Yes, it's mainly the drivers behind the wheel that make us craziest. But what about the "slow-walkers," those pedestrians who get into the crossing area when into the cycle and then take their good old time getting across the street. Of course we are talking about able-bodied individuals and not those with one or fewer legs. These are the same people who also like to look deep into your eyes as if to ask if you are having a problem waiting for them. I have personally gotten better with this particular issue but it still seems to me that in order for traffic and transportation systems to work that every one needs to take the time allotted them; at least no more.
Bernie from Alexandria wrote about the issue of passive aggressiveness on the interstates: "It really doesn't matter which road you were writing about, the true driver will come out. I agree with you that the character trait of passive aggression is probably the most dangerous. I know that these drivers will argue that they are going the speed limit or that they have a right to do whatever it is that they are doing. The problem is that more than not the actions of these drivers put people at risk and cause accidents.
"The other thing that I see is that some of these same drivers play a particularly dangerous form of what we used to call 'Chicken' with others trying to merge into their lane. They will speed up or slow down to make it more difficult for others to merge. This creates totally unnecessary friction in the flow pattern of the roads and, again, causes accidents. It would certainly be nice if police could enforce these situations although I tend to doubt whether these drivers would have the [nerve] to pull these kind of stunts in front of a cop."
Thanks for that, Bernie. As always, there is never a cop around when you need one.
Here's another one of my pet peeves: people who don't pay attention to lane directions. There is an intersection in the west end of downtown. The far right lane must turn right according to the big sign just to the left of the intersection. The center lane can either turn right or go straight and the left lane must turn left. The problem is that too many drivers in the right lane want to go straight through instead of turning right. In most cases I think the misunderstanding is earnest--it certainly looked like that lane can and should go through the intersection.
The problem is that drivers in the center lane want to turn right from that perspective because they want to be in the left lane of the perpendicular road. I have yet to seen a crash there although I can't count how many times horns have been blown and one-hand gestures have been made because of this. It's one of those things that traffic engineers should check out and rethink. The problem is that they probably aren't getting a heads-up that a problem exists because there aren't more crashes. I for one just don't use that center lane any more because I don't want the hassle of a crash even though I would be in the right.
Steve Eldridge is a long-time reporter, observer and commentator on the Washington region's transportation issues. You can contact him directly by writing to: Steve@SprawlandCrawl.com. Unless otherwise requested, letters or portions of letters can be used within future columns. Letter writers will be identified by their first name and city/neighborhood.
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