I-270 and the morons who neglect it

I gripe about I-270 a lot. As is non-stop, day and night. Anyone who has read this blog for a while knows how much I loath that gawd awful highway to hell. And, according to the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board, I bitch with good reason.

In a recent report by the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board, I-270 was listed among the five corridors with the longest delays.

Between 8 and 9 a.m., southbound I-270 can be backed up as much as 16 miles, with a 12.5-minute estimated delay, according to the study. A northbound evening commute between 4:30 and 5:30 p.m. can result in a 23-mile bottleneck.

Can result? Try it's not altogether uncommon. My standard sardonic comment regarding I-270 is that if someone spits on the sidewalk in Rockville, you can add 2 hours to your commute.

Okay, Vulture, so why are you beating this dead horse again? (Mmmm...dead horse...a Vulture's favorite dish!)

I might has let this story slide had it not included this moronic comment by a "public official" whose job it is to convince the public that mass transit is the solution.

"Widening a highway like I-270 creates more traffic that gets dumped onto other roads," he said.

Spoken like a true collectivist tool.

Let me suggest that quite the opposite occurs. The only reason the traffic is as bad as it is on Maryland 355 and US-15 is because of people trying to bail on I-270! Build a better 270, and watch as the overflow traffic on 355 and 15 goes from awful to non-existent. Better yet, build the Outer Beltway that has been promised for, oh, I don't know, since the Reagan administration, and THEN we'll see what traffic REALLY looks like.

I know! Why don't we try to do it my way for a change and turn I-270 from Frederick to Germantown into an 8-lane superhighway? Your way...to stick your head in the sand (or wherever it is that you stick it) and say "Let them take transit!" obviously doesn't work.