Tales of the Incredible Hoke Robertson

Drivers

A Scientific Analysis of Transportation Issues

Okay: I finally have enough time to write up my keen observations dealing with traffic. If the powers to be would simply listen to what I have to say and act accordingly, the world would be a nicer place. Traveling to Sacramento over a two week time frame and being caught in traffic every single morning helped me distill my ideas into a cogent synopsis of the problems and the solutions. The following list is in order of importance.

1. Trucks. Yes trucks are majority of the problem. I know, I know; trucks transport almost everything we eat, have and use. Every trucker on earth says "this is how I make my living, I'm a professional.” Well news flash Odie; I make my living via driving also and I don't do it in a manner which maximizes confusion and chaos. Our idiot truckers simply refuse to obey the rules. Right lane only; 55 mph; ALL the time. When you have two lanes and one truck tries to pass another then every one of the cars (which outnumber the trucks 20 to 1) is jammed up behind the truck which totally blocks the smooth and timely flow of traffic. Because the idiot trucker wants to travel 62 mph instead of his 55 mph limit, then 50 cars are prevented from traveling their 70 mph limit. At every opportunity where the view shows a long stretch of highway; bam! there are long lines of cars in the fast lane backed up behind some righteous road hog. This slinky like movement of cars results in the accumulation of hundreds of brakings and accelerations which is what results in the fast lane slowing to 35 mph or even stopping. It is shear madness. Then, when the road becomes 3 or 4 lanes, the cognitively challenged chingaderas then use 2 of 3 or 3 of 4 lanes; making the road some sort of rigged game where no choice is ever correct. Look you hemorrhoidal haulers should ONLY BE IN THE SLOW LANE AND ONLY GO 55. Period; end of story. Any truck found passing on a two lane highway should be confiscated and the driver forced to ride a Japanese commuter train for six months. When it sinks into to the semi-deranged semi driver that cramming everyone into tight places is "bad" then he can return to civil society. Trucks.

2. CalTrans and Urban Planners. Yes, yes it is a bit too easy to badmouth, but facts are facts. Entering Sacramento we have two large over crossings which of course have on/off ramps. The first on ramp has a metered light with THREE car lanes to enter the two highway lanes. Yes, three to merge in with the two. What could go wrong? Two of the lanes are for the normal, miserable commuter who is stuck in his/her lemming like existence (raise your hand like I am). There are about twenty cars constantly backed up in each of these lanes and the automatic light allowing access to the freeway blinks red and green every 1.37 seconds; or at just the rate to allow too many cars to enter the highway at once. Some graduate of the University of Southern New Hampshire figured out that at a rate of one car every 0.685 seconds it will allow traffic to continue smoothly without backing up on the off ramp. That is of course WRONG. The problem is that the graduate was using the old traffic computer model developed when we used punch cards and the outputs are as reliable as a Democrat's promises. It is totally wrong and like truckers using every lane, it simply makes the transportation facility a Stop -n- Go. Now comes the good part. Remember I said THREE lanes merging onto the freeway. Well, because automatic doors into the Supermarket are causing Iceland to become tropical, we have a CarPool lane. Now, first of all, one day I counted 30 cars in a car pool lane that had a drop not a pool; i.e. someone was cheating. But the main point is that the car pool lane IS NOT METERED. This means that the calculation about how many cars can be allowed to enter the flow of traffic and not create havoc IS INTENTIONALLY DESTROYED because a never-ending and FAST flow of cars is now entering the highway at the point where we are trying to control the number of cars entering. Now I assume there is someone out there who would retort: "Ah, but more people in fewer cars means fewer cars entering the freeway and thus less traffic snarling." Any such person should be covered in cardboard and buried in an African termite mound. Perhaps if each car held 37 people traffic might be lighter, but otherwise we still have too many cars trying to use the freeway at the same time. It’s like cutting your risk of the potato famine by half! Half of a billion to one is not an improvement.

The second overpass/onramp a mile farther down has no car pool lane but still has the two lanes merging into two lanes. Now this fiasco merges the two into one but gives them almost a half a mile to merge. Seemingly a good idea, but when you give them such a long stretch to merge you end up with drivers trying to enter the freeway at various points which perhaps contrary to logic makes it WORSE. One guy stops to enter early, one zips past him to enter at the last possible moment, others drive along as if there are no other cars crowding in when the idea strikes them. The result is that we now have fifty cars trying to enter the slow lane all at once but over a relatively short distance and then ....... confusion and chaos. Yes I used the word "chaos" twice already. The traffic has no opportunity to adjust because AGAIN too many cars are trying to get in at once. Duh. Anyway, the above gives us about 5 miles of stop and go traffic in a manner that looks like an intentional act of anarchy. Ah, but there is more! A mile past the second traffic destruction site, the brainiacs of the Sacramento area are constructing a brand-spanking new, twice as large overpass and onramp in preparation of building another 7 million homes. Yes, we are planning on doubling the amount of traffic in the exact same area that has the worst traffic congestion. You know, when cities add new development it always results in increased income, budget surpluses and more services for Joe-Taxpayer; every time! CalTrans personnel and urban planners should have giant fish-hooks stuck through their bodies and pulled behind fishing trawlers as bait for great white sharks.

3. Most drivers. Actually closer to all but one driver. Look, when a small gap opens up in an otherwise completely clogged freeway, speeding up to get within 2 feet of the bumper of the next car IS COUNTER PRODUCTIVE AND ADVERSE TO THE SMOOTH FLOW OF TRAFFIC. Really. By speeding up to close the gap you ensure that reaction times decrease to their smallest possible time span which means there is more braking which means there is longer braking which means the traffic slowing is maximized. Every time you speed up you MAKE THINGS WORSE. Stop doing this. Stop it now. It makes no sense. Don’t do things which are not in your own self interest. Doing things contrary to your own self interest will destroy capitalism and democracy; really. Most people should have their licenses revoked, which would create pressure to find ways to get these people from place to place which would lead to more trains, buses of even some sort of expensive high-speed rail … never mind. Secondly with regard to everyone else but me, when you are driving along breaking the speed limit, pull the f**k over into the slower lane and get out of the fast lane unless you are passing. This was the first rule we learned in Drivers Ed and it makes perfect sense. Just because you think 75 is the proper speed, others have different views and when the differing views are all backing up behind the slowest different view TRAFFIC SLOWS FOR EVERYONE and the highway gets clogged. Pull over damn it (especially WOMEN). Call me a misogynist if you want, but 85 % of women drivers choose a “favorite” lane to stay in and would do so even if Godzilla stepped into their lane. The average horrible driver should be sent to live on a Mumbai trash heap.

4. RV’s and RV’s towing cars. There really is no point wasting time or electronic “ink” on this one. For that 3% of the population who think people with the worst eyesight, hearing and reflexes should drive the most unsafe, unresponsive, road-clogging vehicles I have one comment; “You are wrong.” Pay the damn $145 per night for the motel, save on the $150,000 debt for the damn thing and stop frustrating the rest of our lives. People who make, sell and drive RV’s should be taken to the space station and slammed up against the wall with the small hole in it so that your entire body is sucked into space though that small hole like the Alien in that worst of all Alien movies.

4b. Boaters. Okay, this is mainly a man thing, thus proving I am not a misogynist. Look, you dicks who bass fish, water ski/boogie board or jet ski are the most ignorant bunch of scofflaws the world has ever seen. When is the last time you saw someone pulling a boat going 55 mph? It was in 2700 BC when they first figured out how to get a boat from Ur to Akkad. Since then every single work-avoiding boater has driven like he had his wife in the back seat giving birth and he liked his wife. Slow down you dimwits. You know, there is a reason why those pulling trailers have a slower speed limit; several really. Importantly, when someone pulling a trailer hits his brakes hard or bangs into someone else, the car and trailer become a catapult. Slow down and stop gambling with my safety. If you were going to work or spending time with your kids you wouldn’t be out there anyway. Stop acting like a big ski boat means something other than an idiot in debt. Boaters should have their faces pressed gently against the propeller for 10 seconds; while the propeller is spinning at 200 rpm.

5. Drivers of 35 year old mini pickups. I just recently noticed that EVERTIME I see one of those old Toyota or VW (may it rest in peace) mini trucks it is going 35 miles per hours and has 14 cars behind it trying to go whatever the speed limit is. Look, I don’t want to sound elitist or “rich lawyer-assholy” but there is no reason for there to be 40 year old trucks on the road. They certainly can’t pass a smog test (even the VW ones), they have no power and cannot accelerate, and they are all about 2 inches off the pavement. Not being a namby-pamby I will not comment on the state of filth on each of these munchkin trucks. Anyway, there aren’t too many of these, but since EVERY ONE is a menace, the owners of such trucks should be made to walk down Al-Sever Blvd in ISIS-town carrying a picture of the Pope with the words “Convert to Christianity” in bold letters.

That’s all for now, though there is much more still bothering me.