[Editor’s note: Due to an editing error, the first paragraph of a letter in last week's Artvoice from Kevin Yost of Henrietta was truncated. The entire letter, now including the missing portion appears below.]

Indeed, the Skyway needs to come down and Route 5 should not be split between an elevated highway and Olmstead boulevard, but Hamburg Turnpike and Lake Shore Boulevard should be extended and take over the current highway route, traversing the Buffalo River by either a lower bridge or tunnel and split into Delaware, Elmwood, Hanover, Commericial, Main, Pearl, Bingham, and Franklin streets, as well as Marine Drive and Perry Boulevard on the Inner Harbor and do away with the Upper and Lower terraces. Exchange and Bingham streets should also be connected to each other as well.

As, well, U.S. 219 designation from Springville to Salamanca should be beneficial, as could extending Route 400 should be extended to Interstate 86 at Hinsdale. Both of these routes should be rerouted to connect to each other and to Interstate 190 and the New York State Thruway at the same interchange. Moreover, Interstate 190, should be removed between the I-290 interchange and a new interchange downtown with Michigan Avenue. Traffic should then be directed down River Road, Niagara Street, Michigan Avenue and several other downtown and Inner Harbor streets in between. I-190 should take on the I-290 designation from its interchange with that route just south of Grand Island to the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge. The extended Route 400 and portion of I-190 from the Thruway to downtown should then take on the designation of either “I-186” or “I-99” with the latter taking on the taking on the designation of U.S. 15 from I-86 at Corning to Williamsport and the designation of U.S. 220 from there to the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76) at Altoona. Perhaps, I-99 could run with I-90 from the possible I-90/I-190/219/400 interchange and take over the designation of I-290 and the remainder of I-190 from Tonawanda to Lewiston-Queenston.

The New York State Thruway Authority should be abolished and I-90 should be rerouted over the current Route 33 expressway from its current interchange with such highway to the portion of the Thruway to beyond Harris Hill road by extending what is now the Kensington-King Expressway to eliminate the bottlenecks that occur trying to access Route 33 coming down the Thruway to the east as well as trying to go down the Thruway from Route 33 or points south or west to Transit Road or beyond.

Also, the private Ambassador Niagara Bridge could be an asset to Buffalo and Fort Erie and the respective Black Rock and Bridgeburg districts if it is for non-commercial vehicles-only not trucks-only as part of Route 198 is supposed to be converted into a slower parkway. It would be nice if this were done to the highway in its entirety, as it was originally supposed to be, as well as doing the same to Route 33 between the split with 198 to downtown. Therefore, Humboldt Parkway would also be restored and this would make a “Humboldt-Scajacquada Parkway” complete with roundabouts from the east side of downtown to the QEW, instead of changing Fillmore Avenue to be an “Olmstead-Humboldt makeup.” Also, another bridge should be built between the western end of Sheridan Drive and the QEW as well as a new ferry on the route of the former Canadiana. Several ferries should criss-cross Lake Ontario and connect Youngstown, Rochester, and Oswego to various Canadian ports. Also, there should be a ferry across the Niagara River between Youngstown and Niagara-on-the-Lake

MetroRail needs also to be extended to a network across the Buffalo-Niagara metro area besides just the current single line between downtown and UB South Campus. We should have such a network between most cities and maybe most town across the U.S. as well, like Japan and France.

Kevin F. Yost
Henrietta

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