Highway 40 countdown sign not counting
Southbound motorists on Interstate 170 today noticed someone inspecting the Highway 40 countdown sign - one of three digital placards counting off the remaining time on the massive reconstruction project.
The digital sign wasn’t working. And it still wasn’t functioning early this afternoon, said MoDOT spokeswoman Linda Wilson. Gateway Constructors, the team rebuilding Highway 40, has had some problems with the computer chips running the countdown clocks.
The right southbound lane was closed today so the the worker could take a closer look at the sign. The work is expected to be finished this afternoon.
Motorist reaction has been mixed since the signs went up in late 2007. Some people were a little annoyed early on when they got an eyeful of all the time that remained on the two-year project, Wilson said. Now that the remaining time until the end of this year - and the project - is winding down, people are a little more accepting.
Nope, still annoying. The only piece of information necessary is the largest unit of time, e.g. “3 months”. We don’t need to know whether it’s 3 months and 5 days, or 3 months and 23 days. What difference would it make? Once there’s less than a month, then sure, tell us the number of days. Until then, the number of days is just noise (as was the number of hours, minutes, and seconds when they first deployed the signs).
Wonder if they are slowing down so that the unemployment numbers don’t jump again when all of the workers have to find other jobs? Maybe the days are slipping?
Nope, still fun! Looking forward to the sign being active again and the days ticking down!
Kryalessa…do you always take things too seriously? Three signs. A passing glance at the most as you drive by. And you think they are annoying? Really?
I haven’t been on 40 since it originally shut down, but I go underneath it or over it every work day. I am sure I would find the countdown signs to be annoying, particularly if they are wrong, however, worse than that is the appearance of the new McCausland overpass. My, is that ugly. The lighting on the Hampton and Kingshighway overpasses is also terribly unattractive and cheap looking. I hope the new roadway works out for all involved, but I give the project a “D” for aesthetics.
Does anyone else think that it is stupid that they shut down the right southbound lane to have a worker take a closer look at a sign?? Who cares if it is working, how about getting back to work!!! It is probably a stupid union rule.
Seems like this was a pet project for somebody. seems like a waste of money and effort. I am sure some drunken marketing or public relations person thought this would have been a good idea.
This story is dates mid-last-week, yet Saturday night, coming EAST on I-64 near Mason road, toward I-270, that countdown clock was also not working. Said something about 99 months! Maybe it IS working, and they’ve hit a glitch in construction!
Whether things work or not isn’t important, people! This is America, after all - remember? As long as it’s DONE, and ON TIME - and provides HUGE multi-billion dollar bonuses to all execs and owners involved, it’s a wrap!
They worked for a while - that’s probably more than they expected!
Well HarvardLaw, I’ve dealt with enough mindless lawyers to know that they don’t know the first thing about construction, and that getting a half billion dollar road project open in under 2 years is a pretty bid deal.
Sorry, somehow got on the wrong post