come together as one

I have issues with roads, lines, merging, and the overall ideals of the roadway. Today I’m feeling a little…irritated. I honestly believe that merging from a ramp or entrance lane should be the easiest thing in the World. Maybe it’s my race driving training (Brands Hatch, 2002), my vast experience (driving since February 1981), or my lack of impression with my road mates (always). The Eleven has covered this on numerous occasions, we aren’t generally yell drivers, and it always raises its ugly head when people either coming from or going onto a ramp don’t declare and maintain: declare and maintain. We aren't talking about the “construction ahead, left lane ending, merge right” high school debate; that’s a different issue for a different time. This is simply your everyday, driving to work, and merging often scenario. The example used today envelops a two-lane main road – very busy – that receives two merging veins (arteries? I guess it depends if you’re coming to or going from the heart) entering from the right in a short-ish distance. What you have to make yourself aware of, and you should be getting some aware in your diet if you’re driving, is that the first merge from my right actually becomes a third lane. (See the google map below…zoom in, zoom out, enjoy. I’m driving from SE to NW on the blue line. The big road we’re crossing is the Beltway.) The first merging jokesters are entering from the Beltway (and probably not getting back on the Beltway) but they’ll immediately slow down to a near standstill while the gears work in their little brains. Unfortunately for me, I’m actually trying to slot myself into their lane because I need to be over there in a few blocks. They never declare and maintain – if they’d just keep up the speed and acceleration I’d slide right over. If I know that a missile is moving at x speed then I can adjust. If you stop, start, stop, start, worry, have a sandwich, stop, start, we’ll get nowhere. Once we’re over the Beltway there’s little to concerned anyone's mind aside from the cloverleaf exit back onto the Beltway which is pretty simple and affects no one. But, just after passing under the small road you get another batch of mergers coming in from the (inner) Beltway. Say your damn prayers here. That wee ramp scoots in on my right and adds the fourth lane to the road – people who are going nowhere but straight on: you don’t even have to merge…the lane never ends! Ah, too simple. You see, I now need to get over into that new lane because I’m turning just after the big hotel complex. This second merge is the worst; since no one is actually in dire need of getting over (left) immediately they should be smart enough to just keep pace, the lane never ends: please, let me solve the merge and your issues...move!.

I wondered this morning if there was a standard for merging. I hit the internets and came up with a few nuggets on merging from the DMV.org – here a few of the greatest hits:

Still, the procedure requires extreme awareness because the last thing you want to do is have the driver in the vehicle that you are merging in front of end up in your passenger seat. Nor do you want to go into a panic and wander off from the acceleration pedal and land onto the shoulder. Here are some tips to help you become a major league merger.

Merging is designed to permit vehicles to enter and exit a highway without causing disruption in the flow of traffic. Highways are equipped with on-ramps and off-ramps, which generally connect to acceleration and deceleration lanes.

The idea behind this is when you pull onto the entrance ramp, you slowly begin building velocity. At the point where you can make eye contact with the highway, you need to immediately start assessing the gaps and the speed of existing traffic. From here, you should turn on your signal to reflect your intent to other drivers to merge onto the roadway.

Then use the acceleration lane to match the speed flow, and ease your vehicle into an appropriate gap before the acceleration lane ends. Some highways give you slabs of asphalt that are long enough for a jet to take off; others, especially on the East Coast, are so short you will need to make quick decisions or yield. A successful merge entails you entering the highway almost at or at the speed limit, while causing no disturbance in the speeds of the vehicles behind you.

And in rush hour, just in case you're about to pull out that ticket,

Sometimes [the bottleneck] is simply due to the sheer number of vehicles trying to enter or leave the road on a single stretch of asphalt utilized both as a deceleration and acceleration lane. But, you can also bet there is some improper merging going on, causing the entire system to break down into the proverbial bottleneck.

Maybe I’m not crazy.


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carolina blue

You can say it's easier to be magnanimous when you're leading in states, votes, delegates, and (closing in) on superdelegates. Obama was fantastic in Raleigh tonight - he reached out to both his and Sen. Clinton's supporters. There is no way we can allow the left and the liberals to split and spend the late summer hating each other because of a very harsh campaign. But...what we are seeing now is a party bleeding out slowly and getting weaker each and every week this continues. I don't think I've ever voiced a desire for Clinton to quit - it's her job to fight on and look for every opportunity to win, and she's welcome to it. Have no doubt that I'll support her if she's the nominee. What the party needs to do is shit or get off the pot. Those superdelegates that can make the difference need to make the difference, now. Their decision needs to be made this week and the party needs to support that decision - the rules are in-place for them to influence the drive toward either candidate because those are the rules that were agreed upon. The fact that they are hiding, en masse, in order to save their own asses is appalling. They were established in the early '80s for the expressed purpose of providing guidance from within the system yet they seem to be sitting at home watching American Idol. In fact, a prime example of a superdelegate wasting our time is the President of the College Democrats who seems to be waiting for...for...pint night? A defining letter from Chad at ASU? Anything? I've never heard a more inane interview than I heard with her on NPR last weekend; and she's a law student! I had to look her up...Lauren Wolfe. What Ms. Wolfe doesn't understand is that her decision isn't based on anything other than her own processes - go figure, Prez of College Dems playing politics. I don't care who she supports; I care that she makes a decision.

The Supers need to end it.

And while I'm at it; I stopped the van today, rolled down the window, and kindly asked the woman in her car on Haycock Road to use her lovely turn signal...that thing on the stick. I beg and I plead.

step away from the car

Right. Being as I’m a fan of just about any type of auto racing I was taken aback at an ad I saw on the inside cover of the latest New Yorker. It was an ad for the new Lexus LS and it took a few seconds to register in mind since I don’t generally read advertisements in any of my pubs. I was already into the table of contents before I flipped back to the ad. I’ll get to what caught my eye in a wee second.

My favorite racing series is Formula 1, followed closely by the World Rally Championship…I know my European is showing, I’ll try to tuck it in. I’ve long liked NASCAR but I’m more an open-wheel lover of American racing circuits. The 70s was much more memorable for watching the Indy 500 than the Daytona 500, at least if you were living in Omaha. If I purge my mind of my trivial NASCAR knowledge that has piled up over the years then I’m only being honest in saying that Richard Petty and David Pearson are the only stockcar drivers I knew in my youth. If we’re talking Indy Cars then I can overflow with names like AJ Foyt (I know, he drove stockcars too. Hell, AJ drove anything with wheels…probably the greatest ever American driver), Al Unser, Bobby Unser, Mario Andretti, Gordon Johncock, Johnny Rutherford, Rick Mears, Emmo Fittipaldi, etc. I think the ultimate test is the phrase that’s passed the lips of millions and millions of Americans riding in cars, “Who do you think you are? Mario Andretti?” I’ve heard that from kids in their teens…even now. I have never heard some punk say, “Who do you think you are? Jeff Gordon?” The next time they smart off from back seat ask them if they know who Mario Andretti is. Eventually, I moved to Bill Elliot and NASCAR but that’s another story.

Here are the basic engine specs on the 2007 engine being run by the defending world champion Renault Formula 1 team:

Capacity - 2400 cc
Architecture - 90° V8
Weight - 95 kg
Max rpm - 19,000 rpm

Do you know how many gears that beast has? 7 (plus a reverse…as if that’s used much). 7. 7. 7. 7. The last two World Championships for drivers and constructors have been won by the Renault team with Fernando Alonso at the wheel. I had a chance to attend a basic race driving school in England and I’ll tell you that hauling ass around Brands Hatch at nearly 100mph in an old open wheel Formula Ford is nerve wrecking enough. The idea of zipping around at 200+ mph in a Formula 1 car is terrifying. Is this too much of a back story? Sorry. My point is this: the new Lexus in the ad has EIGHT gears! if Fernando Alonso only needs seven gears to work his way around tracks from Monaco to China then I’m pretty sure Don of Leesburg, VA can get by on fewer. Exactly why does Don need the killer acceleration and power inherent in an 8-speed? Is he worried about his friction circle slipping outside of parameters as he blasts out of DuPont Circle with a VW Bug trying to pass on the outside? I’m pretty sure Don isn’t even capable of counting to 8 as he shifts at 6mph, 13mph, 25mph, 40mph, 60mph, 75mph, 100mph, and finally a kick at 125mph for the long run into Eau Rouge during his practice runs for qualifying. Who does he think he is, Jeff Gordon?. 8 gears? The dingletrons that are buying the sequential 8-speed are probably the same guys that attempt to downshift on the hard right-hand turn while exiting Key Bridge onto the Whitehurst Freeway (local joke). I can see this yahoo pulling into the local Shell, locking up the brakes into the ‘pit box’, and screaming to no one in particular that his car has understeer (‘tight’ for the NASCAR fans) and he needs less front wing. Didn’t we just move to 6-speeds not long ago? That was quite a reach from the kicking 5-speeds of my youth. You know what this reminds me of? This.

I rest my case.

T.

crossing the walk

I’m a hardcore street crosser. I’m adamant about using applicable crosswalks and signals, but even officially sanctioned traffic signals with little lit walking people on signs require a measure of patience and hate. X and I differ on crossing and driving technique and these differences are reinforced when we’re walking together. My stance is that if I’m the walker, I expect the right-of-way in a crosswalk, lighted signs or painted lines; if I’m the driver I always give way (and room) to those crossing the street whether in a crosswalk or not. X is the opposite. My theory being that, right or wrong, I don’t envision a time in court where mowing down a pedestrian is going to be a good defense. It wouldn’t be such a good idea if I were the crosser and she were the driver, that’s why I stay close to her. Truth be told, my supporting data has been gathered mostly in parking lots rather than the mad streets of the greater Metro area – she doesn’t much threaten those on the streets.

The showdown this morning occurred on the usual corner, N. Carlin Springs and N. Park Dr. (click here for a map…if you zoom in on the corner you can see the crosswalk). I know I shouldn’t expect much from the driving clowns of the city but I refuse to be bullied by idiots. This morning there was an opening on my side of the street (the NE-bound lane) which I stepped into in a mad attempt to signal my crossing intention to the fools driving southwest. I’m not dumb enough to step in front of Joe Bob doing 40mph so sometimes I have to hold steady in the middle of the road. The problem with this is that eventually (usually in a few seconds) cars start approaching in the lane I’m occupying and these drivers aren’t quite evolutionarily developed enough to recognize a 6’3” person attempting to cross the street. Since the woman this morning clearly had the analytical ability of a black Labrador, and the intelligence of a wedge, she keeps right on truckin’, and gives me a little honk as she skitters her Audi by me while wondering just what I could be doing in the road? After all, she has a line of 50 cars sitting at the stoplight just 25 feet away. In order to make my opinion known, I respond with this statement through the small opening in her window, “Excuse Miss. I was simply trying to cross the street here in the crosswalk. I’m ever so sorry. Maybe later on I can come over to your house and apologize from my misbehavior.” For some reason, she must have misheard me; I think she gave me a look.

While I’m on about traffic, I’d like to point out to all those driving in this big old world that when turning a corner, if you stay in your lane everything will be peachy. Not only don’t they stay in their own little piece of line-marked terra firma, they refuse to turn right onto a three-lane road when the middle and far lane are occupied with oncoming traffic. Why? Because they can possibly fathom the idea of staying in a lane…they need at least 2.5 lanes of open turf before their little plankton brain can get the car going.

Seems like a Monday.

Hugs.

T.