West Main Parking

 When West Main was made one way through the Arbor District, one of the selling points was that along with West Walnut, on street parking would be provided along one side of the street.  The section of West Walnut between Springer and Poplar does have on sreet parking on the north side of the street, however this never was put into place on the parallel section of West Main. At this late date, it would take some significant contruction to put that in place but it could help slow traffic down through that area.

Stop Lights

 I know I have complained about this before but I really with the city would synchronize the red lights on Illinois and University better. It really wastes gas for the light to change, you drive two blocks, stop again, wait, the light changes and you drive another 3 blocks before having to stop again. All of those cars idling wastes a significant amount of gas.

Eclipse Traffic

 Caught on the news last week that there was so much traffic in southern Illinois for the eclipse that traffic monitors did not show traffic in Illinois getting back to normal until around 8 p.m. that night. That's a whole lot of people exiting the area.

Two-way Streets

 A pair of Springfield streets are shifting from 1 way to two way traffic next month. I do not see that as happening on Walnut and Main and Illinois and University but I would like to see something to slow traffic down more in the Arbor District area of Walnut and Main. Speed limit is 30 mph going through there but cars regularly travel at 40-50 miles. Maybe just putting one of the speed monitor signs up once a month might remind people to slow down. Additional stop signs or lights are not feasible, at least as far as I can tell but something reminding people they are speeding in a residential area would help

Entrances

 The city has spent time and effort to increase the attractiveness of the east side entrance to the city but has really ignored the other three points of the compass. of course, the amount of traffic coming in past Wal-mart is about 4 times that coming in from the other three sides. If I recall correctly, there are about 20,000 cars passing Wal-mart every day and only about 7000 heading to and from Murphysboro, with about the same coming in from the south and even fewer from the north side.

Streets

 Carbondale only received about an inch of snow so the streets are generally passable but for some reason, people wanted to congest the downtown area around the civic center. On Illinois and University in that area, drivers teneded to all line up in one lane, even though the other two lanes had almost no cars in them. Granted I can see not wanting to get into the left hand turn lane but ehy were  avoiding the center lane as well. Slowed down traffic a whole lot.

Stop Light timers

City would install sensors on stoplights on lights in downtown instead of relying on timers. It is quite frustrating to sit at a light, with no one else around, waiting for the light to turn. Surely there are lights with sensors on them that would change when there is no one else around.

Railroad crossing Repaired

Repairs at both railroad crossings on Walnut and Main Streets have been finished, more quickly than I expected. Traffic was still blocked on Main street about 1 p.m. but had reopened by the time I passed by again about 2:15.

Carbondale Traffic

Got to wondering what auto traffic was like on the main streets in Carbondale, so stopped by the Public Works office, where they were kind enough to pull up the IDOT traffic maps, since Carbondale doesn't track vehicular traffic on its own.

Highest traffic area in town is, not surprisingly, out by the intersection of Highway 13 and Reed Station Road, which sees (and all of these figures are averages) about 26,300 cars pass by per day. Traffic drops off significantly as you get to downtown, where the intersection of 13 and Illinois has about 19,200 cars a day heading west. Highway 51 traffic at that spot heading south is about 9100.

Traffic picks up somewhat as 13 reaches the west side of Carbondale with  about 22,700 cars exiting and entering the town at that point and between 15000 to 16000 cars a day travelling between the 2 cities.

Overpass

Drove over and back to Marion yesterday and found myself wondering just why IDOT is building an overpass over Hwy 13 east of Carterville, just before the River Radio and WSIL 3 TV stations. It's not as if that area is highly trafficked. If IDOT really wanted to make the area safer, how about an overpass or even a traffic light at the intersection just east of Carterville, where there have been a number of accidents over the year's.

Traffic

Traffic does not appear nearly as heavy as it  has during past fall semester starts. Usually I see 4-6 cars turning the wrong direction onto Illinois, Walnut, Main or University by this time of the month and so far none. Here's hoping that trend continues

Mill Street Traffic Light

Getting reports of problems with the light directing traffic from West Mill onto University. Apparently the light is staying red so long that cars running it. I recevied an email from one driverwho said he timed it Saturday night after seeing cars give up waiting for it to change and the light stayed red for over 10 minutes before he gave up waiting and pulled through.

I know there has been resurfacing on West Mill for the past few weeks and wonder if some adjustments were made to the timing of the lights there that has not been reset.

Economic Development and Highways

Caught the C'dale Chamber of Commerce's noon presentation on economic development in Jackson County.  A good chunk of it was a promotional spiel regarding upcoming events at SIUC's Small Business Development Center and development at the airport.  Betwix the two was an interesting presentation by the Jackson Growth Alliance on their efforts to push through a 4 lane highway from Carbondale to St. Louis that doesn't run through Marion.  The organizations proposed plan is to widen 127 to 4 lanes, bypass Pickneyville to the west and link up with the interstate at Nashville.  This is something that various organizations have promoted for the region since the mid 1960s.  The Pickneyville route is the least direct but also requires the least amount of construction, totaling only about 43 miles with a cost of around $140 million.

I am not an expert on this but I have talked to someone who is, as they worked for IDOT for a number of years, and they are of the opinion that this won't happen, at least not in the foreseeable future, for two reasons. 

Number one is the way in which highway districts in Illinois are laid out.  The border between District 9 (where we are) and District 8 (north and east of Pickneyville including the Metro East area) runs right through Pickneyville, which means both districts would have to contribute funds and approval to the project.  While District 9 probably could find the money to put into the highway, any additional funds District 8 comes up with would get funneled into infrastructure improvements in the East St. Louis/Metro East area.as population density and road usage is much greater there than anywhere in District 9.

Number two is traffic flow.  If you look at the statewide traffic flow map, there are about 30,000 cars that enter or exit Carbondale daily from the east.  13,000 enter or exit from the west side and the figure drops to 11,400 on the est side of Murphysboro.  The north side of Murphysboro handles about 7200 cars per day and it drops to 5500 by the time you get to Nashville.  There is just not enough traffic in that area to justify an expenditure of $144 million in the hope that "if you build it, they will come."