Here’s Roadguy’s column from the Sunday paper. If you’ve read it elsewhere, please skip on down to the comments. Thanks. 

PLOWING, SIGNAGE AND A RAMP-METER COMPLAINT

With the dark October skies we’ve been having, it’s not surprising that alert reader Beth is thinking about snow:

I love the lanes [that] were added on I-94 after the bridge disaster, but where’s the snow going to go now that there’s no shoulder? I think it’s going to get messy when we get a few inches.

Kent Barnard of the Minnesota Department of Transportation is particularly qualified to answer Beth’s question. Not only is he a department spokesman, but he also works some shifts as a snowplow driver.

With 94 re-striped to add a lane in each direction, the shoulders are indeed gone, so Barnard said that he and his colleagues are probably going to have to close a lane on occasion in order to haul the snow away.

Front-end loaders and big blowers will be part of the mix, he said. Here’s hoping that the snowstorms steer clear of rush hour.

Alert reader Ted has a question related to bridge detours:

I recently had the opportunity to approach the city on Interstate 35 from both north (from Pine City) and south (from Northfield). The 35W bridge has been down for weeks. I did not see a single sign advising traffic to take 35E through the Cities. What is up with that?

Nick Thompson, the MnDOT traffic guy in charge of the detours, said that, even with the detour, “we felt that 35W was still the best route if that was your normal route.”

The agency decided not to try to send traffic through town on 35E in part because of the weight restrictions on the portion south of downtown St. Paul. Explaining the restrictions and the detour on an easy-to-read sign would be tricky, he said.

He noted, however, that the department did put a message board on 35 north of the 35W/35E split to alert southbound drivers of serious traffic problems along either route. That gives them a heads-up and, if their vehicles aren’t too heavy, a choice.

Our final question is from alert reader Lynn:

Is there any way to complain to MnDOT about unreasonable wait times at an entrance ramp meter? I have searched the MnDOT website and can’t find a phone number or e-mail address related to the meters. I would love to be able to call them from my cell phone some mornings when there is a backup of 16 cars at the Dale and Hwy. 36 on-ramp and the freeway is nearly empty.

Roadguy fears MnDOT would have to open an overseas call center if all disgruntled drivers picked up their phones at once. The preferred method for channeling your ramp meter complaint (or compliment), said Todd Kramascz, a traffic operations supervisor, is to e-mail info@dot.state.mn.us. Kramascz says he hears from about three people a day via that address.

And after today, I bet he’ll be hearing from at least three more.

Dale the Truck Driver, who views the Twin Cities freeways from high in his semi, sent along this dispatch yesterday:

It has been a while since the last tale from above, so….

I was reading about this Andover lady who left her child in her vehicle while she was shopping. 90 degrees outside… the child was sweating pretty heavy. Really? While this lady won’t win any Mother of the Year awards anytime soon, why all the uproar? I agree it might not be a good idea to leave you kid in the car while you hit up Target, but what about all the parents who put their kids in danger other ways? Aggressive driving, speeding, using your cell phone, etc.

I wonder what would happen if you dialed 911 to report a lady in a minivan driving recklessly using her cell phone with her kids jumping all around the vehicle. Nothing happens, all you get is “we don’t have anybody in the area at this time.” I bet if I would add she has an open bottle of whiskey in her hand, a trooper would suddenly be in the area.

What this lady did was terrible, but I can imagine parents discussing this, then running a red light or taking a left in front of my semi with their kids looking at me as I narrowly miss them as they wonder where all the blue smoke appeared from, not thinking that 18 tires produce a heavy amount of smoke when skidding.

Glad I got this off my chest. Happy driving.

Dale makes an interesting point — parents endanger their kids in vehicles all the time, yet it rarely makes the 6 p.m. news. Thoughts?

A lonely road caught the eye of alert reader Bill, and he has a question:

Recently while traveling form Long Lake to Shorewood (my home) I noticed that there is a very nice highway just south of Long Lake that nobody uses. From what I can tell, this is meant to be an extension of 394, with the intent to bypass downtown Long Lake. Every time I ask someone in Long Lake about it, they just mutter, shake their head, and avoid me like the Ebola virus. (I know that look, I get it a lot of times at work.)

Do you know the status of this stretch of virgin roadway? I suspect a conspiracy where they will open the road only after it needs road construction, thus delaying motorist or detouring them through Long Lake.

Bill’s e-mail arrived yesterday morning; yesterday afternoon, by pure coincidence, MnDOT provided an answer in the form of a news release. The short answer:

Traffic will not use the new highway until the roadway is connected at County Road 6 and Wayzata Boulevard in the fall of 2008.

Let’s hope it doesn’t get any potholes before then — and let’s hope they don’t spend any money plowing it. (Relatedly, interested parties can sign up for Hwy. 12 e-mail updates here.)

Alert reader Don, meanwhile, is tired of road hogs:

There is something that no one talks about — road intimidation. Sure, we are Minnesota nice — we don’t honk horns at people — but we sure intimidate them. I have two friends who admit they bought large SUVs for the intimidation value. Tailgating is rampant on Minnesota highways. While some of it may be carelessness or inattention, most of it is intimidation…. If Minnesota drivers were REALLY nice they would share the road instead of believing the highway was built just for them alone.

Roadguy’s personal vehicle wouldn’t intimidate the driver of a tricycle, but Don’s point has not gone unnoticed — a few years back, some members of the humorati over at Minnesota Public Radio created a brand of car called the Intimida. You can check out “ads” for it here and here (text and audio) or here (audio only).

Finally today, alert reader Drives in Left Lane has a complaint:

Surely you have had to have covered the annoyance of buses driving down the highway shoulders. I frankly do not understand the legality of this since a bus is not an emergency vehicle and I thought only emergency vehicles were allowed there. If the legislators want to have quick ways to move people from place to place then why don’t they have more trains? I would rather have that than me drifting away on the right lane only to have a bus creep up on me like a bat out of hell. Even more reason why I like coasting in the left lane of urban traffic.

Trains of any kind cost a lot more than buses of any kind. MnDOT is quite proud of its shoulder bus lanes, and the folks on the buses seem to like the practice as well, though it can definitely give motorists pause, especially near ramps.

If you have thoughts on shoulder lanes, or if you’ve ever wanted to buy an Intimida Sherpa SUV to scare the other folks on the road, comment away below.

Earlier this month, Roadguy posted this e-mail from alert reader Nathan:

I had a great time at the Twin Cities Jazz Festival yesterday and stuck around for the late-night jam session at the Dakota (which was totally worth it, BTW) thinking that the last train out of downtown was sometime around 2:30 a.m. Well, it turns out that I was wrong since the last train out of town is at [1:16 a.m.] Good thing there’s plenty of cabs downtown late Saturday night these days. Since bar close is at 2 a.m., it does seem odd that the last train out isn’t an hour later than that, though. What gives?

Nathan’s question (posted here) led to this story in today’s Strib. Your comments are welcomed below.

Also in the Sunday paper: this Roadguy column, the first half of which is about streetlights burning brightly on the freeway in the middle of the day. The second half, about out-of-state plates, got some blog time here a few weeks ago.

(Note to readers: In order to share the joy more widely, Roadguy now has a mini-column in the Sunday newspaper. A version of this week’s column is pasted below; if you’ve already read it in print or online, skip on down to the comments and share your thoughts.)

Roadguy got an earful after last week’s item about police emergency lights — there were blog comments, a couple of phone calls, e-mails with lots of capital letters, etc. Let’s shed a bit more light if we can.

Alert reader Roger was among those who think troopers by the roadside should shine more subtly:

Some of these lighted squad cars are SO BRIGHT that I can not see the lanes in broad daylight even though I had my eyes checked recently and spent $600 on new glasses.

But Sgt. Andrew, who works out of Detroit Lakes for the State Patrol, wrote to say that brighter is better:

As for the toning down of the light intensity, it may be possible depending on the design of the light bar. I had a light bar that had such a setting many years ago, and I found that if I used the lower intensity setting, the public’s driving was as if I did not have them on at all.

Also, if the intensity setting was accidentally left on the lower setting during the day, the lights were not visible beyond a few yards (a very bad situation), so I found that I left the setting on high anyway.

Meanwhile, police who flick on their lights just to go through red lights drew more ire. Sgt. Therese of the Minneapolis police pointed out last week that it’s legal for them to do so, and she offers further explanation:

State statutes say we can go through red lights with our lights or siren on. [Department] policy states we need both. BUT, officers can use discretion when getting to a call and sometimes use just the lights or siren.

And that’s the rub: Readers who say they’ve seen cops use their lights when arriving at the precinct house or when not in a hurry don’t believe that they’re responding to an emergency, as the law specifies. Because it’s hard to discern an officer’s motives, red-light running may be less a traffic problem than a public-relations one.

Further thoughts? Add ‘em below.

First up is alert reader John of White Bear Lake, who wrote to Roadguy late yesterday afternoon:

…Coming home on 61 today two runners carrying unlit torches had a three-squad escort by Ramsey County. Any idea what (hopefully) worthy cause this was for? It was causing above-normal congestion on 61 south from 694 north a few miles.

John sent along a few pictures, and Roadguy cropped them so they’d fit into the friendly confines of the blog software:

Not wanting to bother the sheriff, Roadguy Googled around for a bit, but he found no links to the East Vadnais Heights Unlit Torchlight Parade. If we don’t get a real answer today in the comments below, I’ll ring up the proper authorities.

Also submitting some digital photography is alert reader M, who e-mailed Roadguy on Wednesday:

I am just learning to use my camera phone and sent you a pic of a car parked in a handicapped spot RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE MPLS COURTHOUSE and was there close to 4 hrs today from about 8AM-Noon. No sticker, no plate! And a squad car was waiting for a red light at the intersection when I took the picture!

Roadguy cropped out the license plates on this one, in case there’s some extenuating situation we don’t know about. But sadly, yes, it’s hardly unheard of to see handicap-space abuse downtown.

Our final piece of mail today comes from (gasp!) a public relations person. His name was Mike, and he had this to say:

I thought this website might be of interest to your readers: publicroutes.com. The site takes the old version of Mapquest or Google maps, and expands it to include public transit and walking directions. The site went live yesterday [Wednesday] in the Twin Cities. It also includes great features like traffic and weather, and local search for restaurants or attractions.

Roadguy has been hearing about alternative-transportation Mapquest-type sites for months now, so he was eager to try this one. He typed in his home and workplace addresses, clicked on “best transit options,” and … well, what’s the opposite of “voila”?

There are apparently some bugs to work out yet — whenever Roadguy rides transit to work, it’s about a 4.5-mile trip that takes about 35 minutes, but this software determined that a 12.7439-mile, 42-minute route via the University of Minnesota campus would be the way to go. The driving directions worked OK, as did a few of the other transit routes Roadguy tried, but he’d be interested in your reaction to the site if you have a moment to check it out.

So please share those thoughts (and any knowledge of east-metro torchbearers) below.