DOT Seeks Input on Rest Areas

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Cyclones_R_GR8

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While we all have access to many GPS maps (phones, cars, etc...) I still have a nagging distrust that they know the quickest or most scenic routes to where I'm going. I can't read a map, I sure as hell can't fold a map, but I feel way more comfortable WITH a map if for no other reason than the rest areas are out of booty wipe.
I love maps. I love to look at them whether online or an atlas. I love planning a trip. I keep an atlas at home solely for the purpose of highlighting the route I took on a motorcycle trip when I get back.
 

cycopath25

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How does it cost $700,000 to close a glorified **** house?


Cost Savings

The typical cost to close a full service rest area has been estimated at approximately $700,000 each while the cost to replace an aging rest area is approximately $3,500,000. Closure of a parking only site is estimated to cost approximately $385,000.
 

khardbored

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Middle of the Midwest

MNCYWX

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That's so cool!

I enjoyed looking at the development of the interstates in the 50's & 60's . . . for example, by the 1966 map, I-35 went north from DSM as far as Ames and then stopped.

I could look at those all day... and just check out the progression of a certain area. The city insets I find probably the most fascinating.

Look at the I35 alignment in northern Iowa pre 1965 (I think). Mason City lobbied to pull the alignment closer to them and it was changed. It was originally supposed to come straight up, near Garner instead and continue to the west side of Albert Lea, MN. That angle was the last section to be completed in the late 70s due to farmer opposition for cutting their fields and at an odd angle.
 
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DeereClone

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How does it cost $700,000 to close a glorified **** house?


Cost Savings

The typical cost to close a full service rest area has been estimated at approximately $700,000 each while the cost to replace an aging rest area is approximately $3,500,000. Closure of a parking only site is estimated to cost approximately $385,000.

Because contractors know the government will over pay for something so they over bid it.
 
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psychlone99

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How does it cost $700,000 to close a glorified **** house?
It's not going to just sit there with a barricade at the entrance. There would be significant demolition, haul away, and utility costs. Costs to remove signs along the highway. Assume some advertising costs to announce the closure, costs to update databases and maps, other misc administrative costs related to the sale of the property. Etc. Never as clean and simple as you think.
 
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NWICY

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I've never understood why they don't put these rest stops in-between the roads on an interstate so that you can serve both directions with one building. I've seen this all over Europe and it seems to make so much more sense.

If I remember right Indiana and Kansas do it that way, also a few in Minnesota.
 

NWICY

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Which still raises the question of resources.

Would that 17million have been better spent on other road projects? I'd say absolutely.

Like that cluster of a fly over they are building at 35-30? That's millions being pissed away not even counting all the errors they've made.
 

dmdom

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Like that cluster of a fly over they are building at 35-30? That's millions being pissed away not even counting all the errors they've made.
I drive by this construction quite often. Curious as to what errors were made.
 

NWICY

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I drive by this construction quite often. Curious as to what errors were made.

Tore one of the towers clear down and rebuilt it. Currently leveling the towers basically by hand because they don't match to put the beams in at the right angles.
 

dmdom

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Tore one of the towers clear down and rebuilt it. Currently leveling the towers basically by hand because they don't match to put the beams in at the right angles.
If the DOT changed the design specs during construction, it may add additional expense. The errors you are referring too, sound like constuction issues that come out of the contractor's profit.
 

Rural

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We have a GPS too. Sometimes it gives us totally whack routes no matter what preferences we put in. It decided to send us on some blacktop one way excursion in Hannibal, MO to avoid one short traffic light on highway.:rolleyes: So we use everything, paper maps, Google maps on phone, GPS.

Another epic GPS fail was with kids on baseball team and it sent us to some abomination called Pizza Wheel instead of Pizza Ranch.

Wait, it was an abomination compared to Pizza Ranch?
 
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theshadow

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If I remember right Indiana and Kansas do it that way, also a few in Minnesota.

It makes sense in Kansas, because you're on a toll road. Instead of having to build exits with booths, and on-ramps with booths, it's easier to do an island in the middle.
 
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cycloneML

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With the amount of truck stops along most interstates the state sponsored rest areas are not really needed. While it is nice to be able to pull over, use the facilities, and get back on the road quickly there is usually a truck stop within a reasonable distance so it would save the states some money.
I remember as kids on a road trip that mom would pack lunch and we would stop at a rest area and eat at the picnic tables.

Where will adult men meet each other?
 
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NATEizKING

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I'm not sure where the rest stop is that is on the way to KC but every time we head down for the B12 tourney and on the way back we stop there.
 
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ImJustKCClone

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That's so cool!

I enjoyed looking at the development of the interstates in the 50's & 60's . . . for example, by the 1966 map, I-35 went north from DSM as far as Ames and then stopped.
I went scrolling through the maps. The last bit was completed between the printings of the 1975 & 1976 maps, only 7 years before I moved here.
 
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carvers4math

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If I remember right Indiana and Kansas do it that way, also a few in Minnesota.

The toll road from Chicago to South Bend, which I think is 80/90, has rest areas on both sides. Poor Knute Rockne has one named after him eastbound.

The Kansas Turnpike does have them in the middle.
 
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