Of Freeway Walls and Windy Man

I-610 Southbound Feeder at Bissonnet St. in Bellaire

As with most cities, Houston's freeways always seem to be under construction. However, since I moved away from there in 1992, there seems to be an new concern about aesthetics. All the new freeways are being built with attention to how they look and fit in with the surrounding neighborhoods.

Let's start out with the photo above. I took this while sitting at the stop light on the southbound feeder of the West Loop (I-610) at the intersection with Bissonnet Street, which crosses from left to right. In this photo, you can see the brick retainer walls used at the interchange. This is not an inexpensive proposition at all.

In actuality, this photo is not technically in Houston, but rather in the city of Bellaire, a small town completely within the Houston city limits. This is a town that in recent years has undergone gentrification in a big way, as small homes built in the 1940s & 50s are torn down and replaced by huge custom homes. This same phenomenon is occurring near Denver University's campus as well. While the transition is taking place, many older homes are sold for very high prices just for the purpose of tearing them down. One of the reasons Bellaire is so desirable is its proximity to the Texas Medical Center. I don't know if the interchange is partly paid for by Bellaire taxes or not, but it is known for its extremely high tax rates, along with its tree lined boulevards.

This photo gives you a peek at another phenomenon of Texas' freeways; the Texas Turnaround. Since the feeder streets are one way, traffic engineers have implemented U-Turn lanes under or over a freeway just before the cross street intersection happens. This allows motorists to get to the opposite side feeder going back the other way without waiting through the lights at the cross street and feeders. I can tell you from first hand experience, this is a simple, but major improvement.

Another new freeway wall design of note in Houston is the reconstruction of the Katy Freeway (I-10 on the west side of town). I did not take the following photo and don't remember where I got it, so if the owner objects, I will remove it. I actually hope to get a shot of my own when I get back down there. In any case this is the new freeway design on the Katy. Different intersections have the big star in different colors. Very striking, and maybe a bit overwhelming.


Katy Freeway retainer wall

The city of Sugar Land southwest of Houston has its own new freeway design as well. The Southwest Freeway (US 59) now has California-style HOV lanes with solid stripes in the middle, rather than full-blown, separated HOV lanes. The new design includes tall pillars topped with the city symbol, a crown within a Texas star. The crown alludes to the Imperial Sugar Company, the business that started Sugar Land and gave the town its name. In the photo below, you can see a Jeep Grand Cherokee coming out of the Texas Turnaround to head back northeast on the Freeway feeder street.



Freeway walls have not been without controversy in another part of Texas. Lubbock, home to Buddy Holly, Mac Davis, and other music notables, has a state highway loop, Texas 289 (Martha Sharp Freeway), that circles the city. I was there in June of 2004 and saw some of the construction for myself. One thing I saw there caused a tremendous controversy by some fundamentalist Christian wackos. Unfortunately, I didn't shoot a photo of it myself, but here is the official picture from the TxDOT web site:


Lubbock's "Graven Image", the pagan Windy Man

The issue was that TxDOT had carved images in the walls, one of which was known as the Windy Man. He was basically a depiction of the head of old man Winter, blowing air. Well, the fundies decided this was a pagan abomination to the Lord God, creator of heaven, earth, and Waffle Houses; what with it being a graven image of a pagan deity or some such thing.

Now you have to understand that Lubbock has the well deserved reputation of being the most conservative city in America, so apparently that includes religious conservatism. So after the image was continually being defaced and vandalized, no doubt by good Christian folks, TxDOT decided to remove them. This cost the taxpayers of Texas more than the cost of installing them during freeway construction.

Of Highways, Tolls, and Another Sign Goof

Denver, Colorado skyline from I-25 southbound - Click for larger view

Denver is the largest city for many miles around. Go east on I-70, and you have to get to Kansas City, Missouri before you encounter a city of any size. Go south on I-25, and its over 400 miles to Albuquerque, New Mexico. West, not much at all. Go to the end of I-70 and the take I-15 north to Salt Lake City, Utah or south to Las Vegas, Nevada. Head north, well, no cities of any significance. Cheyenne is 100 miles north, but it is not very large. Beyond that lies the Great White North.

So the Mile High City stands alone as the major metropolis of the Rocky Mountain West. Even so, it is not an enormous city. It does have an impressive skyline, and its freeways have undergone some badly needed renovations lately, most notably the Transportation Expansion Project, or TREX along I-25 south of town. TREX not only widened the freeway, but ran light rail service along the side of the highway.

From downtown north, I-25 lacks light rail, but instead has High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes. These lanes were formerly only for vehicles with 2 or more occupants. This resulted in the case where a man was caught with a blow up doll in the passenger seat, and auctioned it off on eBay for charity, as part of his punishment. Now the powers that be have figured out a different plan. Instead of prohibiting cars with only a driver, one may now buy their way into the HOV lanes. You can't pay with cash, but if you have a toll transponder(Express Toll), you can zip on into the HOV lanes and be on your way, no worries about a ticket. The Westpark Tollway in Houston uses a similar system; one must have a transponder (EZ-Tag). The difference is that even carpoolers have to pay on Westpark.


HOV Toll Signage in Downtown Denver

In my last post, I showed a sign goof on I-45 in Houston. Here is one on I-25 in Denver. I saw a similar sign on R-Dub's website, and as I zipped along today I saw this one near Invesco Field at Mile High, home of the Denver Broncos NFL football team:


Interstate "I-25"

What the heck is Interstate I-25. It should be just the numerals 25 in the shield. Hawaii has H prefixes, and I-35 has 35E and 35W in Dallas/Ft. Worth and in Minneapolis/St. Paul. But there is no such thing as Interstate I-25. Actually, I don't think CDOT put this one up. I think it was the Department of Redundancy Department.

A few posts down, I wrote about ghost ramps on the highway. There was one on the ramp from eastbound US 36 to southbound I-25. This is the opposing ramp, I-25 NB to US 36 WB. This is notable for a couple of reasons. First, the little green sign is a bit unusual. I have not seen signs like this in many places, showing the two highways and directions the ramp you are on connects. But also, look in the background. That is the main freeway where US 36 feeds into Interstate 270. There is a mast for a bank of big green signs, but no signs are mounted on it. I imagine that eventually, CDOT will get around to putting something up there. But for now, it stands, a naked mast with no signs.

As for the sign in the foreground, something appeals to me visually about the post. It is side mounted on the barrier (see the 4 bolts holding it on?), and curves upward in symmetry to the arrow on the yellow sign. I guess art and aesthetics are where ever you find them.

Signs, Signs, Everywhere a Sign

BGSs (Big Green Signs) on the Gulf Freeway (Click photo for full size)

My upcoming road trip to Houston is still a little ways off, but since I am in a road trip mood, let's take a look at some of the photos I took last October during a visit there (yeah, I got there by air and rented a car). Here are a couple of sign banks on the Gulf Freeway (I-45) getting near Hobby Airport. There are a couple of things to note in this photo. First, there is a sign goof. Do you see it? The Interstate Highway shield for I-45 is not the right proportions. It is a wider version used for 3-digit Interstate loops and spurs. The 45 should have been on a narrower shield.

I snapped this while driving down the freeway and just pointed the camera in the general direction of the signs. The real reason I tried for this shot is in the signs in the background. I will extract and zoom in on that reason in the photo below.



Does it jump out at you like it does me? This sign features the new Clearview font that has been approved for highway signs. Clearview is supposedly easier to read while driving down the road than the older font seen in most of the signs in the first photo. Texas is starting to deploy Clearview signs, but it and Pennsylvania are making the move in the U.S. at this point. Colorado has not adopted the new typeface. After years of seeing the older font on road signs, Clearview jumps out at you just because it is different. I guess time will tell if it really is easier to read.

Below you can see a fairly new section of the Southwest Freeway, US 59 and future I-69, in Sugar Land. Even though this is a new stretch of freeway, the old Highway Gothic font is in use.


BGS in Sugar Land, Texas

This photo also shows a couple of things that you don't see here in Colorado. First, the frontage road, or as Houstonians call them, feeders, are rare outside of Texas. Almost every freeway in the state has them, and they are quite useful for access on and off. Also notice the lanes on the feeder are marked by "Botts' Dots", named after their inventor, a California highway engineer. They are raised dots glued onto the road surface to mark the lanes. They are more durable than paint, and also give you audio and tactile feedback when crossing lanes. The obvious reason you don't find them in Colorado is that we have snowplows here. During the winter, the plows would just pop them right off the road, leaving it unmarked. Botts' Dots are common in Houston and Southern California.

For more on Clearview see the following web sites:

US Department of Transportation
Samples of Clearview and Highway Gothic

Oh Estelline, Why Can'tcha Be True

Estelline, Texas - all six blocks of it

In a few weeks, I will be making at trip that I have long wanted to take. I will be hitting the road from Denver to Houston. My past visits to Texas' largest city from Colorado have been via the fine jet aircraft of Frontier, United, and (since their re-entry to Denver) Southwest Airlines. Flying is great, you get there quick, but you miss the sights of things along the way. You also must put up with the near full body cavity search at the airport. Of course, you also fly six miles high over all the local cops of every podunk town and speed trap.

This trip will take me through Texas' most notorious speed trap, the small and dwindling town of Estelline on US 287 located in the panhandle near the point where the southwest corner of Oklahoma protrudes into the Lone Star State. Dubbed the worst speed trap in Texas by the Dallas Morning News, Estelline apparently has closely spaced speed limit changes with no warning, and an overly aggressive cop. I have heard horror stories of people getting ticketed even when going under the speed limit, being tailgated through town by the cop in his gray Mustang, and ticket payment deadlines set within one week from the alleged infraction.

Texas has a law that any town of under 5000 population must send the state any traffic fines they collect in excess of 30% of their town budget. The trouble is, there is no automatic enforcement, and it is only if they are audited that a town has to pay up. This town of less than 200 people seems to use motorists on the highway as their main source of town funding.

So the question becomes, do I go miles out of my way to avoid the place altogether? I certainly won't take the full Interstate route of going to Salina, Kansas on I-70, then turning south through Dallas. That is many more miles. I also could take a state highway and another US highway and add an estimated 20 miles to go around Estelline. However, I think the only reason I would to that is if I get a ticket there on the way down, and decide to bypass on the way back home.

The truth is that I rarely get over the speed limit, and if I do, it is because of momentary inattention. I would rather relax and not worry about it, but it sounds like you may get a ticket regardless from Estelline's version of Buford T. Justice.

Still, I have not been on this stretch of highway between Amarillo and Wichita Falls, so I am looking forward to it. So, to the podunk cop of podunk Estelline, Texas, just try to get me! As the President likes to say, "Bring it on!".

Oh, so you'll know me, I'll be the guy in the red BMW with Florida license plates. NOT!

Ghosts of Freeways Past

I will be the first to admit it. I am a "road geek", someone who is fascinated by roads, highways, freeways. All the ins and outs, trivia, history, and design of highways are something I can very easily get caught up in. As a kid, I drew maps of cities I invented in my mind. Today, I play Sim City 4 on the computer. And while most people would rather fly than drive, I still have enjoyment by getting in the car and heading out on the open road.

One thing I have come across in my road geekiness is the phenomena of stub ramps, or "ghost ramps". These are ramps on or off of a freeway that seemingly have no reason to be there. Sometimes they were built as part of a future expansion that never happened. Others are the remains of an interchange that no longer exists.

I got thinking about these again today, as I was driving through the interchange from eastbound US 36 (Boulder-Denver Turnpike) onto southbound I-25 (North Valley Highway) in Denver. Off to the right, I was surprised to see a very wide entrance ramp coming up to the interchange ramp, but it had no beginning. The merge of this ramp to the main one was blocked by barricades. It apparently was supposed to be a ramp from North Broadway onto I-25, but was never connected. Below is an arial photo of this ghost ramp:


Ghost ramp merging into ramp from US 36 to I-25

That got me thinking about another Denver area ghost ramp, this one on the north side of the town of Castle Rock. There used to be an interchange where Black Feather Trail now crosses the I-25 freeway, a route where motorists once exited from I-25 North to US 85 North toward Littleton; and southbound US 85 traffic merged onto southbound I-25. About three years ago, the interchange was removed and a new bridge built over the freeway at that spot. I-85 traffic now must take the next exit at Founders Parkway / Meadows Parkway. When the old interchange was torn down, the ghost of the southbound merge lane was left, a forgotten reminder of an interchange that is gone.


Ghost ramp from old US 85 South to I-25 South. Dirt trail of old road can still be seen.

But the title of Granddaddy of All Ghost Ramps has a contender in my hometown of Houston. That city has a very interesting layout of freeways. Before getting to the big ghost ramp there, a little visualization of the freeway system of the Bayou City is in order. Main routes radiate from downtown, with a series of loop freeways surrounding the city. Think of a spoked wheel and you will get the idea. The center hub is a little loop around downtown formed by I-45, US 59, and I-10. The next major loop is the Interstate 610 loop, circling the city's center about 6 miles out. Then another 6 miles out is the Sam Houston Tollway / Beltway 8. Further still is a partial, non-freeway loop on the north and west side formed by FM 1960 and Texas 6 (FM roads are a Texas anomaly, meaning "Farm to Market" Road). Now, another partial loop has been started as Texas 99, also known as the Grand Parkway, which currently is partially built from about Sugar Land to Katy.

So anyway, the 610 Loop crosses two freeways that don't go downtown. One is the Northwest Freeway (US 290), and the other being Texas 225, the La Porte Freeway. This is the freeway that parallels the Houston Ship Channel on the south side of it, and passes by the industrial and refining operations in Pasadena, Deer Park, and La Porte. The freeway heading toward Houston crosses 610 on the southeast side of town, but doesn't extend to downtown. Here's the kicker. . .a major stack interchange was built at 610 and 225, and that works to go out to Pasadena. But it also has huge ramps going toward Houston, even though the freeway comes to an end just a few hundred feet inside the 610 Loop! What happened?

Well, as it turns out, Texas 225 was supposed to eventually be built into downtown Houston as the Harrisburg Freeway. But opposition caused the project to be canceled in the 1970s. So we have ended up with a major interchange that leads to nothing. Below is an aerial shot of the interchange, with I-610 the vertical freeway, and Texas 225 the horizontal one. Clearly you can see the end of the freeway just to the west (left) of 610.



To read more about this waste of money and freeway anomaly, you can read the Houston Chronicle article about it from 1999 by CLICKING HERE.

A ground-level photo of the abrupt freeway ending is at the bottom of the page by clicking on this link to the Texas Freeway site.