Cloverleafs - the kind that occur when highways intersect: what do you think about them?
I think they are a really big nuissance. Sometimes I'll be biking along a highway that's legal to bike on, and I feel safe enough biking in the shoulder or something, but later on I have to either deal with navigating a tricky cloverleaf, or I have to make a big detour to get around the cloverleaf.
Obviously, cloverleafs aren't the most bike friendly intersections, but they are necessary in order to alleviate car congestion at some interchanges. I feel comfortable biking on them, depending where they are and how busy it is, but I know most people don't.
What are some good ways for state transportation departments to construct these types of "high car quantity" interchanges/intersections but to do so in a way that allows for bikes to continue along down the same road to get past them?
One solution is to build a pedestrian/bike bridge, to connect service roads that could run alongside the highway. This only works when there is 1) a service road nearby, and 2) there is enough room to build the bike bridge 3) enough funds within the city to build the bridge (since state DOTs usually don't pay for pedestrian bridges)
Another idea I thought of recently was this:
Construct a pathway that runs down the middle of the road (between the opposing traffic lanes) as it goes through the cloverleaf, with a barracade on each side of the pathway. The way pedestrians and bikes could access this cloverleaf is by boarding it from the crosswalk at the nearest intersection on both sides of the cloverleaf. The cost of this would probably be a lot cheaper than constructing a seperate pedestrian/bike bridge. This picture illustrates what I have in mind:
What do you think? What would it take to convince cities/states to look into this type of idea?