CINCINNATI -- The Ohio Department of Transportation is asking the public to give it time to smooth out the problems that cropped up on the first day of entry ramp traffic lights along eastbound I-74 on Tuesday.
Long lines were reported throughout the morning rush hour trying to get to entrances at Colerain, Montana and Spring Grove avenues.
The red and green stop and go lights are part of a $3 million, two year ODOT project designed to reduce crashes and speed up traffic flow along the interstate during rush hour mornings. The new ramp metering signals only operate Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. until 9 a.m.
Kathy Rademacher lives on Cincinnati's Westside but works in Highland Heights, Kentucky. She tells 9News, "I've driven that route for 25 years and never had a problem getting onto inbound I-74. At 6:30 a.m., I couldn't even get to the entrance ramp (at Colerain Avenue) because of the new traffic monitoring system. I was late to work because I finally got out of line to find another entrance ramp to 74/75.
When Rademacher left that line of waiting cars at Colerain she says, "I looked into my rear view mirror, the line of cars was backed well onto Colerain Avenue."
Other motorists tell 9News, the green lights were far too quick or short at many of the entrance ramps. At the North Bend Road entrance, 9News crews could see the green light staying on less than a half second and then switching to red. That caused more than one motorist to stop, start at the next green, stop at red, and then start moving again at the next green light.
ODOT Lebanon spokeswoman Sharon Smigielski says her office has gotten numerous complaints about the first day of the I-74 ramp metering system operations. She says meetings are planned for later today to figure out how to tweak the system to make it work better and make motorists more comfortable with it.
Smigielski says she had heard that the green lights were too short on some of the ramps.
ODOT also says he noticed that at Montana and Colerain entrance ramps there are two lanes, but, out of habit, most motorists stayed in just one of them. The agency asks that motorists using either ramp remember they can use both lanes to come up to the entry ramp lights.
What do you think about the lights? Are there other ramps in the Tri-State you think need them? Let us know in the comment section below, our Facebook page or our TalkBack section on Twitter.
