Hurricane, Holiday Cause Traffic Changes On Highway 29

September 2, 2008

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Hurricane Gustav led to unusual Labor Day weekend traffic patterns in North Escambia.

There is one live traffic counter in North Escambia located on Highway 29 just south of Century. It records and reports hourly data on traffic patterns, including vehicle counts and the average speed at the location.

On Sunday afternoon, northbound traffic at the traffic counter jumped from a Labor Day weekend average of about 310 vehicles per hour to a high of 480 vehicles per hour as people headed north from the coast.

A notable decrease in northbound traffic was observed Monday morning, due to both the holiday and the hurricane. During the 7 a.m. hour on a Monday morning, 222 vehicles per hour normally head north on Highway 29 toward Century. Monday morning, that number was just 83 vehicles during that hour.

Southbound traffic on Sunday did was not far off average, with about 260 vehicles per hour headed south compared to a normal of about 280 per hour.

Southbound traffic was much lighter than normal Monday morning, dropping from an average of about 200 vehicles per hour to about 35 vehicle per hour headed south.

Speed was not a problem for the weekend traffic. The average speed per hour ranged from 61 mph to 70 mph. The 70 mph was the average speed of the 262 northbound vehicles Monday morning between 11 a.m. and noon. The speed limit in the area is 65 mph.

Pictured above: This graph shows in yellow the weekend northbound traffic count at an automated counter on Highway 29 just south of Century; the green line is the weekend average. Pictured below: The same information for the southbound side of the highway.

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Written by William Reynolds · Filed Under News