An open letter to the drivers of the Puget Sound
You see those red octagon-shaped things sitting at many corners? Those are called STOP SIGNS. You are supposed to STOP at the sign.
And do you see the white line painted on the road in front of the stop sign? That's the line that tells you where to stop.
To those of you in the Safeway parking lot across from my work - YOU have a red sign and a white line. I do NOT have a sign and a line coming in from the entry I use. That means YOU have to stop and I do not. You must wait for me to pass through, and THEN if it is CLEAR you may go. I'm a considerate person, and would be willing to stop and let you through, but between the traffic coming off the street and the back-up created by the poorly-placed gas station, loitering in that little stretch of pavement is not a desirable option.
And to those of you coming from the side streets onto the main drag - you must STOP at the LINE and THEN you may, if necessary, creep forward in order to see if it is clear for you to turn onto the street. When you drive full-speed to the exact spot where the cross-streets intersect and then stopping on a dime you force me to defensively swerve around you. Thank goodness there hasn't been oncoming traffic any of the multiple times I've been forced to do this in the last three days. Sorry, but I've had one too many jerks cut in front of me and two too many jerks run red lights and crush my car to trust you to stop.
These really aren't difficult rules to follow. Get these right and I may even give you a little more leeway on the whole merge issue.
OK, rant over.
And do you see the white line painted on the road in front of the stop sign? That's the line that tells you where to stop.
To those of you in the Safeway parking lot across from my work - YOU have a red sign and a white line. I do NOT have a sign and a line coming in from the entry I use. That means YOU have to stop and I do not. You must wait for me to pass through, and THEN if it is CLEAR you may go. I'm a considerate person, and would be willing to stop and let you through, but between the traffic coming off the street and the back-up created by the poorly-placed gas station, loitering in that little stretch of pavement is not a desirable option.
And to those of you coming from the side streets onto the main drag - you must STOP at the LINE and THEN you may, if necessary, creep forward in order to see if it is clear for you to turn onto the street. When you drive full-speed to the exact spot where the cross-streets intersect and then stopping on a dime you force me to defensively swerve around you. Thank goodness there hasn't been oncoming traffic any of the multiple times I've been forced to do this in the last three days. Sorry, but I've had one too many jerks cut in front of me and two too many jerks run red lights and crush my car to trust you to stop.
These really aren't difficult rules to follow. Get these right and I may even give you a little more leeway on the whole merge issue.
OK, rant over.
posted by Swankette at 6:36 PM
3 Comments:
You are officially invited to come drive around Boston some. My favorite thing about driving out here is the consistent lack of lane markings between lanes going the same direction. It makes for situations in which, on a wide street, some people assume it's three lanes in the same direction and drive that way and others assume two lanes. And everyone is stubbornly driving their own way. Ack!
kaphine
OH, that used to happen when I lived in San Antonio. There was one road just north of campus (that realsupergirl could probably help me determine the name of) that was either a REALLY WIDE one lane road or a REALLY NARROW two lane road, and people would just randomly decide how many lanes to make it.
One really wide lane or two lanes with no marker? That describes most of the streets in San Antonio. Probably though if you're talking north of Trinity, maybe it was San Pedro, or N. St. Mary's?
The streets are wide in San Antonio because we have no sidewalks. We walk our dogs in the street.
In Boston, it doesn't matter if there are lane markings because people drift from one lane to the other whenever the hell they feel like it, without signaling.
Post a Comment
<< Home