Re:To fix L.A.'s traffic, we need tolls
by majormajor on Tuesday March 07, 2017 @05:51PM
(#13815913)
> The problem as I see it is that we force everyone onto the freeway. Need to get somewhere a few miles from here? They make it very difficult to get there without getting onto the freeway.
This applies to many American cities, but not really most of LA. The relatively grid-like nature of the surface street network + the level of highway congestion makes short trips do much better on surface streets most of the day.
Of course, the flip side is terrible surface street congestion (to to go east from Santa Monica to UCLA at end-of-day rush hour... or south to LAX on Lincoln). But it reflects that LA's street planning is in many ways much more like an "old" city than a "new" one with lots of intentionally-confusing local road routing and consistent, easy routing to the highways instead.
But when every street going west->east or north->south is backed up, whether they're 1 lane or 3-to-4, I'm not sure there's any room for a denser grid of narrower streets, or that it would improve much.
This applies to many American cities, but not really most of LA. The relatively grid-like nature of the surface street network + the level of highway congestion makes short trips do much better on surface streets most of the day.
Of course, the flip side is terrible surface street congestion (to to go east from Santa Monica to UCLA at end-of-day rush hour... or south to LAX on Lincoln). But it reflects that LA's street planning is in many ways much more like an "old" city than a "new" one with lots of intentionally-confusing local road routing and consistent, easy routing to the highways instead.
But when every street going west->east or north->south is backed up, whether they're 1 lane or 3-to-4, I'm not sure there's any room for a denser grid of narrower streets, or that it would improve much.