The View From Wisconsin

Now that the Marquette Interchange reconstruction project is reaching its halfway point, now's a good time to start looking at what else needs to be done to the freeways in Milwaukee and southeastern Wisconsin.

Just off the top of my head, I came up with a list of 10 things that really should be done to the Milwaukee freeway system.

As a driver that uses the system on a regular basis, I can verify that these are definitely needed changes.

1. Construct a HOV lane on both the North-South and East-West Freeways. The HOV lane would extend in three directions – North on I-43 from the Appleton Avenue (formerly Park Freeway) exit to the Ozaukee County line; South on I-94/43 over the High-Rise Bridge to the Airport, all the way south to the Racine County line; and West on I-94 to the Waukesha County line. The HOV lane could be made reversible or even a "zipper" lane, allowing the flow of traffic to be altered during rush hours.

2. Make the section of the East-West Freeway between State Fair Park (STH-181) and the Stadium Freeway a double-decked Freeway. The bottlenecks on this stretch are horrible, especially before and after Brewers games and during the morning/afternoon rush hours. Since the lanes can't be expanded, due to the cemetary on both sides between Hawley and Miller Park, the only way to go is to stack the freeways. Have one or two lanes in each direction be exclusive "HOV" lanes, with one of the lanes being an express lane from the Zoo Interchange to the Miller Park Way exit.

3. Eliminate the exit from STH-100 Eastbound onto I-94. This on-ramp has been the cause of numerous accidents and needless merging delays onto the I-894 bypass. The single-quadrant interchange worked back in the days when there wasn't much traffic on the bypass, but this exit is just a nuisance. Route the traffic to the National Avenue exit onto I-894 instead.

4. Expand the southbound ramp from I-94 East to I-894 East/US 45 South to more than one lane. The single-lane ramp causes more merging delays as trucks slow down, not only because of the curve, but because of the resulting merging issues for National Avenue and STH 59. There just is not enough room for traffic to safely get on to the Zoo Freeway, and this change, along with the following proposal, would alter that.

5. Eliminate the onramp from I-894 East/US 45 South to National Avenue. This is another reason for the bottlenecks at the Zoo Interchange. If there was no exit at National Avenue, there would be room for traffic to merge onto I-894 from I-94. The other option would be to move the ramp to the south side of National Avenue – and that wouldn't make the problem any better. Route the National Avenue traffic down to the next exit.

6. Change the on-ramps from I-94 East to US 45 North, and I-894 West/US 45 North to I-94 West, from left side to right side ramps. This may mean construction of new bridges through the Zoo Interchange, but it will cut down on traffic issues where cars and trucks are trying to merge onto the Zoo or East-West Freeway.

7. Consider connecting the Stadium and Fond du Lac Freeways. The current level of traffic on both the Zoo Freeway and the East-West Freeway needs to be relieved in some manner. A "completion" of the Stadium Freeway to Fond du Lac Avenue would help that – and let's be honest; the section of Milwaukee that the freeway would be routed isn't exactly prime real estate at the moment. Of all the things on this list, this one's the most far-fetched, because of the cost and required real estate purchasing.

8. Make an off-ramp on the Airport Spur to the Amtrak Station on South 6th Street. If WisDOT wants people to use the Hiawatha to go to Chicago, they need to make it easy for people to do it. The way to do this is to make the station accessible from the spur.

9. Convert the Zoo Freeway to Interstate. It doesn't matter if it's renamed I-41, I-143, or I-594 – the highway between Hales Corners and the Fox Cities has been a freeway for years. It's time it finally got upgraded from being a US highway.

10. Consider electronic tolling for the HOV lanes around the system. If people want the convenience of being able to travel in the express lanes to and from downtown, have 'em pay for it. You want that trip from the country line to downtown to stay at 10 minutes all day? Get a transponder box, pay $10 a month, and you've got it. This would be easy to do in conjunction with the construction of the HOV lanes, right off the bat. I'd be against doing this for the bypass, or the Zoo Freeway - but if Milwaukee County really wants to be able to pay for these changes, this is one way to do it. Once the bonds and debt are retired on the freeway repairs, consider removing the electronic tolling.