# Thru streets in metro areas

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thru-streets-in-metro-areas/177219>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [May 24, 2003, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thru-streets-in-metro-areas/177219 "2003-05-24T12:59:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2003, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thru-streets-in-metro-areas/177219/1 "2003-05-24T12:59:43Z")

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This is something I was meaning to ask since thru streets were put in Manhattan (the city, not the mod). Do they work?

You can read up on it here:  
[http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/motorist/streetprog.html](http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/motorist/streetprog.html)

Basically the thru street program sets aside a series of streets in a city grid system as streets that you can’t turn off of till signs permit (you have to go straight trhough the interscetion if no sign allows turns).

Also Streets in Manhattan are the narrower roads running east to west the shorter length of the island while avenues are the broad roads running N to S which are usually given a priority.

When first implemented there were NO turns allowed once on a thru street till the end, but one could turn onto a thru street at any time. This seemed to me to be self defeting as if you actually wanted to start at one end and get to the other you have many avenues of cars, also wanting to cut across town, pileing onto your thru street. It seemed like that’s why it failed the 1st time and some other points where you could turn off of a thru street were allowed along the route (which is how it is currently).

According to the above link:

> [@](#):
>
> On March 5, 2003, Mayor Michael Bloomberg along with Commissioner Iris Weinshall of the Department of Transportation and Chief Mike Scagnelli of the New York City Police Department announced the success of the Thru Streets initiative. As a result of the program, the nine Thru Streets have seen a decrease in average vehicle travel times while the average vehicle volume per hour has increased.

**but:**

> [@](#):
>
> Regulations have also been changed on non-Thru Streets above 42nd Street.
> 
> “No Standing Except Trucks Loading and Unloading” regulations now govern both sides of almost every non-thru street in this area, creating up to 150 spaces for truck loading.
> 
> In addition, one side of each non-Thru street has been “daylighted” for 80 to 100 feet in advance of each intersection to provide space for turning vehicles.

**and**

> [@](#):
>
> In addition, DOT and NYPD are focusing their parking and construction enforcement efforts on these streets to ensure that lanes are available for crosstown traffic.

So has travel time actually decreased becasue of the thru streets or because the DOT and NYPD are creating/enforcing rules that ease the flow of traffic unrelated to the actual thru street program? In other words instead of the Thru Streets, if these streets were designited strict enforcement streets, with bands of cops and tow truck along it waiting to just keep the street open, would it have as good or better cross town travel time?