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Josh - It took more than an hour to get to work today...
09:44 am September 21st, 2005
irilyth
[info]irilyth
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It took more than an hour to get to work today...
...because I spent forty-five minutes (I checked) between Watertown Square and the loop around the hotel south of there. It should take about forty-five seconds to get from one to the other. Not sure what the problem was, but it may have been deliberately induced by local police: At the exit of the loop, there was a sign saying "Mayor Whatsisname is unfair to Newton Firefighters", and another underneath it saying "Sorry for the inconvenience! Call Mayor Whatsisname at 666-whatsisnumber". Were the police sufficiently pissed off about Mayor Whatsisname's treatment of the firefighters that they shut down a major commuting route during rush hour? In my world, they would all be fired for a stunt like that. (If the firefighters are pissed off at Mayor Whatsisname, they should let his house burn down, not get their police friends to harass motorists on their behalf.)

If I had known it would be three days running, I would've started this series on Monday. To fill in retroactively:

(Monday) ...because I thought that the large street running from the outskirts of Somerville to the outskirts of Cambridge (16) would be a fast way to get to Watertown Square, failing to realize that it would actually be flooded with the 1.3 million people who live north of Somerville and work in Boston, and who don't have any way to get there.

(Tuesday) ...because I twice got into a lane that turned out to be turn-only or no-turns, although there was no way I could possibly have known this ahead of time -- there aren't any signs that tell you ahead of time, the only way to know is to be familiar with the route -- and lost half an hour trying to thread my way through a maze of one-way streets to get back on course.

Who knows what Thursday will bring! I can't wait!

Boston driving and traffic are FUCKED UP, and I'll perhaps talk more about why some other time, but I'm an hour late for work right now, so I should probably get to it.
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Comment by Nicolas Q. Wardington III
ultranurd From: [info]ultranurd Date: September 21st, 2005 01:47 pm (UTC) (Link)
What I haven't figured out is why traffic on Mt. Auburn St. near my apartment is so variable. I leave at the same time every day, and sometimes I have to waste 10 minutes and wait several light cycles to get through three intersections, whereas other times I can take my right, zip 3 blocks, and take my left without stopping and without any cars cutting me off.
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Comment by sarahparah
From: [info]sarahparah Date: September 21st, 2005 02:03 pm (UTC) (Link)
Heh. That's right. Sometimes I have to remind myself why it's OK that I don't live there any more: Shitty weather and unbelievably bad driving and traffic!

Glad to hear you are settling in though. You are missed!!
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Comment by ruthling
ruthling From: [info]ruthling Date: September 21st, 2005 02:06 pm (UTC) (Link)
I thought we warned you ;)

Welcome! We have to like see each other sometime now that you're here.
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Comment by blue shark of friendliness
ckd From: [info]ckd Date: September 21st, 2005 02:09 pm (UTC) (Link)
More on the protest.
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Thread started by Wayman
wayman From: [info]wayman Date: September 21st, 2005 03:19 pm (UTC) (Link)
Boston area driving tip #1: Avoid the left lane because it tends to unexpectedly become an unmarked left turn only lane.

Boston area driving tip #2: Avoid the right lane because in the event that it doesn't unexpectedly become an unmarked right turn only lane, you will be stuck behind a bus forever.

I think the three-word answer as to why Boston driving is so fucked up is "seventeenth-century cows".
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ultranurd From: [info]ultranurd Date: September 21st, 2005 04:43 pm (UTC) (Link)
Somebody recently told me that it's not cowpaths, but older: pre-colonial hunting trails, which naturally followed the trails of game.

So we can probably blame Ice Age mammals, or something.
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From: [info]eastgategirl Date: September 21st, 2005 07:34 pm (UTC) (Link)
But neither seventeenth-century cows nor ice-age mammals can explain why there are so many consecutive one-way streets going the same way in Boston.
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orawnzva From: [info]orawnzva Date: September 22nd, 2005 02:16 am (UTC) (Link)
The ice-age mammals were only going one way?
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From: [info]jayjaybobay Date: September 22nd, 2005 12:14 pm (UTC) (Link)
One word: migration.
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From: [info]elysdir Date: September 25th, 2005 02:17 am (UTC) (Link)
Sympathies on the commute suckage.

This won't actually help, but you might find it entertaining if you haven't seen it before: my "How to drive in Boston: a survival guide." Written, I think, after spending a few months in Boston during my Wanderjahr. These days, I refuse to drive in the Boston area, no matter how much more convenient it makes things, simply because I get way too stressed when I try it.

...Maybe I ought to add Wayman's left-lane/right-lane notes to that page....
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Comment by riffraff814
riffraff814 From: [info]riffraff814 Date: September 21st, 2005 04:39 pm (UTC) (Link)
Motorcycle. (although, that probably only helps if lanesharing is legal...)
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Thread started by BDan
tirerim From: [info]tirerim Date: September 21st, 2005 05:16 pm (UTC) (Link)
Are there no good MBTA options for getting you where you need to go? Or, for that matter, combination options involving driving to a station and then taking the T? Of course, if your commute will actually be reasonably short once you adapt to the local insanity, it might be easier just to drive.
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psocoptera From: [info]psocoptera Date: September 21st, 2005 10:44 pm (UTC) (Link)
As best as I can figure, the T route would involve so many transfers you'd be spending as much time just waiting for buses and trains as you would doing the driving, plus also having to do the driving (at least for any bus parts, the bus will also be on the same road as your car could be). We are pretty T savvy up here, you know. ::grin:: Sadly it is just not always convenient.
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Comment by secretslip
secretslip From: [info]secretslip Date: September 21st, 2005 06:19 pm (UTC) (Link)
May I recomment a phone post while you're stuck in traffic? Curse as you will, I'll transcribe it for you :)

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Comment by Andy
andele From: [info]andele Date: September 21st, 2005 07:51 pm (UTC) (Link)
Heh. Rhode Island is worse. As I've said before, if you were in a helicopter looking down at Boston and Providence, the cars would be behaving in roughly the same manner. However, on the ground, you realize the major difference. In Boston, drivers act out of sheer malevolence. They know it's wrong, but they are intentionally trying to kill you. At least they're semi-competent and semi-predictable.

In Providence, drivers are utterly clueless. They don't even know that there are these things called "traffic laws," much less what the laws actually are. They act out of sheer incompetence, which is even scarier than competent malice (cf. 1984 and Brazil).
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Comment by antimony
antimony From: [info]antimony Date: September 22nd, 2005 01:11 am (UTC) (Link)
I [heart] my MBTA commute, even if it's longer time-wise by a bunch. At least it's always the same length. (Leave house at 6:30 on foot, get to work at 8:18, versus leave at 7:15, get to work any time between 7:45 and 8:45, when I have to be there by 8:30. With the suckiest part usually being the route 2 -> 128 southbound intersection.)
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