used as a cut-through. As for the exits, have you considered that maybe they look so clogged because the connector is clogged and producing spillback (kinda like how water rises in a clogged toilet...sorry for the gross example)? Clogged ramps don't prove that Midtown/Downtown is the source for the majority of traffic on the connector.

[dante2308]

Realm, if only a ~3 mile section of interstate is removed like the map I posted above there would be no lost connectivity with the city (i.e. the city would still be linked to the metro area).

You realize that map you brought up would actually require the reconstruction of I-20 through urban neighborhoods on the black-majority south side. I also hope you realize that the original I-420 plans we stopped in court. The map also suggests that I-85 south by the airport be removed and thus access to the world's busiest airport be reconfigured completely. On top of that, that plan would be cutting off the entire south side from the north side of the city, forcing all the connector traffic onto 285 and lengthening millions of commutes. The only way that would even begin to be possible would be to triple the width of I-285 or double deck it. The plan is interesting and I'll put the costs at about 50 billion dollars including land acquisition and rising construction and labor prices.

I wonder if 50 billion is a good price to not have the connector and I-20 go through downtown and midtown. The entire military budget of China is 60 billion to put this in perspective. It seems we could put a good mass transit system in every metro over 2 million for that price. Heck we could airlift our urban core and put in the ocean like that Futurama episode at that price.

In all seriousness, there is nothing that we gain that is worth the cost of what that map proposes. Even getting rid of the connector alone would be a fantastic waste of money. "Urban fabric" is a nebulous term at best and as much as the urban fabric of Atlanta was "raped" by the highway, we don't need to rape the budget moving a road.

[CityFan]

136,776 - Workplace population Downtown
40,000 - Students attending classes Downtown
64,500 - Workplace population Midtown
20,000 - Students attending classes Midtown

How many of these folks use the connector getting into Downtown or Midtown? By the way, the southbound afternoon traffic referred to earlier coming into Midtown on the North end of the connector...the backup begins around N. Druid Hills Rd. and stop-and-go traffic continues down to I-20. Maybe you consider N. Druid Hills Rd. suburban...but the majority of traffic is not coming from outside 285.

I don't need to try and figure out or prove where people on the connector are going. There aren't THAT many people crazy enough to use it as a "shortcut" or cut-through from suburb to suburb. Most people know that it's wise to avoid the connector, even if it means a route with longer mileage. The exits throughout Midtown/Downtown are often clogged with traffic entering and exiting the connector. Maybe they are just making a pitstop on their trek from Jonesboro to Alpharetta?
Your numbers and observation help clarify a lot of issues we have been discussing here. The fact is that donwtown connector serves lots of intown residents.

[Andrea]

The fact is that donwtown connector serves lots of intown residents.

No one has suggested that some intown residents don't use the connector sometimes. The point is that there are BETTER ways for people to get around within the city. Good heavens, are we still at the point where we believe the only way to travel inside the urban core of Atlanta is on a limited access freeway?

Just anecdotally speaking, yesterday afternoon about 4:30 I had to go from Buckhead to some property I have over on Moreland. I would not have dreamed of attempting to get on the connector at that time of day. The surface streets are much quicker even as they exist today. If they were brought up to modern standards with better intersections, turn lanes, optimally timed signals, and more connectivity, they would a fabulous way to get around the city.

I came home about 8:30 p.m. and decided to do the connector. I was the only car which got on at the Moreland ramp, The vast majority of the northbound traffic had already entered the connector south of I-20, and between there and Buckhead only two others cars got on at any downtown ramp. Between I-20 and Buckhead, only three cars exited at any downtown ramp, and nearly all the vehicles continued to travel north past the Buckhead exits. That’s pretty typical.

[RobMidtowner]

You realize that map you brought up would actually require the reconstruction of I-20 through urban neighborhoods on the black-majority south side. I also hope you realize that the original I-420 plans we stopped in court. The map also suggests that I-85 south by the airport be removed and thus access to the world's busiest airport be reconfigured completely. On top of that, that plan would be cutting off the entire south side from the north side of the city, forcing all the connector traffic onto 285 and lengthening millions of commutes. The only way that would even begin to be possible would be to triple the width of I-285 or double deck it. The plan is interesting and I'll put the costs at about 50 billion dollars including land acquisition and rising construction and labor prices.

I wonder if 50 billion is a good price to not have the connector and I-20 go through downtown and midtown. The entire military budget of China is 60 billion to put this in perspective. It seems we could put a good mass transit system in every metro over 2 million for that price. Heck we could airlift our urban core and put in the ocean like that Futurama episode at that price.

In all seriousness, there is nothing that we gain that is worth the cost of what that map proposes. Even getting rid of the connector alone would be a fantastic waste of money. "Urban fabric" is a nebulous term at best and as much as the urban fabric of Atlanta was "raped" by the highway, we don't need to rape the budget moving a road.

The point I was trying to make is that removing the connector doesn't eliminate access to the city and thus make it isolated from the metro like Realm said. I'm not claiming that the map I posted is the correct answer. All I said when I posted it was that it helped me to realize what could be done if we start thinking outside of the box.

Yes I realize that it would be a costly project (although I think $50 billion is a bit inflated), but how is this project anymore outlandish than some of the other proposed projects we've been hearing about recently in the news (i.e. Northern Arc, I-675/GA 400 tunnel, I-20 tunnel, etc.)?

Oh and in response to the north side being cut off from the southside....believe it or not, there's actually streets other than an interstate that go north-south through the city. :yes:

[Andrea]

I have found this back and forth discussion fascinating, and I appreciate the thought and passion which has gone into many of the posts. Realm and Andrea, maybe you're not so far apart as you both think. I don't think I've heard Andrea advocating anything of an immediate nature. I've read her posts on several occasions convey that what she's advocating is that city leaders and transportation officials begin to think in a different manner now, and begin to perhaps plan for that outcome, so that it could be accomplished at some future date, at, which time, you might also agree that the downtown core would be able to sustain such a loss, or, even benefit from it. I believe the crux of what she's been conveying is for decision makers to begin to take the leap of imagination that is necessary to envision the downtown connector actually not being there, at some appropriate future date.

Thanks, Steve. Yeah, that is basically what I've been saying. Transportation projects develop over a period of years, which means that the vision and the priorities which shape them have to be addressed NOW. If we want the core of our city to become less auto dependent by 2027, or 2047, then we need to revisit freeway thinking today.

As I've said many times, it's a matter of setting goals and priorities. We can either stick our heads in the sand and cling religiously to the status quo, or we can look for new and better solutions.

[Andrea]

You, Andrea, are advocating something that will not happen in the foreseeable future. Yes, it's an interesting concept. Yes, it should have been as you suggest. But, they did it, it's done.

Fiorenza, you know I value your opinions, too. But unless we start thinking creatively about change now, we virtually guarantee that things will continue in the same direction.

Maybe that is fine with some people. I think we can do better. I don't think that we have to keep doing things the same way just because they were done that way before.

I'm not so naive, by the way, to imagine that 60 years of history can magically washed away. Nor do I believe that all of that history has been negative. What I do fervently hope is that we can, by considered and conscientious judgment, avoid repeating and enhancing the errors of the past. I've got just about the same length of time in grade with this city as does the connector, and Lord knows I hope that nobody tries to replicate my life! And maybe that's one of the reasons I feel so strongly about making things better. We've go to learn from the past, or as they say, we’re doomed to repeat it.

[holladay]

Ok, so after a few decades the connector may not be necessary. Most of us agree on that point. Looking at the map a second time, Rob, I'll give you that connectivity losses may not be extreme. However, I also agree with dante that the erection of a new I-20 on the southside is a detriment. Granted, these things can be worked out.

At this point, I'd like to include the introduction of an article written in 1995 by Rem Koolhaas about Atlanta. Koolhaas, as many of you probably know, is the premier architect of our generation throughout the globe. He is renown for his urban studies and is particularly poignant in his understanding of cultural and social phenomena. He is as much an anthropologist and sociologist as he is an urbanist and architect.

I'm mainly posting this because I think it offers some insight into the current state of Atlanta. Koolhaas is not opposed to any of it. In fact, he appreciates the specificity of Atlanta's conditions. Before anyone starts saying, "We need to change this, we need to change that" it may be beneficial to try to see the city in a new light. Maybe things aren't as problematic as they seem to be according to the 'normal' standards of urbanism.

If I find the time to type it out I'll make a thread with the whole article. There's quite a bit more to Koolhaas' argument.



"Atlanta"

by Rem Koolhaas

Sometimes it’s important to find what the city is – instead of what it was, or what it should be. This is what drove me to Atlanta – an intuition that the real city of the end of the 20th century could be found there…

1. Atlanta has CNN and Coca-Cola
2. Atlanta has a black mayor, and it will have the Olympics
3. Atlanta has culture, or at least it has a Richard Meier museum (like Ulm, Barcelona, Frankfurt, The Hague, etc.)
4. Atlanta has an airport; actually it has 40 airports. One of them is the biggest in the world. Not that everybody wants to be there; it’s a hub, a spoke, an airport for connections. It could be anywhere.
5. Atlanta has history. Or it had history. Now it has history machines that replay the battles of the Civil War every hour on the hour. Its real history has been erased, removed, or artificially resuscitated.
6. Atlanta has other elements that provide intensity without physical density: one building looks innocent from the outside – like a regular supermarket – but it actually is the largest, most sophisticated food hall in the world. Each day it receives three cargo planes of fresh food from Holland, four from Paris, two from Southeast Asia. It proves that there are hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of gourmets in Atlanta.
7. Atlanta does not have the classic symptoms of city; it is not dense; it is a sparse, thin carpet of habitation, a kind of suprematist composition of little fields. Its strongest contextual givens are vegetal and infrastructural: forests and roads. Atlanta is not a city – it is a landscape.
8. Atlanta’s basic form – but it is not a form – its basic formlessness is generated by the highway system, a stretched X surrounded by an O: branches connecting across the city connecting to a single perimeter highway. The X brings people in and out; the O – like a turntable – takes them anywhere. They are thinking about projecting a Super-O somewhere in the beyond.
9. Atlanta has nature – both original and improved; a sparkling, perfect nature where no leaf is ever out of place. Its artificiality sometimes makes it hard to tell whether you are outside or inside; somehow, you’re always in nature.
10. Atlanta does not have planning, exactly, but another process called zoning. Atlanta’s zoning law is very interesting; its first line tells you what to do if you want to propose an exception to the regulations. The regulations are so weak that the exception is the norm. Elsewhere, zoning has a bad name – for putting things in their place simplistically: work, sleep, shop, play. Atlanta has a kind of reverse zoning, zoning as instrument of indetermination, making anything possible anywhere.

[RobMidtowner]

:previous:
But if a city gets to where it is based on flawed assumptions, then wouldn't you want to adapt the city to the actual conditions? I realize no one can predict the future, but that doesn't mean we have to continue going in the wrong direction if we know it's wrong. To me, saying "Sometimes it’s important to find what the city is – ... instead of what it should be" is like saying "Well I know it's a mess, but I'm just not gonna waste my time cleaning it up" and maybe some people are willing to have that attitude about their community, but I'm not.