West East Road report !!!

[TeJay]

Doing some traveling and thought I'd report what we've experienced so far. Will update as we encounter other roads.

I-44 across MO from west of Springfield to St. Louis. It is a beautiful road to drive. A lot of traffic but very smooth 98% of the way. We have traveled that a lot over the years and have seen it get better over the years. That gets an "A".

Most of the time we travel straight through St. Louis but twice have taken the southern bypass around and just like before it was bad. Very little done (except getting worse) on it in the last 4 years. Maybe the traffic was less but the road was awful.

It's interesting to notice the same interstate as one travels from state to state. Sometimes there is a drastic change crossing the state line. This trip that has not been the case. Most of the bad roads crossed state lines with few if any improvements.

I-70 across IL has its moments. Some of it is good and some isn't. We know the cities and many overpasses are usually worse.

I-70 west side of IN is not good and I-70 east of Indy went down hill and it really sucks. The trip straight through INDY was the worst of our travels ever. Two hours to travel 10 miles surrounded by semi's with 6 lanes of traffic merging, cutting in and crossing lanes to exit up the road a piece was awful. Many folks heading home and of course they knew where they were going and were determined to get there no matter what. The entire southern route of 465 around St. Louis was closed. Every vehicle had to get through taking some other route and most of it funneled onto I-70 straight through.

While traveling I-70 we both noticed a large increase in semi's. Most of the time they outnumbered the cars. Maybe it's the economy but it was much worse than we have ever experienced.

IN is not spending much $$$$ on highways. The PA interstate roads were in good to very good condition.

I-79 North from Pittsburgh to Erie was very nice with some of it very fresh blacktop which we know gives the best surface if it's placed on a concrete base.

Will update as we travel.

[leadman]

Thanks for the report. I'll be sure to avoid St. Louis on the trip back to Az. from Michigan.
New Mexico roads are not very good in general either, just in case anyone is going that way,

[dix39]

We've been traveling these E-W interstates as well as a lot of N-S routes every year since the late '70's except a couple when we went to AK and a boat trip in the San Juan's. I would agree wholeheartedly that truck traffic has increased significantly since then.

Going into St Louis W-E on 70 we usually take 370, 270, 70, but this year we went S into KY on 64 in order to visit the Ark. I don't know the exact roads we used to get there as I was mostly on "autopilot" with the GPS, but it didn't seem too bad. The worst on this trip was coming back when I chose to go N off 40W on 49 and 29 to Omaha and catch 80. The road through the city was terrible and we even had a piece of pipe thrown at us by the vehicle in front. It hit the MH but didn't cause any damage.

We usually take the S bi-pass through Indy after trying a straight through years ago. When going to Oskosh EAA E-W we would go N on the bi-pass and catch 65. KC was always straight through either way. It was always like a load had been lifted off my shoulders when we finally got past Topeka on 70 heading W. Only Denver and SLC remained to be navigated. I still haven't figured out a good way to get around Denver. Getting through SLC on 80 is mostly about knowing which lane to be in and the GPS helped with that, except for the detours this year. We also went through Birmingham on 20 this trip which had detours because of construction and "mislead" the GPS. Like TeJay in Indy, it took me a while to figure out that mess.

Driving through large cities and in heavy traffic is the pits. Almost as bad as dumping the holding tanks.

Have a great trip.

Steve

[Bob_C]

Will be heading thru St. Louis in 2 weeks on I-70, then onto I-64, coming from the west....better time of day or night?

[F4Gary]

Why wouldn't you take 270 around the north side of St Louis? It's much shorter.
Maybe you meant Indy?
The bypass around the south side of Indy is closed.
I would have taken 465 north to 38th st and then east to 65 and on to 70.
Google maps traffic is a great feature.
It show 70 all jammed up right now (1pm) before it joins with 65 then normal flow.

[Mojim]

Originally Posted by bob caldwell

Will be heading thru St. Louis in 2 weeks on I-70, then onto I-64, coming from the west....better time of day or night?

avoid am rush hour 6-9 am you'll be fine ….

[Bob_C]

Originally Posted by Mojim

avoid am rush hour 6-9 am you'll be fine ….

Thanks.......been thru there 2 times, but it's been a while....

[TeJay]

The DW is the Co-pilot and gives me directions. I just respond with, "Yes dear". Things go better that way even if we end up at the CG around midnight!!!!

If you don't think that was funny neither did she!!!!

I-86 the southern route through NY was good toady. At times I couldn't see any other traffic front or rear. Eventually as we got closer to Corning and Binghamton, NY it did get worse but still nothing like INDY and few semi's. I guess it's not a good truck route.

The roads were also very good except for a a few miles through Corning and around Binghamton. The scenery was always stunning.

[TeJay]

We arrived at our destination. The 2nd to last day across VT and NH (routes 9, 102 & 202) was not good only because of all the rain. The roads were mostly 2-lane hilly and through small NE towns. Nice but got boring after a few hours. Mostly those roads were good so no complaints.

Eventually we got into ME and I-95 was good. Since we avoided 495 around Boston we missed most of the awful overpasses which there are many, many under and over passes with all the roads coming into and out of all the towns.

Without a doubt the worst road was I-70 through IN. Especially through Indy and East.
We came that way 4 years ago and I believe they were even worse back then. Next to IN roads probably was OH. They had some good and some not so good.

Sorry!! Back up on post #1 I miss spoke. That was 465 around INDY that was closed on the southern half and not through St. Louis.

We did take the by-pass south around St. Louis and it's not a very good road. I think if you hit it at the correct time going straight through is OK. The road isn't much better but it's at least shorter.

Don't ever go through St. Louis when they are having a pro baseball game. That would be a good time to take the by-pass.

We always try to never hit any big city during rush hours.