re: The Baton Rouge traffic problem exceeds the problem solving skills of our political class

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The traffic threads today have been entertaining

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LNCHBOX

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Because you're stupid.

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Having fun on that bridge?

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You should just be thankful that most of us care enough about the state and country to bitch about it and maybe *gasp* do something about it. And by do something I mean something other than bend over backwards to let government frick us.

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xiv

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fricking downtown BR, apparently

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Could be worse, I guess!

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I drove up for work yesterday morning - left New Orleans (close to Metairie) - a little before 6:45. Took about 2 hours, was at a standstill before Prairieville and got off and worked my way around the highway.

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Damn, that's really fast! Normally, traffic should take about 2.5 hours minimum!

It regularly takes me two hours to get from the LA22 Exit in Sorrento to Downtown BR.

There are so many issues which have compounded to make these traffic nightmares:
1. the systematic destruction of our public school systems by segregation and the federal reaction to discrimination. Segregation never really went away because people tend to self-segregate. Mandatory integration of schools in BR via the Judge Parker decision did so much more than simply allow blacks to attend schools in white neighborhoods to the point that it completely destroyed the public school system. That left families with two options: pay a premium to send their kids to private school (often requiring them to drive well across town to do so since bussing for those schools isn't nearly as reliable or feasible), or move to a more affluent municipality or parish (read whiter) with better public schools. For those who can pay the premium, that's great. However, a lot of middle class families can't afford that, and they were forced to move out to the suburbs, but their jobs didn't move. THey just had to add an extra 20 miles to their daily commute to make it possible.

2. Federal environmental impact study requirements for undertaking large infrastructure projects: this policy has done more to slow down infrastructure development than any other. What used to take months to get started now takes decades, and costs are multiplied as a result. This, more so than almost any other policy change, has increased the price tag and time requirements for building new and expanding existing roads.

3. Wetlands Mitigation: this policy greatly constricts the places where roads can be built. When the policy was first implemented, the idea was to preserve existing wetlands by requiring developers who wanted to build something in a wetland to "mitigate" (i.e. pay to restore) one acre of wetland for every acre of wetland they developed. It started off as 1:1, then 1.5:1, then 2:1, and now it is many times that. The costs associated with mitigation for large-scale projects such as roads have now grown so exhorbitant as to be completely cost-prohibitive. In addition, by adopting a definition for "wetlands" and "waters of the United States" that are wholly incongruent with every other branch of government and government entity on the planet, the Army Corps of Engineers has essentially made every single square inch of Louisiana a wetland. Under existing policy, there is zero chance I-10 could have ever been built in the first place, which is why it is damn near impossible to improve it now. New roads essentially cannot be built through currently unpopulated areas in South Louisiana, meaning any new roads have to go through areas where imminent domain will be extremely expensive and politically laborious. Changing the definitions of "wetlands" or easing the mitigation requirements for road projects would decrease costs dramatically while also opening up a lot of areas where roads could go.

4. Zero planning by the metro council and parish councils in the suburban areas. This is actually one aspect where a lack of government intervention caused a major problem. If you look at older neighborhoods (prior to the late 1970's), you see that the streets are laid out (more or less) in a grid pattern. The neighborhoods have multiple entrances and exits and redundancy. However, when you get to newer areas, you see a complete shift in how those neighborhoods are laid out. The streets meander and dead-end, often having just one entrance/exit all dumping onto one state highway. Rather than an integrated grid, it's more like a family tree that blossoms in many directions, but eventually all branches from just one intersection. I don't know what changed in these councils at this time, but suddenly, allowing these types of developments rather than the older versions with connecting streets suddenly became the standard. This lack of connectivity causes those few streets that actually connect to quickly become over-burdened, and having all of these dead-end neighborhoods then becomes a blockade for actually building new highways to connect them. There is no thought, no plan, and no vision that would ever conceive of anything so idiotic as all of these developments in the aggregate. They simply make zero sense from a transportation standpoint.

5. A completely well-earned lack of trust between taxpayers and the government. We have a gas tax that was passed specifically to pay for road improvements and only road improvements, yet only a small fraction of the trust fund actually goes to pay for roads. The vast majority of it is made up of funding for municipal bus systems like CATS, funding for airports, dredging operations for ports, and state police. If the money in the gas tax were actually used for roads (and roads alone), the backlog of projects would be FINISHED (as in all the projects are BUILT) in less than 10 years. That is how much money that is being siphoned off to other things. This is why the public will not approve more taxes. The money never goes where the government says it will go, and the government says "well if you just give us a little bit more, THIS time we'll spend it wisely! We promise!!!!" No one's buying it. Literally the only thing that literally EVERYONE in this state can agree needs money is roads. So, politicians hold funding those roads hostage so they extract more taxes from citizens to fund everything else.

We have serious structural issues to fix in order to really do anything noticeable to fix our roads.

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Plaquemine is the Brusly of Brusly.

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Why is this not a problem in any Texas city?

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You ever driven through Beaumont?

If people could just drive straight, stop texting and not hit anyone else there wouldn't be any traffic

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If everyone moved closer to where they work

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Your daily bike ride would become more treacherous with all the additional cars around, because very few people are going to give up the freedom and convenience of having their vehicle at work.

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Your daily bike ride would become more treacherous with all the additional cars around, because very few people are going to give up the freedom and convenience of having their vehicle at work.

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Clearly you live a simple life with few responsibilities.

Maybe one day you'll understand what I'm talking about. Not today, certainly, but maybe one day.

Without a doubt the BEST subject title I have ever seen on this board. You stated the problem and then the other problem in succint fashion with humor.

Very well done OP. No BS... Awesome subject title.