Main Street paving between 15th and 25th

Submitted by SnowWhitesBox t3_11yxpcs in rva

Maybe I am out of the loop here but what on earth is going on with the city paving Main Street? Who thought it was a good idea to close 10 blocks of Main Street during rush hour on a Wednesday?

I’m not a road engineer or anything, but I know for a fact VDOT does paving and other work on busy roads like Interstates at night to avoid this very issue. I am just flabbergasted that the city would think this is a good idea.

Had to ask here because it took me 45 minutes this evening for a commute that’s usually less than 10. I know I can’t be the only one who thinks the way the city has done this is asinine.

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lunar_unit t1_jda26tv wrote

Yeah, it's a little nuts, and the scraping of the existing surface has taken a weirdly long time. But night paving costs more, because of overtime, the need for nighttime safety equipment, people parking in the lanes and having to get cars towed, etc etc. Better signage might mitigate some of the curfuffle, but that never seems to happen.

I've been taking Dock St (which has its own suck factor at rush hour), cutting through Church Hill or even taking 64 to Nine Mile to 31st to creep in the back way.

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SnowWhitesBox OP t1_jda3bp5 wrote

Yeah these are all good points. I suppose I would agree I’d rather the city do it cost-effectively than not, I would also say just more information about what is coming would be nice.

Can confirm Dock Street tends to be awful in general, gotta say the 64-Nine Mile-31st route sounds circuitous as hell, but I have been needing to go to Walmart… might do that tomorrow

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lunar_unit t1_jdag19a wrote

Also consider the Leigh St bridge to Mosby to Princess Anne to 21st/E Clay to get from downtown into the side of CH.

There's so much street work happening lately, it's hard not to get snagged up somewhere.

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3FoxInATrenchcoat t1_jdf9lr6 wrote

Haha my first reaction was “no don’t blow up the secret way! Lol” but there’s plenty of room, y’all come on…

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lunar_unit t1_jdfbwn7 wrote

Lol. Don't forget the super duper secret back way on the Richmond Henrico parkway (parallels the Cannon Creek Greenway bike path.) Pops you out at Brookland Park Boulevard and other destinations in Northside. Lately it's been way faster than 95 to Chamberlayne.

But really, WHERE'S MY FLYING CAR??!!

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RulerOfTheRest t1_jda4rjw wrote

At least VDoT will log onto Reddit and give us a heads up when something major is about to happen (amongst many other avenues). There's really nothing with dates on the Richmond DPU website, or on their social media of the work currently being done on Main Street, and the only reason I know that a project is currently ongoing in the Carver neighborhood is because the RTD had an article on it in late February...

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LurkerUnderCover t1_jdccr8v wrote

Road paving has nothing to do with DPU. Unless it's paving restoration as apart of a utility project.

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deuxcourgettes t1_jdab2vw wrote

I was stuck IN FRONT OF MY APARTMENT for 25 minutes lmao. A nightmare

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WeetWoo97 t1_jd9wc0a wrote

Currently sitting on E Cary trying to make it to 25th St. wanting to claw my eyes out

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SnowWhitesBox OP t1_jd9wq9c wrote

Good luck man. It definitely doesn’t help the same geniuses that thought this would be a good idea also have Cary Street closed between 15th and 18th.

Again, not a traffic planner, but if I didn’t know any better I would expect all the official documents associated with this to be written in crayon.

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-B001- t1_jdbgo3p wrote

That's one of the biggest problems I've had w/ roadwork downtown -- multiple routes get closed at the same time, so that it causes backups. Add that to the lanes closed for construction zones, and then Bank Street being closed, it really is miserable driving down there now!

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BureauOfBureaucrats t1_jdaj6e8 wrote

I think our traffic planners have room temperature IQs.

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SnowWhitesBox OP t1_jdaxjwo wrote

Tend to agree, especially after hearing about how the traffic lights are being retimed. I don’t know if they have done the ones on Main yet downtown going into VCU but uhhh they could be done better.

And just in response to your other comment, I also ran into a dead end at 15th street, went right and took half an hour to get down to Dock and take a left. Absolute madhouse. Glad I have the opportunity to WFH the rest of this week, because I am not putting up with that again

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BureauOfBureaucrats t1_jdaydz0 wrote

I’m a Rideshare driver and was taking someone to the train station when I was there. Customer had to bail out early at 14th and walk that last block or miss her train.

I joined with the sidewalk drivers to make an illegal uturn and got the hell out. I’m basically a “Ned Flanders” of obeying traffic laws 99% of the time, but I was not fucking with that shit. I went straight home.

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oh_hello_rva t1_jda9kra wrote

My neighbor pointed out that many of the blocks they're digging up were freshly paved just recently. Classic Richmond. 🙃

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kayvaan1 t1_jdb7cpf wrote

The years they spent working on Nine Mile between 25th and 64 was agonizing, but I was so glad it was over. Only for them to tear up the road in front of the cemetery for piping or some BS and now the road is arguably worse than before.

I hated having to gamble on if it was worth trying to take 64 to work or if it would be easier to make the early commitment to Williamsburg Rd.

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gonefrombad t1_jdd5u3f wrote

PREACH!

It's so very on-brand that the new, sloppily-asphalted gash down Nine Mile is almost perfectly placed down the right side of your car so you get a nice rumble strip all the way to 64.

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NoRecommendation8634 t1_jd9xj7p wrote

WFH and live off Main, so I had to apologize profusely for the sound of jackhammering during my meetings 😑

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Asterion7 t1_jd9wlh7 wrote

I swear to God they just paved this stretch in the fall.

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picklingspice t1_jdafrc0 wrote

This reminds of how Chesterfield decided 8:20 on a school day was a good time to close the intersection leading into Bird High

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2ndruncanoe t1_jd9zmj9 wrote

Seriously. I’m at home now trying to breathe deeply and rescue my mood after getting caught up in that.

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Chickenmoons t1_jdabkv6 wrote

VDOT doesn’t pave city streets. That’s all Richmond.

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SnowWhitesBox OP t1_jdadgu6 wrote

I know, I was saying why can’t they do it like VDOT

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Chickenmoons t1_jdamcnb wrote

There are more reasons than could be succinctly described here why Richmond can’t.

Mostly staffing, funding and decades of disinvestment. Same as many things in town.

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BureauOfBureaucrats t1_jdaj170 wrote

I was just bitching about this. Yet another thing this city/VDOT can’t competently manage.

I was stuck right before 15th. No signage. No traffic cop. No direction. People were driving over curbs/on sidewalks to get out.

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BrinxJob t1_jdalcxh wrote

YUP. Took two hours to get to work today, fuck that noise.

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