Well, almost. Had to drive to DFW today and was glad to see it all mostly done except the stretch between Hearne and Calvert. They were diligently working on that when I was going through. Would be nice if we got a bypass around those two towns too.

Oh well. Back to lunch at one of those restaurants we don't have.

They will fight that bypass tooth and nail. H6 is a cash cow for both.

No bypass as far as i know, but the last of the major construction of 2-lane to 4-lane is in the seven mile stretch between Calvert and Hearne.

They've got a good start on, but there's still a lot of subgrade work going in, and not a lot of the bridging and culvert work quite done, so there's a couple years' worth left to do out there--at least to my eye.

Other than that bit, 6 is 4-lane from Loop 340 to Hempstead.

If you've not been recently, Reagan is completely by-passed--you no longer even have to slow down. But, Pneumatic Products has been doing their best to beautify their campus, and the City Limits.

Kind of sad to see how empty the "Highway 6 RV Park" is with the roadwork moved to the Calvert-Hearne stretch.

Riesel looks a lot different with the huge powerplant just west of town.

techno-ag. iam curious. how long does it take you to get to dfw with the route you take thru waco and then i guess to i35? i head east to i45 to get to dallas

Hwy 6 through Calvert and Hearne is going to be like 290 going through Giddings eventually.
I bet if you ask Giddings folks if they regret not allowing a bypass they would tell that they do.

amadeob -- It's practically the same either way you go. I have family in Waco so I almost always go that route.

3 hours to Ft. Worth if there's no traffic. It's under 200 miles. Biggest problems occur around holidays when traffic stacks up between Waco and Hillsboro. They've done great work improving the Interstate in Hillsboro to where it's 6 lanes now. Hopefully that will help. Many times in the past I'd cut through Mexia to avoid that mess.

Someone told me there is a plan for a bypass around Hearne. The new Holiday Inn Express was built on the edge of town in expectation of being near the bypass. Dunno about Calvert but I sure hope so. You have to drive slow for about 4 miles through there.

I drove down to CS for the Tech football game a few months back. First time back to Aggieland in 4 years after living out of state. I was excited to see the changes on campus and around town. But I was most shocked and pleasntly surprised to see how nice the drive down Hwy 6 from Waco to CS was. MUCH MUCH improved from my days as a student!

Another question - does anyone know why the speed limit 0n Highway 6 drops from 70 to 65 when you cross the Grimes-Waller County line and stays there all the way to Houston? (Not that anyone obeserves it!)

Rob it's an urban county. Lower speed limits allegedly lower smog, though I doubt that's true. You'll see the same thing in the counties surrounding the other big cities in Texas.

Thanks, Techno-Ag! I can see them doing that for Harris County. I never considered Waller County as "urban," but I guess it's so close to Houston that they considered it an extended part of Harris County.

The speed limit must be lower one county out around Harris COunty.

It actuallyw as lowered to 55 a few years ago, but then they changed it to 65. Also, word was that many judges were throwing out speeding tickets below 70 in those areas that had been lowered to 55.

I think those outlying counties have to do tailpipe inspections for inspection stickers too. Very expensive.

Yep. if USEPA gives an area a "non-compliant" surface-level ozone rating, then the abutting counties are assumed to "share" in the non-compliance.

TCEQ arbitrarily decided that lower speed=lower emissions, which is why it was 55 in Waller Co down 290 for a while. Compliance with the 55 speed limit was about nil; and everybody and their brother campaigned to change the limit.

Then TxDoT applied their rule for speed limits based on county population and traffic flow counts. Which is why I-45 slows to 65 near Ennis, then 60 at Red Oak.

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Standing guard, even sitting behind a desk

Occupational hazard of my occupation just not being around

You will get run over going too slow in some of those artificially lower speed limit areas. I go down to 65 outside Hillsboro like a good citizen, but people are always flying past me like I'm standing still.