What happens to traffic when you tear down a freeway? 

If you all want some more transpo content, this is a favorite -- ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ado6uLHvo9U.html "How an old traffic rule keeps raising city speed limits"

You can feel in this guy's eyes his deep hate for freeways

If you want to see how a North American city does long-term without a freeway, just look north to Vancouver, BC. Almost no freeways within its city limits, and driving into downtown is seen as a last resort. Walkability is high and bike commutes are through the roof.

In terms of efficiency and safety: rail>road.

This data underlines what the authors of Suburban Nation show, that increasing traffic lanes has zero impact on congestion after 3 months. Every city planning department in North America has access to this data, which is irrefutable. Yet most of them ignore it and sink gazillions of taxpayer dollars into highways. Thankfully, a few cities are starting to wake up. Jane Jacobs would say, It's about damn time.

Many cities all over the world function just fine without downtown highways.

this video: *gets released literally every european: pathetic

highway in the middle of a city is the dumbest idea, highways should conect cities not go thru them, u want to get cars going, make a bulevard... highways shoud conect to ringroad around the city and continue to next city

I don't understand America's fascination with motorways, I mean lots of cities don't have them running through the city. In London for example it instead wraps around the whole city, if you want to go into it you just travel on normal streets

Freeways going through cities can cause issues like noise, pollution, less desirably for walking, and disconnection between communities. I think freeways should only serve as long distance connectors, not cutting through communities. Fun fact: the City of Vancouver have only a few km of freeway, and the city is increasing the number of transit and biking options.

Try driving in Houston. We got like 5-7 lanes and we still have to deal with traffic.

My home town did a similar thing, they cut the number of lanes on two major thouroughfares down from 2 either way to just 1. In doing so they were able to over size the bicycle lanes and add a dedicated buslane to parts that were known for terrible congestion. At first people protested it, saying it'd kill traffic into and out of the inner city. But after a few weeks it turned out that a whole lot of lorries and other heavy traffic was now taking a detour, switching from the A325 to the A15 about 10km north of town, and bypassing the city entirely, using the new bridges in the A50 to get to the A73. What the city did, pissed off the province because they thought they had solved the traffic jams on the A50. Which are now back, as more traffic is directed that way. But it massively cut the traffic that was just cutting through our city from North to South. The air is noticably cleaner, it's become easier, faster and safer to get into the inner city by bike or moped. And for us residents, now that the traffic that didn't need to be here, doesn't come here anymore. It's actually become ever so slightly faster to drive into town.

I’m not going to miss the viaduct at all. WAAAY too many drivers would speed through the area coming off the highway into the city streets regardless of speed limits. Saw my fair share of cars almost taking out pedestrians or accidents from them swerving into parked cars.

Highways in cities are just a terrible thing. They don’t reduce congestion, they’re bad for the environment and they are a factor they why American cities sprawl out so much

I was disappointed there was no mention of the I-40 revolt in Memphis which prevented the city's historic Overton Park from being paved over AND remains, to this day, one of the few remaining "unfinished links" in the Interstate Highway System.

Atlanta, GA I-85 bridge fire is a counterexample to this. Removing freeways only works if there is alternate infrastructure in place such as citywide mass transit.

A different zoning would also help. In the US almost no new middle density is being build, because it is not zoned for. Middle density housing would make public transport more viable, and medium density neighborhoods are nice to live in. They are walkable and cycable, you have amenities close by, and you can still have your own garden.

I remember living in LA during "Carmaggeddon" the 405 for a few days. It was honestly the easiest time I had driving in years. But as soon as the 405 re-opened: gridlock on the streets. All the cars that wanted to get on the 405 bottlenecked at all the freeway entrances.

Highway 401 in toronto is the epitome of this

Just found stumbled across your channel, after a bit of a binge you have your self a new sub excellent content really enjoying it

If an urban highway were shut down I think people would choose to avoid the downtown area due to traffic. People that are forced to go to or through downtown, due to work, have no choice but to use public transit or other means. It just forces people to adjust. IMO I'd rather see the transition into building public transportation infrastructure like better additional subway/train systems to the point that people would voluntarily choose these other forms of transit. Instead, I fear opportunists like land developers will take advantage still leaving transit congestion an issue.

In Portland, all this needs to happen: (Saying all this as a suburbanite in the outskirts of the Portland metro.) *Removal of Central City Freeways and (New) Ring-Road Freeway Completion:* - Both 405 and I-5 should be torn down and replaced with boulevards, and instead build a westside bypass freeway to complete the ring loop around the outskirts of the city with 205. (Like most European cities have with their ring freeways, while having no freeways at all through the heart of the city.) - Route I-5 through one of the ring halves (probably the westside bypass as it would likely be built further from the current urban area than 205 is. Then continue to use the urban growth boundary to restrict new suburban development and sprawl along the new westside bypass, ensuring that it doesn't accelerate suburban sprawl. *Massive Expansion of Light Rail and Street Car Networks:* - Dedicated lanes in major roadways, or mixed lanes in narrower roadways. - Lightrail lines expanded to every corner of the suburban area, followed by building a web of interconnecting lines to facilitate travel routes that don't need to get to the city center. - Streetcar lines built outside of city center, expanding radially from major lightrail destinations. Then reduce number of stops along lightrail lines to speed up the main lines, and use streetcar networks to expand the reach of lightrail stops. - Expansion of system into Vancouver, WA, and merge the two systems under one bi-state organization/branding. *Expansion/Inclusion of heavier Passenger Rail or Commuter Rail* - Build lines to connect up to nearby cities: Salem, Kelso-Longview, Newberg, McMinnville, Canby, Scappoose, and St Helens. - North-South line through the city, starting with nationalizing the railroad networks like basically every other developed nation with a great rail network. *Improvement and Expansion of Bike Network* - Implement a standard of building fully separated, and when not, paint-differentiated bike-lanes across the metro region. More people will bike if it feels safer, and for just one car lane, you can fit a ton of bicycle commuters; far more than one lane for cars. Not everyone needs to drive far for work either. Bike routes along roads should feel safe enough for your kids to bike on, like in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands. -Portland already has a decent system of bike paths/"bike highways" too. The missing link is making bike routes along roadways feel safe enough that the general population feels comfortable enough to make the switch. -With more people taking the more space efficient modes (biking and public transport), traffic will not be worse for drivers who actually still need (or want) to continue driving to work. *Implement More Traffic Calming* - In particular, sidewalks should not dip down to the street surface when crossing a minor street or road. Instead, cars should drive up over the sidewalk via a ramp, then down again to continue along the street. Make cars feel like they are invading the pedestrian space, basically. Raised surface prevents drivers from speeding across crosswalks, and psychologically makes drivers pay more attention when crossing a pedestrian crossing. Just like the Dutch do. We Americans should be learning from Europeans in all this.

Stroads need to be removed too, change in building code allowing commercial building rights almost anywhere within residential area, also called development. Allowing people to shop closer, work closer and walk/drive shorter distances to places they want to go.

"the traffic impacts were pretty minimal" that's why the entire embaracadero is at a dead stop all day every day

Forgot to note that many employers allowed their employees to stay home during this.

where I live we had a major highway into the city close off one direction for construction, and this direction would change twice in a day, except weekends. it threw a lot of traffic onto side roads and caused some issues, especially in heavier traffic

really looking forward to this channel growing

How are you going to make this video without addressing Boston and the nightmare that was The Big Dig?

A republican governor advocating for green open space? Wow!

America is too dependent on cars and the infrastructure is planned badly because people need a car to go shopping etc. Here in the Netherlands we can do almost everything on bicycles or on foot. City centers are becoming car free or low on cars.

Harbor drive in Portland is a bad example because as it was torn down it was replaced with two freeways (405 and I-5) that both run through the heart of the city (one inner east of the river and one inner west). If anything he just said tearing down a freeway works great if you build two more to replace it

There was also a freeway removal near Downtown Boston which is I-93. It was destructed in the '90s and when the 2000s came, they started the most expensive tunnel project of the nation which is the Big Dig.

A good way to complement this would be to add big subsidized parking lots at the end of metro lines so that people can ditch their cars and take the transit into town... I was recently in Luxembourg where they did this as well. Evidently, that's a different country with much deeper pockets, but nonetheless interesting. It was especially useful for people who lived in rural regions where there was no bus service.

traffic in SF didn’t just disappear after the freeway was removed. It now backs up and filters through the city on other streets to get to the bridge.

That's like the same principle where like if Disney saw their parks were overcrowding, they open another park/gate, to help absorb some of the load, but really it would just bring MORE people to the parks.

The Embarcadero viaduct is a bad example. Because it was never completed it only ran for 1.3 miles before it dumped it's traffic on surface streets. All its removal did was dump the traffic at the foot of the Bay Bridge a mile earlier. The traffic did not return to the new Embarcadero because it is very difficult to get to to it from the Bay Bridge and the surface street traffic in the Rincon Hill and South of Market neighborhoods is horrible. The Embarcadero viaduct was an eyesore, no doubt about that. It was also structurally unsound so it had to go. It also served little purpose as the intended connection to the Golden Gate Bridge was never built. The Cypress Viaduct was removed for the same reasons the Embarcadero viaduct was removed. However, it was replaced with I880 because the lose of that connector would have had a hugely negative impact on traffic.

Simply widening highways may not eliminate traffic but eliminating highways doesn't eliminate traffic either. Cities should design their infrastructure to be as efficient and effective as possible

3:20 Fun fact if you pause here. SF actually had originally planned to cover the city with freeways. That dead end you can see here was supposed to be where the Golden Gate freeway would be. It would have connected to the GG bridge and would have cut off the waterfront from the Marina district. I guess back in the 50s they were super hopeful that they could still build the connection so they made that little nub just in case. Wishful thinking lol

My city which is less than 500,000 people is expanding an interstate downtown. A small section of park which is popularly used for sledding when it snows was turned into a road. To my knowledge the city voted no on the bill allowing an increase in sales tax to fund the construction that could damage downtown like many interstates have in the city.

The only reason the old port in Montreal didn't get bulldozed in the '60s for a freeway was because an official lied that building one would make it impossible to transport goods to the island.

Earthquakes I would say that gets rid of freeways rather quickly the mess you got to clean up that takes years

I live in shoreline and I don’t go downtown unless it’s 100% necessary.

I would love to see how the closure of the interstate temporarily in Atlanta increased ridership to the point that the trains were full the whole time.

Did it actually take 3 weeks? To finish after they closed it? In my city its no an interest its a small highway but they were doing some upgrades and repairs they said it would take 2 weeks thats was 5 months ago

Hint: there aren't any downtown freeways in European cities and we haven't died yet.

So what you're saying is that the widening of the 405 along the Sepulveda Pass in LA only made traffic worse?

Maybe Atlanta should get rid of the I75/I85 connector and I20. They bisect the city in half.

I wish SF would have built a tunnel. They got rid of the freeway and that’s it. I always wondered why there was no 101 freeway from south SF to the golden gate and was so surprised to see there used to be one in the making. Yeah it’s an eye sore but I’d rather have a freeway than none. I wish they made a tunnel to replace it.

Removing a freeway in Southern California wouldn't work. We don't have the mass transit infrastructure and people aren't riding their bikes 30 miles to work.

I live in Seattle and respect this guys opinion and knowledge on the topic, but the tunnel has many flaws. It is more prone to traffic jams, is 2 lanes as opposed to 4, and has no exit DOWNTOWN. Also, the whole process is corrupt with HEAVY influence from waterfront properties. and don't forget, biking in Seattle is only viable during the summer as it rains the rest of the year, and those hills are no joke! RIP the viaduct, she was a tourist attraction and I will always remember late night drives with the city on my right and the sound on my left.

As a civil engineer i endorse the message in this video. Think hard before building roads, citizens.

this video proved that if anything re-locating highways is more benificial.

They should do this in my city, too. I really don't like our urban freeway.

Umm, Portland was only able to remove Harbor Drive because they built I-5 directly across the river. And saying you can just make traffic disappear by tearing down freeways is like throwing the dog crap in your yard over the neighbor’s fence.

Excellent video!!

Great Vid, Awesome Channel. Liked and Subbed!

One can also make open tunnels for the highway, that will remove it from the view and help the city to move across the highway without restrictions.

At the end it is suggested that overall trips went down in Seattle. I would not say that this is a positive outcome actually. Also, the rise in house prices in San Francisco is not necessarily caused by the removal of the freeway. There might be other factors as well.

Margaret T Hance park built over a portion of I10 in downtown Phoenix has led to significant development and an increase in property values surrounding it. I hope the city considers covering more of the freeway to improve the quality of life for surrounding residents.

fantastic video!!

Come to Johannesburg South Africa, the M2 Highway connecting the city with the eastern suburbs has been closed since November last year for repairs and upgrading... Traffic has to go through the city and it's a mess.

It’s done and everything is ok here Seattle, I don’t see an issue.

Highways are a good investment when it wraps around a city, however not when it plows right through.

You'd THIMK that the obvious example right in Seattle face would be Vancouver, BC, another tech hub. The city shares the extra barriers that most US cities don't have: rivers with bridges that needed upgrading, a funnel of land out into the valley, and hemmed in by the ocean on one side, the International border on the south, and mountains to the north. EVEN WITH all those extra issues, Vancouver moved forward. Seattle slept. Now with it's .com money it's trying to play catch up. Canadian architect Arthur Erickson made a speech in the early sixties that Canada DIDN'T WANT to follow the US "model" of freeway madness. And the need for four cars in a three person household.

All the freeways in every city should be torn down and destroyed, rerouted outside the city, or placed underground. Light rail, limited car traffic, bikes, and just plain walking are the better choice.

Demolish the freeway. Travel by train! its much more exciting and relaxing

In each example he failed to mention that the section of highway removed is accompanied by the construction of an equivalent new route.

"If left to their own devices traffic engineers will always build new jersey" Some guy, who gets quoted alot.

A freeway should never go into downtown, what should be encouraged more is public transport

I see alot of places in the bay area i played as CJ. GTA SA!

great video 👍😮

i been to seattle for the first time in sep 2019 from melbourne and never saw this ugly double decker freeway! Looks a lot nicer without the ugly thing

Imagine if Portland had another white, male, conservative Republican governor.

Mentioned that their where less trips and more people used bikes. How did this effect the local economy? Did more merchants see less costumers? did those costumers buy less because they had to bike it home?

I remember hearing that Detroit was thinking about taking out a freeway.

[Freeway comes down] This guy: : ᴰ

Take away the 101fwy, 170fwy, 110fwy, 405fwy, or the 10 in LA, and it’ll be absolutely chaos

It’s like the rest of the country doesn’t exist? Milwaukee did the same thing. But they left the self-righteous attitude for the West Coast.

I was in San Fran in 91 it was crazy my aunt almost drove off one of the on ramps to no where

Morgan Balogh at 4:40 lives next door to my oldest sister... small world here in the PNW and an even smaller world at WSDOT where I'm employed and will hopefully retire in less than a year :)

what happens when there's no freeway? well housing is gonna be more expensive (think SF or NYC), higher cost of deliver -> higher groceries, food, necessities cost, loss of middle class due to loss of jobs that require more than a 100sf office (anything else but desk work), unreliable utilities (imagine how long it takes to fix power line if it is underground and has to be dug up to get to it), longer recovery time when disaster strikes.. etc. yall live in a realist world with no expectation of realities or other people lives.

Well depends on the city’ location. Cities in the gulf coast like Houston that are prone to get hit by hurricanes need freeways for evacuation

I was in Seattle when the freeway was coming down and we could walk home faster than driving home. We walked from Pike place all the way to the 5 and got an Uber there lol. Worth it

Yes. Great video. More topics like this. Glad I subscribed.

Would love to see the Cross Bronx Expressway removed. Too bad you can't bring back the neighborhoods that were destroyed in its construction.

It depends also the only one that was a true removal was San Francisco: Portland still has I5 on the other side of the removed freeway so that's why north south traffic wasn't impacted much Seattle as you said replaced the viaduct with a tunnel. San Franciscos freeway was useless, it didn't really go anywhere besides down town and it didn't nicely connect with the interstate system thus removing it wasn't a big deal. However some highways greenies want to remove like I5 in Portland and I70 in Denver will cause MASSIVE disruption if they are removed since they are major arteries not only for the city but for the entire nation.

Tearing down a highway can solve, in some cases, a lot of traffic problems in a city.

Haven't been back across to that side of the mountains since I moved back..... I'm sure a whole lot (besides the Viaduct) will look a lot different to me! 15 years since I crossed the Cascades, 25 years since I lived in Seattle itself......

Y'all hate highways but y'all use them everyday -___-

I was in Seattle during the 3-week closure, and it was the worst traffic I've ever experienced in any major city in my life (including LA, NY, SF, Miami, and more). It was absolutely impossible to drive anywhere. I'm not saying that removing freeways is a bad idea - I generally support it - but if there are no alternative options then it doesn't work. Seattle has terrible public transit, so until they expand it, they can't afford to close any more highways.

Harbour Drive was literally replaced by I-5, which was a brand new and more efficient highway through the city. They didn't actually remove any net freeway lanes. Funny enough, there was also a major freeway closure in Portland three years ago. It was similar to the example you used for the Alaskan Way Viaduct. Two weeks where everyone expected the worst congestion ever... Spoiler: it wasn't that bad. That is because a lot of people just took vacation time during then or companies let people work from home (including mine). That seems like a much better, more topical solution than tearing down freeways.

"Seattle is getting rid of the freeway bridge--" Yes! Go Seattle! Get rid of those freeways! "--to build a tunnel." Damn you, damn you Seattle!

They widened 45 south of Houston. At first it was a dream. But soon became just as congested as before. My wish is sky high fuel prices. Force people to stay home. With amazon and streaming services there is no need for all these people to be out driving around all the time. Where are they even going? Dropping their opioid script off to their local dealer for rent money is my best guess.

So easy for someone with no Civil engineer degree or experience to talk about urban design who only looks at pros not consider any cons.

I'm guessing folks who are ok with this are like "If it's not close enough to get to by train or bus or bike, just stay home."

5:30 I think the mayor meant "fixed" or "defined", and not "finite".

Closing freeways in downtowns MIGHT work if the city has excellent public transportation like Seattle or San Fran. Try that in a place like Atlanta or Nashville(which has virtually NO public transit) and it simply WILL NOT WORK.

North America could really learn a thing on two from cities like Copenhagen and Amsterdam. Focus on better bicycle infrastructure rather than more freeways and car lanes. /European city planner

San Francisco also tore down the feeder ramps to the Central Freeway in the Mission district. The resulting parkway probably tripled the property values which had been severely held back by the double decker concrete monstrosity. I predicted carmageddon and it never really happened. The level of traffic suck is still up around a 9.

This is really true I drive in Westchester NY and I see it with the taconic vs the sawmill all the time you would think since the taconic and 684 have 4 lanes and the sawmill has two only you think there would be more traffic on the sawmill and would be slower but it's not the case at all i drive from Yonkers to mahopac all the time and it's always faster of I take the sawmill till it ends that. A back road than if I take 684 or the taconic