Chattanooga is the only major city in Tennessee that does not have a bypass.
I don't think the widening of lanes will help the traffic problems we have.
The plans for a bypass have been made. Spend the money on the bypass, not on things that won't help.
Why won't TDOT do it?
Ernie McCarson
Ooltewah
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Where should the Tennessee Department of Transportation build a bypass? They can’t, because it needs to go through North Georgia. And traffic on I-24 in Chattanooga just is not a big problem in Atlanta. It’s needed no doubt, I just don’t think it will ever happen.
George Odom
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Well, now, I have some perennial gripes about Interstate Highway construction. Primarily, what I see is 3-to-5 years of utter destruction and disruption, followed by (at best) 3-to-5 years of somewhat smooth running, and then the hateful cycle begins again.
As far as local 'improvement' projects go, I never see any truly local innovation. What I see is always local politicians copy-catting something they've seen somewhere else -- whether it's needed here or not, whether it fits here or not, whether we can afford it or not, we're going to do this, that, and the other!
But in the case of a bypass, the monkey-see-monkey-do approach isn't unreasonable. It's a fair argument that we are the only major city in Tennessee that doesn't have a bypass. In response to the first contrary response, even half a bypass would be better than none, and the northern half of a Chattanooga bypass would be entirely in Tennessee.
Then, for the southern half of a proper near-full-circle bypass, all we've gotta do is to convince Trenton (a logical starting place already served by I-59 from I-24), Lafayette, and Dalton how much they will benefit by having all that extra traffic passing through or near them -- millions of people annually spending their rest-stop money in those Georgia county seats rather than in Chattanooga.
And don't forget, when it comes to paying for Interstate highways, it's the federal government that puts up most of the money. I assume Georgia politicians are no different from those we have around here, and can be easily convinced: "Shucks, that new road through here will pay for itself in no time!"
Larry Cloud