CDeb

I think the issue will probably come down to stadium size. FIFA is going to want to pack as many people in there as possible. The 1994 final was at the Rose Bowl, which seats 92K compared to Reliant's 70K.

SOP for State.

Construction zones are ALWAYS a traffic nightmare. But you generally wake up to a great improvement when they're over with.

Is Reliant Stadium a good venue for soccer? That would be awesome.

Some memories of Astroworld: * Doing the previously-mentioned quarter trick on the Sky Screamer (although we only used pennies, quarters being too valuable). It was fun to watch them float there for a second or two then fling off to oblivion when you hit the curve at the bottom. * Figuring out where the camera was that took your picture on the Viper and flipping it off (dumb kids, we were). * Taz's Texas Tornado's restraints sucked. The g-forces at the bottom of drops were so bad, your spine would compress, further retracting the restraint and leaving your back crunched for the rest of the ride. Agony even at 20 years old. I only rode that ride once. *The two strategies for riding the Bamboo Shoot: either piling everyone in the back so the boat would skip across the water at the bottom or piling everyone in the front so the boat would plow through the water and drench us all. * I remember being afraid of Excalibur (Excalibur for goodness sakes!) as a child, but then riding it a few years later thinking, "Geez, I could practically stand up and ride this thing!" So what was the nature of the disagreement regarding parking with Harris County?

I just happened across this thread today, and I gotta say, HAIF'ers are the schnizit!

Without "a blatant disrespect for the law," it takes me right at an hour to get from College Station to Farfield, which appears to be the outer reaches of "Houston" development. It takes a little over 1.5 hours to get to downtown if there's no traffic. Again, this is trying to stay within 5 mph of the speed limit (which probably 90% of drivers do). So I think BCS is a little far for inclusion, IMO. How far are the cities that Atlanta includes?

I must say, I have a vested interest in this decision, as I own a house in Villa Forest off of Forestwood. The proposed location may be a bit far to have a significant impact for my property, but it's a lot better than being in CS. From an access standpoint, I think the chosen location is a great one.

Errrr, because it's a ROAD maybe?

Joint venture.

But are the visibility conditions the same? I seem to remember that those were the bulk of the safety complaints: a new concrete barrier blocking the visibility of drivers trying to merge. Of course, I could be confusing this with something else.

Overdramatic??? On a message board??? Why, I've never heard of such a thing!!!!

SO what are you trying to say here, anyway?

Because I've chosen to educate myself on the system before making statements for the whole world to see.

Again, "these things" won't give you a citation in that situation.

Yes, you can. But really, if you get a citation, you aren't going to have much to dispute, seeing as how you're going to be receiving a photo with your car in the intersection with the light red. Good luck.

Again.... you have to ENTER the intersection (cross the stop line) after the light turns red. If you're already there, the system isn't going to catch you. But those drivers are breaking the law and if a police officer were there, they'd deserve to be cited.

With the systems I have seen, there is a sensor immediately in front of the stop bar. You have to cross that sensor AFTER the light turns red (i.e. you have to enter the intersection on red) to be issued a citiation. A police officer reviews each photo to determine that a violation has occured. You are also sent this photo with your citation and are free to challenge it in a hearing. I haven't seen anything about linking the cameras to a central command, but that's certainly possible (maybe they will be linked to Transstar somehow). However, I sincerely doubt that a police officer would be given control over timing of the intersection. That would be like NASA letting you and I fly the space shuttle. My reference to "the whole thing" was in regards to the transportation system as a whole, not red light cameras.

I definitely think there's a complacency issue. Roads built today are many times safer than roads built a generation ago. Roads are much more forgiving now. So now we have a whole generation of drivers who have never experienced a time when you really needed to pay attention out there or there was a decent chance you were going to take the eternal celestial dirt nap.

It's a tradeoff. You can always go to extremes. If "the whole thing" was about public safety, setting the speed limit on Interstates to 45 MPH would certainly save lives. Putting a stop sign at every intersection would certainly save lives. But those are considered unacceptable delays to the majority of drivers. And decreasing the capacity of the intersection isn't going to increase your wait by a mere 10%. As the volume of the intersection approaches capacity (as the V/C ratio nears 1) as many intersections in Houston are, the increase in delay due to incremental volumes becomes exponential. A 10% decrease in intersection capacity could mean 2-3 times the wait at an intersection which was already congested (i.e. - you were already waiting a good bit before). That would be an unacceptable delay to the majority of drivers. And if you are not in the habit of running red lights, what is there to "get used to" about a red light camera?

I'm confused: A revenue source that only lawbreakers would have to pay is bad. But revenue sources that everyone HAS to pay (taxes) are good? Like I said, I'm confused, because I sure can tell you which way I would rather have the authorities collect their money. There is always a tradeoff between safety and faster travel times. In your proposal, it may seem like nothing, but for a four-phase signal with a 120 second cycle length, you've just decreased the capacity of the intersection by 10% (3-sec all-red) or more (4-sec all-red). I bet that'll go over real well on many city intersections. For a three-phase signal with a 90-second cycle length, the results are similar. Yellow intervals are timed according to standard engineering practice. Increasing the yellow time will work if it is too short. But in the vast majority of cases, the yellow interval is adequate. Extending it in that case will have a reduction in red-light running in the short term. But as drivers get used to the longer yellow, the situation reverts to previous form as they begin to learn how long the signal is and what they can "get away with."

I hope that piece of crap never passes.

Correct. Another local on the committee is the only thing that would affect Culberson's influence on the project. Like I said before, the other committee members are not going to force something in his district that he is against. They'll happily take their pork funds in their own districts.

My opinion: It doesn't matter so much which party is in control, or how much power Culberson has. He's going to be the only local guy on the committee (is this correct?), and if the local guy says, "Don't fund this project in my district," then the other folks sure as hell aren't going to say, "The hell with our projects, we're funding yours, pal."

Like I said, try 290 (during off-peak, when it's not a parking lot, of course). A near-universal problem, in my experience, especially on rural highways, and on the rise with the advent of cell phones.