Highway Weirdness, or, Kansas City questions

What’s up with 71 stopping at Linwood and shunting over to Prospect? Did they run out of funding because of all that extravagant metal and concrete work? Are they ever going to finish it? If 71 is an interstate, why does it have traffic lights?

What onramp used to be on 70 West at 23rd street? It’s very obvious one USED to be there, but isn’t anymore, because of the shape of the road and contour of the earth beside the highway. What happened?

–Tim

I think the answer is that drunken cowboys designed Kansas City. :wink:

I have seen many strange highway and street configurations on my travels. Usually, I have NO clue why things are designed the way they are. I always assume it’s because they ran out of money.

Prospect? C’mon Homer, look at all of KCMO! You get across state line and there are metal plates covering the potholes instead of just up and fixing them. They save money by building lanes way way way too narrow for comfort. I don’t know where the money goes for highways but it sure as heck isn’t going into the highways.

Then on the KS side you’ve got contruction going on for no reason whatsoever. Nall ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And Shawnee Mission Parkway has been under construction for two friggin’ years!

I think the answer lies in the State’s Secretary of Transportation. I’m such a lousy citizen, I don’t even know if that’s a real position. But if it is, I say write the guy a letter. I’ll help.

Homer, I feel your pain. We have an Elgin O’Hare expressway that goes neither to Elgin, nor to O’Hare.

Do what I did. Move to Indiana. I just got tired of fighting traffic on Ward Parkway (is it possible to have negative space between lanes?) and buying new brakes every 18 months.

I used to run a website here in town called “Johnson County Exposed!” It is being expanded and revamped to include all of Kansas City.

Most of the mail I revived was along similar content; gross mishandling of funds, poor workmanship or roads and bridges, the list goes on.

I remember a story I broke about Kansas Highways. The state was paying time-and-a-half for laborers to fuse RPM’s (Raised Pavement Markers) on the I-35 lane markers. They had the highway down to one lane for four days and four nights while they did this. The following week the RPM’s were disintegrating due to - what else? traffic! Talk about highway litter - and they didn’t clean anything up.

I later contact 3M, the leading manufacturer of such things and I was told the state had used the wrong kind. Untold millions was wasted right there.

As for the Antioch bridge mishap? Don’t even get me started!

Like a poster mentioned earlier, this city’s street and highway layout must have been performed by drunks or performing circus monkeys. Maybe even seals but I digress.

To answer one of the OP’s questions: the Route 71 in Kansas City is NOT an interstate highway. It is U.S. Route 71, which runs from Louisiana to Minnesota. (There is an I-71, but it is in Ohio and Kentucky.) Even though parts of US 71 might be limited-access (with exit ramps), and it goes through more than one state, it isn’t an Interstate Highway. If you follow 71 North past St. Joseph, you will find it drops down to one lane in each direction. Note that the markers for 71 are white shields with black digits; Interstate highways (example: I-70) are red and blue shields with white text.