Streets are intended for stops. Homes, driveways, shops. Low speed. Walkable.
Roads are intended for travel. There should be very few turnoffs, no surprise entrances, etc. Roads are intended to get you onto streets. Generally medium to high speeds.
Stroads combine the worst of both to make death traps, accidents, and make walking difficult, uncomfortable, or impossible.
A left turn lane, a right turn, and a through lane is normal? Anything else allows endless backups. Pedestrians prevent cars from turning right and left, and oncoming prevents cars from turning left, and than no one can go straight either.
It’s usually 2 lanes each way only 100m or so before the intersection and it widens to this configuration. A single lane road still usually has one type of turning lane at all intersection as well.
A left turn lane, a right turn, and a through lane is normal?
No. No it’s not. That’s a design for a major artery, not for every single street with shops on it. If you grew up in the United States, and haven’t traveled, I’m afraid to tell you that you’ve never seen good road infrastructure in your life.
It isn’t normal to have six lanes (>80% of available space) to be exclusively for vehicles. I mean, it is normal in North America but it really shouldn’t be. The problem is two of those lanes could be a bicycle path with a tram line to allow for a lot more throughput while creating space for people to walk around and loiter which then provides increased opportunity for local business’ to create sales and boost the local economy. This would also have a knock-on effect of decreasing congestion (backups) because when there are other, viable transportation options, more people will choose not to drive. With less traffic, local trades and shipping companies will also experience greater productivity with less time spent idling, which also means less air pollution which in turn reduces strain on the medical system. Not to mention all the money saved by people not buying gas, insurance, doing maintenance, etc. (which can then be put into other industries instead of being tied up in transportation).
With stroads like in the OP, all potential customers just go right past to strip malls outside the urban centre that are essentially only accessible by driving. If they do stop at places along a stroad like this they usually park, do whatever it is they need to do, then leave asap because it’s not a nice place to be with all the traffic noise an noxious gasses. With the intersection in the OP specifically, one can imagine a sort of town square where people can sit with their family and have dinner or whatever else. Instead, it’s a few acres of asphalt that raises the local temperature by a few degrees while creating a massive obstacle for pedestrians, especially if they have to cross diagonally. The heat especially makes it a really shitty place to walk through and can even be dangerous for elders or people with weakened respiratory systems. These facts, and the almost non-existent pedestrian infrastructure creates a negative feedback loop where more and more people are using cars to get around because of how awful it is to walk anywhere leading to more focus on vehicle infrastructure, and more people driving cars.
Using only personal vehicles to get anywhere is not a scalable transportation solution and greatly hampers economic growth outside of specific industries (that are usually related to vehicles). By providing other transportation options to people by using land that would ‘normally’ be used for parking or right/left turns (especially intersections), more economic opportunity is created, business’ that rely on transportation (shipping, delivery, plumbers, electricians, etc.) will become more efficient as traffic is reduced and people that live in the area will become healthier.
I mean, overall it’s just good for the economy to provide more options and not pave the entire place with asphalt.
Why would you need three incoming lanes, though? Three outgoing makes sense temporarily, but you only need a single incoming lane if you’re going to go back down to two total, and the OP has three incoming.
No, it should not be normal. In fact it is not normal in almost any city outside NA. While we still have cars in cities (which we categorically should not), we must at the very least make sure there is no more than one lane in each direction, including most intersections. “Endless backups” are unavoidable with cars in any case because of a combination of basic geometry and induced demand. We should instead optimize for the safety & speed of other road users, literally all of which are more efficient than car drivers.
I see three right hand lanes there (as in, the side of the road closest to the camera has three lanes for a single direction of traffic), which means that it’s 6 lanes by default and widens to somewhere between 7 and 9 at the intersection, depending on turn lane configuration. That is unless you want to assume an unbalanced configuration where there are three lanes in one direction and only two lanes in the other, which frankly I consider unlikely.
Those 3 close lanes would merge back into 2 100m from the intersection. It allows free flowing traffic. It allows a through lane, a lane for vehicles to turn right into as well.
This is how i think the intersection on the image looks like:
The difference seems small, but the amount of lanes after cars crossing the street is a big deal.
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If the outer lanes are only for traffic turning left or right, at the other side of the interchange there should only be one lane left. That is not how this interchange looks to me.
That’s a 6 lane road. You must be perpetually on steroids to think that would be normal.
Stroad, it’s a stroad. It’s why I hate North America.
Stroad, n. A road on steroids
Streets are intended for stops. Homes, driveways, shops. Low speed. Walkable.
Roads are intended for travel. There should be very few turnoffs, no surprise entrances, etc. Roads are intended to get you onto streets. Generally medium to high speeds.
Stroads combine the worst of both to make death traps, accidents, and make walking difficult, uncomfortable, or impossible.
A left turn lane, a right turn, and a through lane is normal? Anything else allows endless backups. Pedestrians prevent cars from turning right and left, and oncoming prevents cars from turning left, and than no one can go straight either.
It’s usually 2 lanes each way only 100m or so before the intersection and it widens to this configuration. A single lane road still usually has one type of turning lane at all intersection as well.
What are you even complaining about?
No. No it’s not. That’s a design for a major artery, not for every single street with shops on it. If you grew up in the United States, and haven’t traveled, I’m afraid to tell you that you’ve never seen good road infrastructure in your life.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motonormativity
It isn’t normal to have six lanes (>80% of available space) to be exclusively for vehicles. I mean, it is normal in North America but it really shouldn’t be. The problem is two of those lanes could be a bicycle path with a tram line to allow for a lot more throughput while creating space for people to walk around and loiter which then provides increased opportunity for local business’ to create sales and boost the local economy. This would also have a knock-on effect of decreasing congestion (backups) because when there are other, viable transportation options, more people will choose not to drive. With less traffic, local trades and shipping companies will also experience greater productivity with less time spent idling, which also means less air pollution which in turn reduces strain on the medical system. Not to mention all the money saved by people not buying gas, insurance, doing maintenance, etc. (which can then be put into other industries instead of being tied up in transportation).
With stroads like in the OP, all potential customers just go right past to strip malls outside the urban centre that are essentially only accessible by driving. If they do stop at places along a stroad like this they usually park, do whatever it is they need to do, then leave asap because it’s not a nice place to be with all the traffic noise an noxious gasses. With the intersection in the OP specifically, one can imagine a sort of town square where people can sit with their family and have dinner or whatever else. Instead, it’s a few acres of asphalt that raises the local temperature by a few degrees while creating a massive obstacle for pedestrians, especially if they have to cross diagonally. The heat especially makes it a really shitty place to walk through and can even be dangerous for elders or people with weakened respiratory systems. These facts, and the almost non-existent pedestrian infrastructure creates a negative feedback loop where more and more people are using cars to get around because of how awful it is to walk anywhere leading to more focus on vehicle infrastructure, and more people driving cars.
Using only personal vehicles to get anywhere is not a scalable transportation solution and greatly hampers economic growth outside of specific industries (that are usually related to vehicles). By providing other transportation options to people by using land that would ‘normally’ be used for parking or right/left turns (especially intersections), more economic opportunity is created, business’ that rely on transportation (shipping, delivery, plumbers, electricians, etc.) will become more efficient as traffic is reduced and people that live in the area will become healthier.
I mean, overall it’s just good for the economy to provide more options and not pave the entire place with asphalt.
Why would you need three incoming lanes, though? Three outgoing makes sense temporarily, but you only need a single incoming lane if you’re going to go back down to two total, and the OP has three incoming.
This is is about pedestrians having to cross all 6 lanes at that spot while cars rush past. I don’t care how good it is against congestion.
Next you’re gonna tell me they should ignore the friendly button, walk 100m and cross where it’s “only” 4 lanes anymore.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroad#Disadvantages
There’s also some very nice YT videos explaining the problem and better solutions.
“I never walk further than my driveway, so I don’t see a problem.”
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No, it should not be normal. In fact it is not normal in almost any city outside NA. While we still have cars in cities (which we categorically should not), we must at the very least make sure there is no more than one lane in each direction, including most intersections. “Endless backups” are unavoidable with cars in any case because of a combination of basic geometry and induced demand. We should instead optimize for the safety & speed of other road users, literally all of which are more efficient than car drivers.
I see three right hand lanes there (as in, the side of the road closest to the camera has three lanes for a single direction of traffic), which means that it’s 6 lanes by default and widens to somewhere between 7 and 9 at the intersection, depending on turn lane configuration. That is unless you want to assume an unbalanced configuration where there are three lanes in one direction and only two lanes in the other, which frankly I consider unlikely.
I said there was 3 lanes on each side?
A right turn, a left turn, and a through lane.
Those 3 close lanes would merge back into 2 100m from the intersection. It allows free flowing traffic. It allows a through lane, a lane for vehicles to turn right into as well.
That’s not how any intersection I’ve ever seen works, you don’t have more outgoing lanes than incoming straight through lanes.
This is what you describe:
This is how i think the intersection on the image looks like:
The difference seems small, but the amount of lanes after cars crossing the street is a big deal.
| < | ^ | > |
If the outer lanes are only for traffic turning left or right, at the other side of the interchange there should only be one lane left. That is not how this interchange looks to me.