A little bit of a different issue but it was dumb to me to eliminate exits to down town and Baylor in the revised 35 except for the McLane Stadium exit and the 18th street exit.

https://instagr.am/p/CM0e4arHLoV

PartyBear said:

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A little bit of a different issue but it was dumb to me to eliminate exits to down town and Baylor in the revised 35 except for the McLane Stadium exit and the 18th street exit.

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No exits in the new highway between 18th & MLK? That is crazy! I thought the city leaders wanted to revitalize the downtown economy. That seems destined to slow things down a bit. At least university events (especially sports) and the Silos will provide some spark but they should not be making it difficult for tourists to arrive at their destinations. Poor leadership.

historian said:

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PartyBear said:

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A little bit of a different issue but it was dumb to me to eliminate exits to down town and Baylor in the revised 35 except for the McLane Stadium exit and the 18th street exit.

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No exits in the new highway between 18th & MLK? That is crazy! I thought the city leaders wanted to revitalize the downtown economy. That seems destined to slow things down a bit. At least university events (especially sports) and the Silos will provide some spark but they should not be making it difficult for tourists to arrive at their destinations. Poor leadership.

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I don't have the plans in front of me right now to confirm whether this is the case, but it would not surprise me if it were.

TxDOT has over the past few years implemented new policies concerning service roads and service road access. Those policies are then implemented whenever one of the affected roads are re-built.

To keep mainline traffic flows safer at high speeds, they want to limit ingress and egress points. Take for example the northbound I-35 exit (#328) for Sun Valley Road in Hewitt. My goodness, it seems like you exit off of I-35 in Lorena with that one. It seems excessively far in advance even considering their new guidelines, but strangely, they never asked my opinion. ;-)

Businesses also have to contend with the new requirements. While some driveway accesses to the service roads are 'grandfathered', future access driveways are not and the required distances between permitted driveways often exceeds the frontage of a particular single tract. In some cases, that requires the adjacent landowners (or subdivider) to work together and agree to some type of reciprocal access agreement whereby they end up sharing a driveway. Sometimes that consumes square footage on the lots that could otherwise be used for construction or parking.

So, while we all question certain things the Waco leadership does (I certainly do), I'm not sure they had a lot of choice in this particular matter.

It may be U Parks and 18th but I'm pretty sure that is still the plan and yes it sounds counterintuitive to wanting to revitalize down town and cuts Baylor off from down town more than before.

I suppose they could have double decked it like Austin so people have both option. They can fly through if they want and traffic allows or take a lower deck to exit off onto campus and at various points down town.

PartyBear said:

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It may be U Parks and 18th but I'm pretty sure that is still the plan and yes it sounds counterintuitive to wanting to revitalize down town and cuts Baylor off from down town more than before.

I suppose they could have double decked it like Austin so people have both option. They can fly through if they want and traffic allows or take a lower deck to exit off onto campus and at various points down town.

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ive never once gotten on I-35 from Baylor to get to downtown. It doesn't cut campus off from downtown at all, it actually allows downtown and campus to meld.

You can no longer cross 35 to down town. I believe you have to drive to MLK or U Parks if that is an exit or 18th street and cross over. Unless under passes are being built at various points to get to one side or the other. But I have not noticed any yet except at UP which is a previous one being kept. I don't think that 5th street area is being kept open as a crossing point.

PartyBear said:

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You can no longer cross 35 to down town. I believe you have to drive to MLK or U Parks if that is an exit or 18th street and cross over. Unless under passes are being built at various points to get to one side or the other. But I have not noticed any yet except at UP which is a previous one being kept. I don't think that 5th street area is being kept open as a crossing point.

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for right now. You will be able to once construction is complete. 4th and 5th will still run as they used to. 11th will run under I-35 rather than over it (at 12th).

Eleven-League Grant said:

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historian said:

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PartyBear said:

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A little bit of a different issue but it was dumb to me to eliminate exits to down town and Baylor in the revised 35 except for the McLane Stadium exit and the 18th street exit.

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No exits in the new highway between 18th & MLK? That is crazy! I thought the city leaders wanted to revitalize the downtown economy. That seems destined to slow things down a bit. At least university events (especially sports) and the Silos will provide some spark but they should not be making it difficult for tourists to arrive at their destinations. Poor leadership.

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I don't have the plans in front of me right now to confirm whether this is the case, but it would not surprise me if it were.

TxDOT has over the past few years implemented new policies concerning service roads and service road access. Those policies are then implemented whenever one of the affected roads are re-built.

To keep mainline traffic flows safer at high speeds, they want to limit ingress and egress points. Take for example the northbound I-35 exit (#328) for Sun Valley Road in Hewitt. My goodness, it seems like you exit off of I-35 in Lorena with that one. It seems excessively far in advance even considering their new guidelines, but strangely, they never asked my opinion. ;-)

Businesses also have to contend with the new requirements. While some driveway accesses to the service roads are 'grandfathered', future access driveways are not and the required distances between permitted driveways often exceeds the frontage of a particular single tract. In some cases, that requires the adjacent landowners (or subdivider) to work together and agree to some type of reciprocal access agreement whereby they end up sharing a driveway. Sometimes that consumes square footage on the lots that could otherwise be used for construction or parking.

So, while we all question certain things the Waco leadership does (I certainly do), I'm not sure they had a lot of choice in this particular matter.

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The IH 35 project is a multi year one for a great length: from San Antonio to Dallas. The highway was widened for much of that length, improved (or added) access roads, better crossings, & better entrance/exit ramps. Overall, I'd say it is a success and I've driven most of that distance many times in the past 35 years. Waco is one of the last stretches to overhaul. I cannot imagine they would do all that & not have at least one exit for downtown Waco.

http://www.my35.org/

PartyBear said:

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You can no longer cross 35 to down town. I believe you have to drive to MLK or U Parks if that is an exit or 18th street and cross over. Unless under passes are being built at various points to get to one side or the other. But I have not noticed any yet except at UP which is a previous one being kept. I don't think that 5th street area is being kept open as a crossing point.

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That may be temporary during the construction but I bet there will be something in that ares ehgg egg n the project is complete.

trey3216 said:

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PartyBear said:

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You can no longer cross 35 to down town. I believe you have to drive to MLK or U Parks if that is an exit or 18th street and cross over. Unless under passes are being built at various points to get to one side or the other. But I have not noticed any yet except at UP which is a previous one being kept. I don't think that 5th street area is being kept open as a crossing point.

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for right now. You will be able to once construction is complete. 4th and 5th will still run as they used to. 11th will run under I-35 rather than over it (at 12th).

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Good to know. At least Baylor and downtown arent being cut off from each other on top of 35 travelers essentially being cut off from both.

PartyBear said:

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trey3216 said:

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PartyBear said:

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You can no longer cross 35 to down town. I believe you have to drive to MLK or U Parks if that is an exit or 18th street and cross over. Unless under passes are being built at various points to get to one side or the other. But I have not noticed any yet except at UP which is a previous one being kept. I don't think that 5th street area is being kept open as a crossing point.

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for right now. You will be able to once construction is complete. 4th and 5th will still run as they used to. 11th will run under I-35 rather than over it (at 12th).

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Good to know. At least Baylor and downtown arent being cut off from each other on top of 35 travelers essentially being cut off from both.

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They won't be, nor will I-35 travelers. The service roads are also being expanded and there will be fewer lights in either direction allowing for better traffic flow adjacent to the highway. This will actually expedite traffic into and around downtown rather than impede it.

I do think the plan is for 18th St and Either U parks and or MLK are the exits for down town and Baylor unless that has changed. I thought I recalled that from at least two news stories about the expansion.

That makes more sense. I liked having 2 exits but knew it wouldn't last.

I sincerely hope the engineers have worked out the drainage issues that have been discussed around the 11th - 12th street areas along the frontage road. There was much discussion regarding potential flooding of those areas during periods of heavy rain.

That is always a major issue with any highway construction/renovation. I cannot imagine their plans did not include something about it.

This was one of many articles concerning this particular drainage issue. https://www.kwtx.com/content/news/Waco--I-35-construction-project-could-cause-flooding-drainage-issues-504983062.html Waco Trib has several more in depth reports around that time , but I think they are behind a pay wall.

I read an article on the "mall to mall" project for Highway 6 that would add continuous frontage roads from 84 to Highway 6. I don't think that would help traffic much, personally, but I wasn't able to find plans for it yet.

Pseudo3D said:

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I read an article on the "mall to mall" project for Highway 6 that would add continuous frontage roads from 84 to Highway 6. I don't think that would help traffic much, personally, but I wasn't able to find plans for it yet.

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The links to the plans are at the bottom of this TxDOT page:

TxDOT Mall-to-Mall / Loop 340 - SH 6

They are labeled 'Schematic 1' and 'Schematic 2'. They are very large .pdf files and be prepared to do a lot of zooming.

That area is particularly tough due to there being not one, but TWO railroad tracks that have to be crossed over. There will be no way to avoid some lack of access issues that the new service roads will bring, it appears.

I believe (but don't know for certain) that utility relocation is currently in progress for the project.

Regarding traffic, I've noticed quite a backup onto the westbound main lanes at the Highway 84 exit in the mornings. I suppose now that traffic will be backed up on the service road instead.

Eleven-League Grant said:

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Pseudo3D said:

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I read an article on the "mall to mall" project for Highway 6 that would add continuous frontage roads from 84 to Highway 6. I don't think that would help traffic much, personally, but I wasn't able to find plans for it yet.

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The links to the plans are at the bottom of this TxDOT page:

TxDOT Mall-to-Mall / Loop 340 - SH 6

They are labeled 'Schematic 1' and 'Schematic 2'. They are very large .pdf files and be prepared to do a lot of zooming.

That area is particularly tough due to there being not one, but TWO railroad tracks that have to be crossed over. There will be no way to avoid some lack of access issues that the new service roads will bring, it appears.

I believe (but don't know for certain) that utility relocation is currently in progress for the project.

Regarding traffic, I've noticed quite a backup onto the westbound main lanes at the Highway 84 exit in the mornings. I suppose now that traffic will be backed up on the service road instead.

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Thanks! Most of the time I drive on that section is admittedly off hours. The one time I remember a backup was when a large amount of hay was dumped on a bridge...

Not a fan of the design though, it would help access issues if Oxygen Drive remained open (the railroad is seldom used), not connecting Beverly Drive up with Exchange Parkway (and making it much harder to go west on Highway 6 toward 84 from Beverly), and not untangling the Franklin Avenue/Waco Avenue split.

I used to work in an office off of Franklin but lived off Speegleville Road, so if I wanted to get home, I'd either have to exit at the Highway 6 ramp and quickly change 3-4 lanes, or have the quasi-highway abruptly end in a pair of yield signs.

35 has been outright terrible all week for spring break. 40 minutes from TSTC to Robinson everyday at 5.

Also, 84 (Waco Drive) is not that bad of an alternate route. It has lights but is still quicker than 340.

Plus, since Waco Drive runs almost parallel to 35 through much of Waco, you can cut across at any time: Valley Mills, New Road, 340, Hewitt Drive, etc.

Brian Ethridge said:

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I skipped all that **** last weekend and never stopped going around 17th-Elm Mott.

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I'll do a scenic route through downtown on some Fridays. Same amount of time and get to see what's happening.

I do from basically the McGregor Airport to Baylor every day at 7:30 and encounter zero traffic going 84 > 6 > 35 > UParks, and then leave around 4:30 and minus the backup on UParks that goes from 35 to about the Law School entrance, encounter zero traffic on that ride back home.

Been doing that drive for 7 years and so far...unless there was an accident, I almost never have a slowdown. If I see there is an accident, then instead of 35 I just take loop 340 home, only adds about 3 mins in comparison to a normal 35 drive.

They are making great progress and it looks to me like the service roads around Baylor and the main lanes over the new bridges will be open by football season barring anything major happening.

Wow I wish this forum had more than one title/hook. The information you give is also quite helpful to those of us returning to our hometown to visit family and friends. We come about 1-2 times a year and deal with I-35 and it's "influence".
The information on this forum and some of the other Waco ones are quite helpful. Waco is really changing. As 1969 RHS grad who also attended old WHS then came back from 73-80 to work at Baylor the changes have been significant. And the information really helps those like me catch up plus get some good tips on many subjects.
Thanks!