Will someone explain to me, PLEASE, why every single route AND every alternate route to a destination in Nashville HAS TO BE under construction 100% of the time, EVERY MINUTE of the day and night??? There is no way to avoid it. Every way that a human being could take to get somewhere only has more road construction. Everything is confusingly marked, making it look (if possible) even worse than it is. TDOT IS EVIL. One day I will SNAP!!! I will FINALLY reach an infinite number of road construction projects while trying to get somewhere one day, and I WILL SNAP.
My theory is that they want to use their entire annual budget up as quickly as possible, so they get more money for the next year, and on and on. But yes, it is annoying when everything is under construction at the same time.
Were you not aware that the state symbol of Tennessee is the orange traffic barrel?
It’s like that almost everywhere in the state!
When we don’t improve the roads, we get constant complaints.
And, when we do improve the roads, the public wants a half-million tons of concrete, asphault & gravel to appear overnight! So they won’t be inconvienced.
And we get complaints when every single flyspeck of a village isn’t slated to get an Interstate hookup.
And then, when we change the route of the Interstate, so it wiggles like a snake to reach those one-horse towns, we get complaints that the cost went up.
And no matter where we go, people scream at us for cutting down trees, or digging up burial sites that have been forgotten for more than 100 years. If it’s so darn “sacred”, why don’t ya visit, trim the grass, & plant a few flowers, instead of letting Live Oaks & Hemlocks grow there?
:mad: :smack: :mad: :smack:
Hey, one of the TDOT emergency van’s helped my wife with a flat tire the other day, so I’m ok with them right now. I just remind myself that it’s not as bad now as when I first moved to Nashville. During the I-24 widening near Antioch. That was pure hell.
But I-65 north does still suck.
This is all clearly the fault of Elvis.
No it isn’t.
We dug him up last Tuesday, to build an offramp.
Bosda: You really ought to embrace this “TDOT is evil” thing. It really enhances your street cred as an evil overlord. 
But I’m not an Overlord, here at TDOT.
I’ve met the Overlords, and they’re really evil!
Have you seen the size of my iddy-biddy paycheck? EVIL! I tell you! EVIL! 
Actually, you’re completely wrong about this. A couple of yers ago, when the state’s budget mess first started, someone noticed that TDOT was the only part of the state government to be running a surplus. This raised quite a few eyebrows, including those of the Feds, since if TDOT wasn’t spending money like it was supposed to, it was inelligible for federal highway funds.
When you add in the fact that several members in the Sundquist administration are now in prison for how they awarded road construction contracts, TDOT begins to look a little bit more, well, vile. I’d also like to point out that the US built the Al-Can Highway, which is something like 1000 miles long, and runs from Alaska to Canada in a mere nine months, but TDOT can’t build highways at a rate faster than 1 mile a year, the festering sheep pimping bastards.
Oh, I’m sorry. Poor Dear. 
Anyway, I don’t really sympathize that much, having been on the bad end. But it’s not just you, love, it’s all the construction in Tennessee. Even been over UT way laterly? Look at that nice new strip of road next to the library. Big pedestrian walkway and some new footpaths. Despite the fact that it doesn’t need to carry cars, and the place was already graded, and there was no huge earth-moving required…
Yeah, it took over a year and a half. For less than a quarter-mile of pavement. Go fig.
Seriously, though, I’m still PO’d about the I-40 project. Frankly, I don’t think it’s going to help matters. Of course, they’re not screwing up the whole highway like four years ago. Actually, I designed, theoretically, a device to take care of the whole process of road-building in one stretch because of that PITA.
From what I recall, this huge traffic project started about when I hit high school and had to start driving in it (on the north end of 65, anyway). I hate it but I just remind myself how someday it will be nice, smooth sailing from Gallatin to Columbia.
And smiling bandit, I didn’t think they’d actually finish the pedestrian walkway before I graduated, but it turns out I got to enjoy it for at least one year. I especially like the markers commemorating all the university’s presidents. And how we’ve had like 4 in the past 6 years. Woo.
By the way, is it true that I-40 is so bad through Knoxville now that traffic is being diverted to Kingston Pike (which is already clogged with its own construction project)? I’ve heard some horror stories and it could only get worse once school starts.
That is what annoys me. Like when I -40w into Nashville was closed and they said to take Briley ( I refer to Briley as “The Gauntlet”), but Briley is down to 3/4 of a lane in each direction? Maybe they should do ONE thing at a time.
Heh, I live near Detroit. We’re tearing up every piece of freeway we’ve got trying to magically grow enough road to accomodate next year’s Superbowl traffic.
And I don’t even like football, grr.
We’ve got our own folksy traditions regarding road maintenence. Historical home of the automakers, so we can’t have anything like public transit, that’d make less people buy cars! Oh, and don’t fix potholes, because they break cars, and when cars break, people buy more! Same with salting the ice instead of using, I dunno, sand from all our lakes maybe? Salt eats cars, people buy more! More cars is good!
:smack: It’s vicious, man.
Yeah, Briley is just brutal. I’m really surprised there are not a lot more accidents on it between Opry Mills and I-40. That’s a really nasty stretch, especially with heavy rain.
Ah yes, I remember taking Briley daily to get to work. I’m glad I got rid of that job.
True dat. It is pretty.
Odd thing: I watched them put it up for a long time. I noticed that they always had the following. One construction guy would be out kind of half-heartedly pushing a few stray lumps with the bulldozer. And two other would be sort of standing around rinking coffee watching him and chatting. No wonder it took so long. :smack: They could have been done in a month.
No. They’ve done some *very * weird things with the Papermill exist, but it flows mostly alright. I still don’t want to be on it from 4:30 to 6:30, but it’s not as bad as it was four years ago.
If you like any geeky things, gimme a mail when you come back. I graduated but live in town.
Does that even make any sense? Shouldn’t the traffic for the Super Bowl be about the same as the traffic for any other sold-out game at the same stadium? Am I missing something?
When’d you graduate, bandit?
Umm, I really wish there was a local with a passing sports ticket sale knowledge about, maybe Shirley, Portia or Diceman will stumble in.
I’ve been hearing news types say the increase is because of the expected SB traffic. This makes sense to me, a non-football knowing person, because it makes sense that The Big Game would have more attendance than even the average sell-out game, all the halftime stuff and sportswriters and all the crews, etc. There’s an expectation that with the SB comes tourism and stuff.
And the Lions haven’t sold out a game in…my memory anyway.