KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Feb 01, 2022 2:16 pm
Loving these ideas. Also helps remind everybody how and why we are here with this new bridge especially the next two tier goals .critical for maximum success. Might help grid understand the project a bit more.
https://www.beyondtheloopkc.com/enhancements
Did this study or whatever this is not come after the main plans for the bridge were done and construction was already started? If this were the plan from the start, I probably would not have been so aggressively against it. However, it's people like me that probably got people really thinking about what could be done with the old bridge.
Some things still don't make sense though. Route 9 barely carries any any traffic, so I don't see how the new bridge is going to really change anything there. If the city wanted to make Route 9 an at grade, it could regardless of what happened with Broadway. Also, the fact that Modot and Kdot just rebuilt the Lewis and Clark Viaduct back to its original state makes no sense.
I still don't love the idea of another high speed freeway and ramps. You are going to take so much traffic off the I-29/I-35 bridge (especially trucks) with this new configuration and clog up the west side of the loop. I just think the city should have done the exact opposite and discouraged through traffic from using the Broadway Bridge. 169 should just turn into Broadway with no direct access to the interstate system. Route 9 can be at grade and the north loop can be downgraded or removed. The west loop would simply be access to the Fairfax district of KCK or removed as well since it's also redundant to 670 which is way under capacity.
None of this matters. The new bridge is happening now and I think people are finally thinking beyond KC's typical 1950's highway design culture. Repurpose the old bridge. That's all I'm hoping for now. Removing the north loop could have happened regardless of making 169 an interstate alternative. Hopefully it still happens.
More and more cities are getting the funding to do it:
https://www.curbed.com/2022/01/hochul-s ... -i-81.html
Hopefully KC's happens soon.