Category Archives: Patreon Locked

This $100M bridge is made with WOOD and is MOSTLY AIR inside!

Sign in with your Patreon account!This content is available exclusively to members of Road Guy Rob Patreon at $1 or higher tier at the time this content was posted, or having at least $1 pledged in total. Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to access this content.

Foolish to build FACTORIES underneath FREEWAYS? (It’s legal in California)

Sign in with your Patreon account!This content is available exclusively to members of Road Guy Rob Patreon at $1 or higher tier, or having at least $1 pledged in total. Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to access this content.

Los Angeles THREW AWAY all their RED-LIGHT cameras?

Sign in with your Patreon account!To view this content, you must be a member of Road Guy Rob Patreon at $1 or more Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to access this content.

Stop lights can… RUIN a street for bicyclists?

Sign in with your Patreon account!To view this content, you must be a member of Road Guy Rob Patreon at $1 or more Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to access this content.

Can this “HAWK” STOP LIGHT make walking feel SAFE again?

Sign in with your Patreon account!To view this content, you must be a member of Road Guy Rob Patreon at $1 or more Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to access this content.

Why freeway exits and chickens don’t mix!

So, you’re having this really nice walk across town when suddenly, there’s a freeway you have to cross. Seeing a large bridges with nice big sidewalks can be a relief. But what about those pesky interchanges where cars are entering and exiting the freeway? It gets a little bit scarier at newfangled designs which work […]

Would you drive on this flip-flopped freeway interchage?

America loves “diamond” highway exits. Which is too bad, because when life gets busy, they work pretty terribly. Gil Chlewicki, the “adoptive” father of the Diverging Diamond Interchange (DDI), explains why it’s time to untangle our freeway interchanges.

Rebuilding the road? Don’t forget about joggers and bicyclists!

Avid bicyclists roll their eyes as state engineers rebuild a highway through town. Tyranny of the car, right? Here’s a project in Utah which added a raised median that unlocked an avalanche of really cool safety improvements — including a traffic signal just for bikes!

Why does this street BLOCK off Arby’s (but not McDonald’s)?

Raised medians reduce left turns which prevents crashes (and saves lives). But cities only block left turns for some businesses and not others. How can the engineers decide fairly? And what do we do with drivers who still need to turn left? ——————————- Additional reading: ——————————- Federal Highway Administration. https://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/saferjourney1/library/countermeasures/16.htm. Accessed Jun. 9, 2021.

Does a turn lane really deserve its terrible nickname?

Traffic travels in both directions. So it makes sense we’d have a malicious moniker for two-way left turn lanes (TWLTLs). Are they actually dangerous, though? Let’s look at the safety of these middle lanes. After all, they are on roads pretty much everywhere in the United States. ————– Sources cited: ————– Mukherjee, D. Choosing Between […]

Radar can make green lights longer?

The light turns yellow and you find yourself in a panic. Should I slam on my brakes and risk getting rear-ended? Or should I run the yellow— and possibly in the process, the red too? Every stop light on the planet has one of these “A BAD PLACES.” Radar technology can act like a life […]

Are some yellow lights TOO SHORT? (Math to check it!)

Getting a red light ticket feels really crummy. When yellow lights (“change intervals”) are set long enough, red light runners vanish. For safety, why don’t we double or triple the length of yellow lights? Check out pt. 2: Our brains and yellow lights — https://youtu.be/P_EmAKRrlBc ——————————- Sources cited: ——————————- “Guidelines for Timing Yellow and All-Red […]

Wait, the train runs INSIDE your house?

If we let more people live ¼-mile from the train, everyone saves money.

America is not affordable because building lots are not affordable. And there is not nearly enough people who ride our billion-dollar light/commuter rail trains. Here’s how these two problems solve one another.

Phoenix without freeways?

In the 1970s, Arizonans resoundingly voted “NO” to completing Interstate 10 through downtown Phoenix. But that’s because I-10 would have been a ten-story tall freeway bridge through the north of downtown. But the “NO” vote canceled all new freeways, including finishing Interstate 10 coast to coast.