In February, I mentioned that two (2) interchanges along I-85 in Gwinnett County were selected as possible candidates for a radical redesign called "diverging diamond". In case you didn't catch that blog, no problem. Just click here.

Since then, another Atlanta-area interchange has become a candidate for this particluar redesign, and according to the North DeKalb Neighbor, the I-285 interchange at Ashford-Dunwoody Road (Exit 29) is now one of them. Please click here to read the article.

If, according to the news article, the interchange redesign and reconfiguration is completed and open to trafffic by the beginning of next year, this would make it the very first "diverging diamond" in Georgia (and the Southeast) and only the second of its kind in the U.S.

Here's a video of America's first "diverging diamond" on I-44 at State Route 13 in Springfield, Missouri...



From what I have observed on the above YouTube video, I think that this redesign possibly has potential here in the Atlanta area. However, I wonder if the I-285/Ashford-Dunwoody interchange can really be both redesigned and rebuilt by the beginning of next year. If that is the plan, then the engineers would have to be working some serious overtime to get this done. Assuming the design has been done in record time, the construction crews would likely be working around the clock to meet any such deadline (assuming January 1, 2011 is the deadline). Even when the project becomes "shovel ready", it still has to be put out to bid, which, in and of itself, could take time.

Given what I have read in the Neighbor article, the Perimeter Community Improvement District seems to be extremely ambitious, and I would be concerned regarding the overall quality of the finished product. Granted it shouldn't be taking forever to complete the work (as is the case of the GA 141 widening in Forsyth County), but there needs to be some reasonable amount of time built into the project plan from design to construction and completion. As a Georgia taxpayer and frequent driver of Metro Atlanta's roads, I feel that we are owed a satisfactory "return-on-investment".

Thanks to Andy Dickerson for forwarding the article to me and to y'all for reading. If you have any "heads up" regarding road projects anywhere in Georgia, then please feel free to do as Andy did and e-mail the info to steve at georgiaroadgeek dot com.

That's it for now. Thanks for reading and please come back often.

 

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