From a broader urban planning and public policy perspective:
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For a while, this was the widest freeway bridge on the planet. In a metropolitan area that isn't even in the top 150 by population, IIRC.
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I guess the component in Coquitlam has some redeeming quality in that, instead of bisecting neighbourhoods, it's a firewall between the suburbs and our increasingly scarce light industrial land?
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The whole thing is just… …even if some of the road lanes get converted for transit-dedicated use in the future, well, it's on a corridor where heavy rail would make the most sense, but I'm not sure the geometry or structures are up to that task.
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Most of this car capacity basically exists for the purpose of dumping cars onto Gaglardi, Willingdon, Boundary, Grandview/12th, East 1st, Hastings, Marine, and Lonsdale. None of those streets need even one (1) more car on them. (The corollary being that people in the Valley absolutely, completely deserve, not kidding, fifty times the current level of rail service into and through Vancouver.)
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The design of this whole stretch of Highway 1 is basically as useless as possible to the people most affected by having this gigantic freeway interchange system right near their houses.
But it's not even that good to drive on, either:
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Trying to get from Surrey to Coquitlam City Centre? Better choose the right lane five kilometres in advance, dipshit.
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Want to go to Downtown Surrey? Too bad, bozo, you picked the wrong lane two municipal borders ago.
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Just admire how Highway 1 crosses right over Highway 17, with the quickest route between the two being, uh, many kilometres in length.
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Trying to get to Surrey from somewhere along the Mary Hill Bypass? You better not miss the turnoff for United Boulevard or take any wrong turns after there!
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For certain routes, there's a lot of jarring speed transitions that I'm pretty sure are usually discouraged for freeway interchanges.
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Certain underpasses in the interchange are basically built to flood as easily as possible, as far as I can tell. (I'm half-kidding, but.)
When I was 17, my grandparents lived basically right next to newark airport and my grandfather, who had started developing cataracts, sold me his car for 100 bucks. It was a piece of junk but more importantly in order to get home to my parents house out in the woods, I had to drive home from Elizabeth with my new car that I had never driven before through some of the worst road interchanges known to scientists. And it's not like the Chevy Lumina was a particularly graceful car to drive, the thing handled like a boat.
Also, I should point out, I was 17 in 2004. GPS standalone units were out there but were pretty uncommon, and smartphones weren't even invented yet. So you just kind of had to know where you were going or look it up ahead of time, and if you fucked up, well shit I guess you're in Kearny now. Time to start driving in a single direction until I see a highway I recognize.
Also if you are confused, US 1 and US 9 run concurrently through most of northern New Jersey, they split somewhere around Perth Amboy, where 9 continues to The Jersey Shore towns down the coast and 1 hangs west towards Trenton, where it spills over into PA. Anyway, everyone north of Perth Amboy just calls it "One and Nine" and even the signs depict "1-9" in the little highway shield thing, which is not something I've seen any other highway concurrences do.
As someone on hell Island I have to bring up Spaghetti Junction (M6/A38 Gravelly Hill near Birmingham)
Shit thing, I hate seeing it
I can't drive I just hate it
