Disneyland Drive reversable lanes

[potzbie]

Am I the only one who is amazed and who gawks at the reversable lanes of Disneyland Drive (the yellow-marker lanes perpendicular to, and over, Ball Road)?

I drive to DL using the south I-5 and get off at the marked spot so that I can park at Mickey And Friends.
I sometimes use the reversable lanes to go in, if it is still morning.
The reversable lanes are always outbound by afternoon.

Do you know the HOURS at which the change occurs?
Do they reverse the lanes every single day?

And ain't it just a marvel whoever thought up such a concept?

[MommyTo3Boys1Girl]

They have something like this in Phoenix. It is for the traffic flow, commuting in and out of down town. It is one way in the morning, for like 3 hours, and then the opposite direction in the afternoon, for about 3 hours. It works well, until some idiot doesn't read the signs. LOL

[bassett1976]

I think they start to change around 1pm or so. We've seen the crew out working in the afternoon. They shut down the entrance traffic one lane at a time and then no one uses the lanes for a while. Then they open the outbound lanes a little while later.

[junglemom]

Tucson had these since before I was born, and just a year or two ago finally phased out that last of them. They were on the heavy trafficed roads that traveled towards downtown. In the morning the extra lane headed downtown 7-9 am and in the evening they headed away 4-6. I hated them, I forgot once and tried to make a left in one and had a car coming right at me!!!

[cfrith]

That is so wierd .

[Alex S.]

Quite a few large cities have them in some form, though I'm not familiar with any others in the Los Angeles area (not surprising since I'm not really familiar with the Los Angeles area).

The first ones I encountered were in Vancouver, Canada, in 1986, where they are used heavily to help with rush hours. Freaked my parents out (I was 12 at the time).

In the San Francisco area we have one big example of it in the Caldecott Tunnel. This "tunnel" is actually three separate tunnels. The two outside tunnels go in opposite directions permanently. The middle tunnel changes direction based on the prevailing flow of traffic (towards the Bay in the morning, towards the suburbs in the evening).

[cstephens]

There are also times when the flyover has one lane going in each direction, with orange cones in the middle as a divider.

[soccerlady16]

Quite a few large cities have them in some form, though I'm not familiar with any others in the Los Angeles area (not surprising since I'm not really familiar with the Los Angeles area).

.

I live in the LA area and haven't seen any anywhere else. I think its a great idea and should be use in other places too

[evrythngwmn]

Quite a few large cities have them in some form, though I'm not familiar with any others in the Los Angeles area (not surprising since I'm not really familiar with the Los Angeles area).

The first ones I encountered were in Vancouver, Canada, in 1986, where they are used heavily to help with rush hours. Freaked my parents out (I was 12 at the time).

In the San Francisco area we have one big example of it in the Caldecott Tunnel. This "tunnel" is actually three separate tunnels. The two outside tunnels go in opposite directions permanently. The middle tunnel changes direction based on the prevailing flow of traffic (towards the Bay in the morning, towards the suburbs in the evening).

The ones in Vancouver are the only ones I've seen outside of DL. Totally freaked my friend and I out. We just couldn't believe it worked.

[briangl]

They had them in Seattle about 10 years ago on the 1st Ave. S. bridge. The bridge was 50mph, had a open grated metal deck (slick), and opposing traffic was only separated by a row of cones. People called them the suicide lanes as there were many deadly accidents. We wisely got rid of them. They do make sense at DL since the traffic is low speed < 30mph.

[MermaidHair]

The Golden Gate Bridge is a classic example of reversable lanes. It is a total of 6 lanes wide. In the morning they have 4 lanes going into San Francisco. Mid-day they switch it to 3 and 3 and in the evening it is 4 lanes leaving the city. At nigt they generally have 2 lanes going in, 2 lanes going out and 2 lanes in the middle closed as a buffer zone.

[Alex S.]

D'oh! Forgot about the Golden Gate Bridge, which for most people is probably a more noteworthy example than the Caldecott Tunnel.

[evrythngwmn]

The Golden Gate Bridge is a classic example of reversable lanes. It is a total of 6 lanes wide. In the morning they have 4 lanes going into San Francisco. Mid-day they switch it to 3 and 3 and in the evening it is 4 lanes leaving the city. At nigt they generally have 2 lanes going in, 2 lanes going out and 2 lanes in the middle closed as a buffer zone.

Guess in my many trips to San Francisco I've never seen it operate like this.

[Malcon10t]

Guess in my many trips to San Francisco I've never seen it operate like this.

Unless you are in the middle of rush hour traffic, you really wouldn't. Its been like that since back in the early 60s. It is a great system, and they are studying putting a moveable barrier to prevent head on accidents.

[evrythngwmn]

Unless you are in the middle of rush hour traffic, you really wouldn't. Its been like that since back in the early 60s. It is a great system, and they are studying putting a moveable barrier to prevent head on accidents.

Well, we're not morning people so we would've missed it then. Guess we just never timed it right in the evenings. Now I've got something new to check out on my next trip. In addition they're building a new location there for one of my favorite day spas.

[Darkbeer]

The San Diego Bay Bridge actually has concrete movable K rails that can change the number of lanes in each direction. (A special tractor can pick them up and move them over one line at a time.)

On Interestate 15 in San Diego, they have a set of car pool lanes in the middle of the freeway that go south in the morning, and then go north in the evening.

[Bolivar]

It isn't that noticeable on the Golden Gate Bridge. It is basically orange traffic cones placed between the lanes (except they are yellow and not shaped like cones). When they change a lane a big orange truck drives down the lane with a guy on one side pulling up the cones and a guy on the other putting new ones down.

It has been a big political football for years, decades really. One side says it is way to dangerous and they need to replace this system with a moveable barrier and the other side saying that would be worse. The issue is that the bridge was built in 1932 and is too narrow -- the six lanes it has now are narrower than standard lanes of traffic. If you add the thickness of a barrier it gives even less space for the lanes.

[MermaidHair]

D'oh! Forgot about the Golden Gate Bridge, which for most people is probably a more noteworthy example than the Caldecott Tunnel.

No worries, I had not thought about the Tunnel until you mentioned it and I live less than 2 miles from it!

[SeansMom]

The express lanes in Seattle still reverse, if I'm not mistaken. I don't know how they decide if they are reverse southbound or northbound. Of course, they are barricaded in a way that you can't really access them if they are closed. Gotta love the yellow tiled tunnels in those express lanes .

[CrazyTrain]

They do it in Denver and on some bridges in NY state. (Though, not with really with cones, but it's the same concept)

I love that DL does this. I hate going to the stop light... it's like DL is teasing me, just on the other side but i'm stuck at red.

What is dangerous is the way its set up in the evenings... I'd say 85% of the time, someone has to cut over traffic to take the overpass. It seems like most think that they HAVE to go that way to get to a 5, so they cut across in a panic. I've been forced down to the stop light sometimes because of this. (Not to mention almost getting hit!)

Also, the signs at the 5 are tricky and a bit misleading.

[darph nader]

Tucson had these since before I was born, and just a year or two ago finally phased out that last of them. They were on the heavy trafficed roads that traveled towards downtown. In the morning the extra lane headed downtown 7-9 am and in the evening they headed away 4-6. I hated them, I forgot once and tried to make a left in one and had a car coming right at me!!!

I remember those from years ago. I very rarely drove in the so called fast lane.The one of few times i did going down Grant RD. i met a semi toe to toe. He blared his horn at me then he realised he 'messed' up.Every time i hear reversible lanes i have a desire to drive backwards.

[TowerofTerror]

I like them it cool glad they are they at Disneyland.

[Mark Goldhaber]

They do it in Denver and on some bridges in NY state. (Though, not with really with cones, but it's the same concept)

Yeah, every time I approach the Tappan Zee Bridge, I wonder if we're going to have the extra lane or not.

[nightdesigns]

Seattle has the only reversible lanes that I've seen that don't physically require someone to make the change. It's a separate section of the freeway between the 2 regular sides about 3 lanes wide. There are barriers that open and close the entrance and exit lanes.

The disneyland lanes seem labor intensive to me. Seems like it'd be easier to make the dividers pop-out of the ground instead of having someone place them manually.

[Alex S.]

Well, for the cone method they pay a driver and a cone man to do it and neither is probably a great paying job. Plus a truck and maintenance on that.

To use an automated method would require a very expensive investment in technology (and I don't know if that overpass technically belongs to Disney or to Anaheim) and then either expensive mechanics able to maintain/fix it or an expensive maintenance contract and then when it does break it has a chance of rendering the overpass unusable depending on how it fails.

In the short and middle term, manual labor is probably quite a bit cheaper and in the long term you don't have the mechanical frustration.

The Caldecott Tunnel near San Francisco is automated to a degree. It uses yellow plastic prongs that sheath strait down into the street and then pop back up depending on what is wanted but each individual prong is still triggered by remote control from a truck that drives along the lane. I imagine this is
so that mechanics can quickly deal with it if something doesn't work right.