Jackson Jambalaya

From Google Earth, it appears to me there are separate eastbound and westbound I-20 bridges crossing Lynch Creek. Each bridge is three lanes wide with shoulders on both sides.

Does anyone know why all traffic can't be diverted to the operable bridge while the other bridge is under reconstruction?

This morning, a simple 2 car accident on 20 had 8 mile backups. Just 2 lanes. So this diversion is going to work???? There is NO emphasis in keeping traffic moving. No communication, just snappy sayings on "electronic boards."

Reservoir construction, check.
Lakeland Drive, 50000 vehicles, 5000 lights, check.
I-20 closed, check.
49 construction, check.
55 South construction, check.
55/220 construction, check.
Lake Harbor/51 construction, check.
Stack jam with double the traffic, check.
Single exit lanes at 55/220, check.
6 mile "detour" (LMAO) on US 80, check.

All routes blocked, check.

MDOT, go home, your work is done! There IS NO transportation, merely idling and parking.

Good grief. Just to finish us off, have the Trace Police run extra radar, close 463, and have Gary "Clogged" Rhoads rush out some more redlights for Lakeland. He missed an intersection.

50 years...where's the money in that??

Just another racist attempt to keep people from traveling into Jackson

I can see it now. We'll hear from all the arm chair engineers as to why MDOT is doing this all wrong.

Shut the hell up, 4:28. That makes too much sense.

MDOT has been laying off road workers, because the Chinese invented a shovel that stands up by itself.

I moved to Mississippi 11 years ago and I must say. MDOT does some really dumb things. In California it was much more organized and thought out.

90% of the "engineers" at MDOT are leghumpers. Go figure.

Hold my beer and WATCH THIS!

signed EMDOT.idiot.com

The Trans-Alaskan highway was built by the army in 5.5 months?

In my opinion I-20 through Jackson was very poorly planned. Hard curves on an interstate is not a good thing. We need an east-west interstate bypass for I-20 south of the metropolitan area.

I still remember my supervisor showing me a video of the MDOT executive director showing all of the TV crews why they closed Springridge Road bridge and how dangerous it was, only to allow the county to open the bridge the next day because it had already been fixed.

Maybe Linda McGrath could call WLBT and show them how under-maintained that interstate bridge is.

6:33, if they came from UM would that make them better or just allow them to rent a billboard to advertise they are MDOT workers on the side but attorneys during the day. Call this number if you are in an accident.

The interstate system around Jackson has not been well taken care of and it’s almost 60 years old. With it being a major artery for not just Mississippi but several other states our MDOT has failed. For many years we have needed the widening of both I-20 and I-55, but it was too late. 20 years ago you could count the amount of seconds between cars because of the amount of people at any given time traveling. Now, it’s bumper to bumper. I did not like saying what I said about the MDOT but our state has fallen behind in many things. Not just highways and interstates.

@7:28, no kidding; it would be interesting to see how many accidents/injuries/deaths have happened on the curves on I-20 and on waterworks curve on I-55. Even though the speed limit is 60, everybody seems to think that because it's an interstate, the speed limit is 70, and they wind up doing 80.

MDOT engineers are just the engineers that were to stupid to get hired in the private industry. They are the bottom of the barrel.

"Does anyone know why all traffic can't be diverted to the operable bridge while the other bridge is under reconstruction?"

Yes.

After the re-surfacing at I-55 @ Meadowbrook by MDOT, and the subsequent re-stripping, which created dangerous approaches through intersections and merging of traffic, and the fact they can not even lay out an expanded lane in a curve (flyover from old canton to 55S frontage at meadowbrook), I have no confidence in them AT ALL. Who signed off and accepted the work? Why have obvious mistakes been allowed to exist! Was contractor paid in full? Is retain age being held until mistakes corrected? Does anyone at MDOT even know what they are doing as it relates to public safety on the roadway? Then there is their reprogramming of traffic lights that are creating backups on to I55!! This will be an EPIC catastrophe !! and the worst part is that there will be an emergency that minutes will save a life, but that life will be lost due to this decision.

MDOT has few choices but to fix the bridges. Folks should understand that and live with it.

I can remember the Interstate feeding into Houston being S%#t for 10 years when they were redesigning it. I think I-20 between Tuscaloosa and Birmingham was under rebuild for 15 years while they were doing it. Look at the project on 49 south. We have highways (a good thing) and they need to be maintained and even then rebuilt occasionally (live with it).

@4:28
Putting traffic head to head at this location is not feasible. There are too many on/off ramps, other bridges, and structures in too close proximity. It would also take much longer to build the detours and provide the proper traffic control on the interstate than it will to complete the bridge work. The additional construction would mean the impact to traffic would be for a much longer period and have a greater impact on motorists’ safety.

This closure is necessary for this work to be done. It will allow the work to be done quickly and efficiently, and these five day closures will add multiple decades to the expected lifespan of these bridges.

Jas N Smith (MDOT)

Jas is one of the engineers that wasn’t qualified enough for a real job.

Cynical Sam- love it!!😂😂 wish I had thought of it!!

4:28 is one of THOUSANDS of city, state & federal workers ("employees", not workers) who monitor blog sites and surf the net throughout the day.

8:50pm.

It's Jas N. Not just Jas. You pronounce this communications specialist's name as "Jaysun". I don't know if that was his given "name" but suspect it was his communications specialist self that came up with that moniker.

Jas N (MDOT),

I'm not sure that the level of incompetence exercised by the MDOT in the past can touch this. To be a communication specialist you fail. You don't say the work is feasible then turn around and give reasons why the work would not be feasible if it was feasible to begin with.

No. Putting traffic head to head is feasible and is the safest and best option. There are no ramps or other bridges that would affect this. The speed in the area due to the stupidity of the original design of the curve, makes it very easy to combine traffic.

What it will do is cost more and it is certainly a situation where the public's safety and mobility is lower down the list of concerns than costs.

I'm going to finish up with the absolute idiocy that the MDOT fused into the "Stack" interchange. What engineers, with any kind of concern for doing a good job, would think that the 49 north offramp to 20/55 makes sense? It is a trucking area with 5 lanes of open straightway feeding into a 35 MPH turn. A turn that required a speed monitoring device not very long after completion of the project because the idiotic design proved to be unsafe.

Just to put a dot to the "i's" in interstate incompetence, Jas N was the former communications person for Jackson Public Schools.

Thanks @8:50, but I'm not an engineer. Glad to see you are handing out qualifications and credentials. Let me know where I need to apply for your expert approval.

And @8:56, there is this thing you can set up on Google that will alert you to keywords like "MDOT" so I don't have to spend all my time to "monitor blog sites and surf the net". Leaves more time for cat videos.

If you are interested in more actual info on the project you can find it here: http://bit.ly/I20closure

Thanks - Jas N

@8:56 I googled him (https://www.google.com/search?q=Jas+N+Smith+MDOT&oq=Jas+N+Smith+MDOT&aqs=chrome..69i57.3479j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8) and it appears part of his job IS to "monitor blog sites and surf the net throughout the day" as the Public Information Officer to keep the public informed. At least he was brave enough to speak up with some background and shed some light on an unpopular topic and the decisions that went into the closure.

@9:49 - You are correct. Thanks for the clarification on my name. I did work for JPS, as well as CNN, WebMD and Hattiesburg Schools.

If traffic were put head to head in that area it would require the construction of additional crossover lanes in both directions and those would require approach length not available at the site. Traffic would have to be switched over a great deal before the site, requiring 3 lanes condensed to 1 lane for miles impacting 93,000 vehicles per day. The existing plan impacts half that number of vehicles and does not put those vehicles into a condensed pattern at a worksite. The medians near the worksite would have to be filled and leveled and then lanes would have to be put into place along with additional traffic control. I don't see how this would be a better solution.

Also, in a head-to-head situation, a single accident would shut down I-20 completely in BOTH directions. Right now the travel will be congested but moving and will be safer.


But I appreciate your passion and concern. You clearly have put a lot of thought into this.


Thanks- Jas N

49 South through Richland has been one long pothole for at least 30 years. I remember thinking, as a child, that people that live in that area must be really poor. Because we didn’t have a lot of money, but we had good roads. I just assumed the people actually got out there and fixed the roads with money they saved. Boy, was I wrong.

10:19 Although possible, it seems unlikely that our tax dollars would be spent on a comedic entertainer who responds to keywords like "MDOT...HOT...SEXY" on his computer to "keep the public informed".

I guess they don't think we all have computers & internet to realize that on our own.

@8:47
...guilty as charged! Lol

Thanks
Jas N

Looks like it went ok. And construction wrapped up 46 hours ahead of schedule. Not bad.

Thanks
Jas N (MDOT)