Triton Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 I was looking for a place to pay my EZ tag fee on the Harris County Toll Road Authority website and stumbled upon this project: https://www.hctra.org/about_construction/State_Highway_288_Toll_Lanes/ Also... if you go to this link, click on the first pdf file and it will show you the extent of the toll lanes down 288. 26 miles in total. $1.4 billion. https://www.hctra.org/about_construction/ Sorry that the image is a little small but you can get a near fullscreen version if you go to the pdf file. Even though this is years away, it would be SUCH a relief for them to build this project. 288 is a nightmare. ... ... ... just like almost all of Houston's highways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alsal29 Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 and Fairmont though? That seems silly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ToryGattis Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 and Fairmont though? That seems silly.Oh, I disagree. Maybe not immediately needed, but long-term it will be a great reliever for 45S, which needs it more every day. There's a lot of development in the gap between Pasadena and Clear Lake. It would be a much more direct route to Kemah and the rest of the coast than 45 to NASA Pkwy.As far as 288: the mistake I think they're making is making it two-way like the HOT lanes on the Katy Freeway. Katy Fwy has strong two-way traffic all day because there are a lot of jobs out there in the Energy Corridor and Westchase. 288 is pretty much pure inbound in the morning and outbound in the evening. That means half the toll lanes will remain pretty much unused all day long (the contra-flow side). They would get more useful capacity, more riders, and more toll revenue if they made all (or most) of the toll lanes inbound in the morning and outbound in the afternoon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LTAWACS Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 More tollways? Ugh!When are they going to be free? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
samagon Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 When are they going to be free?When the next major hurricane rolls through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alsal29 Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 I drive Red Bluff every day to work, and it is a street that has a 55 mile an hour speed limit and never has any cars. If you told me you were going to enlarge Genoa Red Bluff for better access to Red Bluff, I would say that makes sense, but to add years of construction to go 5 miles an hour faster to a street I can drive for free with no cars on it is silly. Tolls are taking over the world. It would be one thing if it ever actually turned into a normal road, but it won't. The toll is the kicker for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LTAWACS Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 We need to tell our elected buffoons to cease and desist regarding tollways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
totheskies Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 More tollways? Ugh! When are they going to be free? More tollways!!!! When are we going to convert all freeways to toll roads?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLWM8609 Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 I was looking for a place to pay my EZ tag fee on the Harris County Toll Road Authority website and stumbled upon this project: https://www.hctra.org/about_construction/State_Highway_288_Toll_Lanes/ Also... if you go to this link, click on the first pdf file and it will show you the extent of the toll lanes down 288. 26 miles in total. $1.4 billion. https://www.hctra.org/about_construction/ Sorry that the image is a little small but you can get a near fullscreen version if you go to the pdf file. Even though this is years away, it would be SUCH a relief for them to build this project. 288 is a nightmare. ... ... ... just like almost all of Houston's highways. A.C. Kyser must be rolling in his grave. When he designed 288 inside the loop in the 1960s, he intended for the wide swath in the median to house free express lanes from 610 to downtown. And as for the Fairmont Parkway freeway, it's been in the plans for a long time. Why else do you think the median there is so wide? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LTAWACS Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 A.C. Kyser must be rolling in his grave. When he designed 288 inside the loop in the 1960s, he intended for the wide swath in the median to house free express lanes from 610 to downtown. And as for the Fairmont Parkway freeway, it's been in the plans for a long time. Why else do you think the median there is so wide?Correct. So why are they installing MORE toll roads? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ToryGattis Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 The future is all tollways. There's no support for the needed gas tax increase for more freeways. It's tollways or nothing. If you don't like 'em, you're welcome to use the feeder. You think 610 is bad now, try to imagine Houston without Beltway 8. Scary thought. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LTAWACS Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 The future is all tollways. There's no support for the needed gas tax increase for more freeways. It's tollways or nothing. If you don't like 'em, you're welcome to use the feeder. You think 610 is bad now, try to imagine Houston without Beltway 8. Scary thought.Simple. I dont live outside 610. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtticaFlinch Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 The future is all tollways. Simple math proof:The future is all tollways.Children are the future.Hell is for children.Hell is Tollways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
totheskies Posted October 28, 2009 Share Posted October 28, 2009 Correct. So why are they installing MORE toll roads?At least tollways generate revenue for their own upkeep, as well as surplus for other projects. I'd love to diffuse the power of HCTRA and get more of those monies to the city and county though. I think Freeways are a bad idea nowadays... all they do is encourage more traffic out to nowhere (not that tollways don't, but atleast there's a little profit from it). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LTAWACS Posted October 29, 2009 Share Posted October 29, 2009 At least tollways generate revenue for their own upkeep, as well as surplus for other projects. I'd love to diffuse the power of HCTRA and get more of those monies to the city and county though. I think Freeways are a bad idea nowadays... all they do is encourage more traffic out to nowhere (not that tollways don't, but atleast there's a little profit from it).They are not supposed to be generating profits. They were supposed to pay for themselves. Originally at least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Specwriter Posted October 29, 2009 Share Posted October 29, 2009 288 has become almost unusable for me. To get from Greenway to Seabrook in the afternoon (and I leave the office before 5:00pm) it is quicker to drive around the 610 Loop to State Highway 225 and then take State Highway 146 south. Forget the Gulf Freeway. I don't know how many others have the same destination. I would think most people using 288 are heading toward Pearland and Alvin and the new development in that area. If that's the case some sort of express lane(s), whether toll, free, or high occupancy only, would seem to make sense.I use toll roads because, when I chose to use them, the time savings and convenience to me is worth the cost but they are decidedly undemocratic. This morning Walton & Johnson were talking on their radio show about cap and trade (or did I misunderstand and they were talking about a naval officer, Cap'n Trade?). I'm not fully informed on the matter but what I gathered was that credits could be bought in exchange for releasing noxious substances into the air. This sounds familiar with a concept floated about fifteen years ago. Their point was that, like with the Church's indugences of the 16th century, the wealthy could "buy forgiveness for their sins."Well, it was just an analogy and these guys are constantly tongue-in-cheek when they riff on such topics but it reminded me of toll roads. If one has the money to pay the tolls he (thoretically) breezes through while his less fortunate brethern crawl through the often hot and always smelly traffic jams. I don't know whether to feel good because I have the where-with-all to use the toll roads or sad because not everyone else does. The traffic situation in our fair city though does make it easier to supress one's guilty feelings.Sometimes I do cut the corner by traveling on Red Bluff and, I believe, with its extremely wide median south of Fairmont Parkway it was intended to be a limited access highway at some point in the future. That would greatly facilitate evacuation of the bay area although it is not really needed now for daily traffic as alsal29 first said above.Since hurricanes Rita and Ike it looks like the future has come. The problem of extending a limited access highway north of Fairmont Parkway to the Beltway is a big problem though. Also, there has been much said about making S. H. 146 limited access between its intersection with Interstate 45 near the Galveston causeway to Interstate 10 in Baytown. That would be a major plus for evacuation of Galveston County. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barracuda Posted October 29, 2009 Share Posted October 29, 2009 They are not supposed to be generating profits. They were supposed to pay for themselves. Originally at least.Tollways are immensely addictive to their financial beneficiaries. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtticaFlinch Posted October 29, 2009 Share Posted October 29, 2009 Tollways are immensely addictive to their financial beneficiaries.Especially if they're one of Slick Perry's cronies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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