Get off the phone already!

[Kogarashi]

Today was...fun. I had a doctor's appointment across town, so Bird (my 4-year-old) and I braved local traffic (which is way too fond of driving too fast for what the roads dictate).

As evidenced by the thread title, we ran into quite a few people driving distractedly (visibly so), and every single one was on the phone. There was the lady who didn't notice the light turned green, then turned without signaling. There was the gentleman who tried to zip around me without signaling while I was merging over from a merging lane (and he was trying to skip the line). And there was the lady who drove quite slow (almost below the minimum speed) on the highway, didn't signal to get into the exit lane, signaled to get into what she thought was a right-turn lane (but turned out to be a separate exit lane for the local park-n-ride), merged back into the regular exit without signaling, and then turned at the light while gesturing with one hand and holding her phone with the other (how do you do that?) without signaling. I'm noticing a trend here.

Unfortunately, unlike NY, GA doesn't seem to have a ban on hand-held cell phones while driving.

And then of course it starts raining this afternoon, so I went to pick up Hubby at work since he biked in and didn't want to bike home in the cold rain, and while I didn't see anyone driving with a phone glued to their ears, everyone seemed bent on driving even faster than they normally would.

[Erinesque]

Sometimes in his travels, my husband has to drive through Georgia, and he tells me that he dreads Atlanta traffic more than any other place that he's been to thus far. He said he even prefers Texas traffic! What I didn't like, when coming through Atlanta, was the fact that the exit is on the left, and you have to cross 5 lanes of traffic to get to it!

[Sunshine]

That scares me, as Texas traffic is terrifying sometimes, especially in the metroplex

[Kogarashi]

I think there are places that scare me more, but not many of them. And here, the biggest problem (at least in my town, not Atlanta) seems to be that everyone just drives too fast. Like, 10+ mph over the speed limit whenever possible.

[Sunshine]

Yeah, we do that here but most of the roads here are flat.West Texas, at least the part I live in, is flat as a pancake. It's only really scary when the weather changes....rain and snow.

[Kogarashi]

The problem with it here is that the roads are not wide enough in my opinion. Some have no shoulder whatsoever, and one major highway has very little shoulder on either side. If you go off those roads, you are going to be hitting ditch or worse immediately.

[Nunavut Pants]

Isn't 10-over the standard in most places?

I get more dirty looks around here by sticking to the speed limit...

[Kogarashi]

In my experience, 5-over is the "safe" zone, with some areas or neighborhoods having stricter cops, and major highways generally allowing for faster speeds. But around here, the roads just don't seem wide enough to justify doing 70 in a 55-60mph area (one of the local highways, and about 30% of drivers do more than 70).

[Sunshine]

Yeah, I live in 80-schhhmeigty Texas. On surface streets our median speed is 30. Bigger, more travelled can go up to 55-60 and that is in town. Not "highway" per se. But those are four lane streets.

[wolfie]

On surface streets our median speed is 30.

I guess that's why everyone in your neck of the woods has the jacked-up 4x4s - so that when traffic in the travelled lanes is backed up, they can drive in the median. Still, 30 MPH in the median would be a VERY rough ride.

[Sunshine]

Not everyone has those lifted "mypenisisbiggerthanyours" mobiles, but yeah, those that do are more likely than not to be median drivers. It's always great to see the DPS pull them over.

[wolfie]

Not everyone has those lifted "Ineedamicroscopetofindmyjunk" mobiles,

Fixed that for you.

[EricKei]

I lived in Hotlanta back in the late 80s -- and I hated travel on i285 even then (and this was pre-Olympics!)....These days, the damn thing is, what, eight lanes in each direction from what I hear...? And even more congested than ever!