Quote:
Originally Posted by Joborule
It definitely is not a design speed of 80
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It's technically a design speed of 90 as limits are posted 10 below the design, i.e. mainline ring road is 110 posted at 100. So let's look at what we've got here. The radius of the curve at my blue arrow:
is roughly ~350 meters, which based on
the chart on page 45 restricts it to a design speed of 90. The ramps from WB Glenmore to WB Stoney and from EB Stoney to EB Glenmore would generally have a design speed of 80, but an
exception was made for those to be bumped up to to 90 to allow Glenmore to just be posted at 80 the whole way through. So if the ramps at the west end have to be 80 and you have to be 80 to go around the curve at 37 St, there's obviously no point having 1,100 meters of 100 or 110 kph pavement.
There are other things, like the noise mitigation measures that are based on modelling at a certain speed. If you make Glenmore 110 through there just because it looks like an interstate, it now fails noise and you need bigger walls and higher berms adding to the cost of the project. It's the same reason (among many) that you can't just erase the speed limit on Stoney NW. Everyone up there signed up to live next to Stoney Trail, not the autobahn.