Having relocated back to the SF Bay Area a little over a year ago, I have commented on how the civility and the sanity of drivers on the freeways and highways had taken a turn for the worse.
Really bad, selfish behaviors had become more prevalent and ingrained, with the trend to trying to get a little bit ahead.
I sorrowed for the past where there was some decorum, and grace to be found, if not universal.
Then I drove through Los Angeles yesterday.
Holy fucking hell
The LA basin has always had bad traffic. There is a continual effort to increase capacity, but alas, all improvements do is create a brief respite until the monster that is LA drivers come in and fill it to overflowing.
I saw first had some truly insane events.
1) As I was on I5 headed south, just past the grapevine is an exit (2 lanes exit only) for Lancaster. This ginormous SUV, with California plates (not a tourist) and a hitch rack loaded with camping gear cut in front of me with about 6″ to spare. No signal, no courtesy wave, just cut in barely missing the front of my car. Then this asshole quickly jumped two more lanes over almost causing another accident.
2) On the 605 cut over from 210 to I5 in Santa Ana, a car about 200 meters in front of me just spun out. No other cars involved, just spinning, smoking tires, and ended up pointing in the wrong direction. Fortunately, I was able to get around that quickly before it turned into a clusterfuck.
3) Back on the 210, there was some roadwork. All sorts of signs said that the speed limit was 55, and that it was enforced aggressively. People didn’t even blink and continued doing 75MPH or more. About 2 miles into this 8 mile stretch, I saw a CHP merge in, thinking “Good, he is going to nail one of the fuckers…” Nope. He quickly accelerated to 80+ and kept moving.
I made it to San Diego about 3:30 PM (left about 7:30), so not a bad time.
