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Your feelings towards driving


BlackSmith

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  • BlackSmith changed the title to Your feelings towards driving

This is the BQE (Brooklyn Queens Expressway) I've spent hundreds of hours on the BQE. That's downtown Brooklyn in the background, Manhattan (NYC) would be off to your right out of the frame over the bridge. Those cars and trucks are just sitting there, barely moving. It's like this every fucking day.

Transform or tear down? The BQE reconstruction, explained - Curbed NY

 

As someone who drove a truck around all parts of NYC and Long Island for a couple of decades, I can tell you it's a horrible place to drive. Manhattan is by far the worst borough to drive in, just way too many vehicles in a small confined area. Movies don't give you a realistic impression because they close the streets to the public when they film and control exactly how many vehicles and pedestrians are in their shot. The reality is much much worse, it's just wall to wall cars and trucks all day long, nobody's moving. Nighttime after about 7pm isn't so bad though. You do become numb to the gridlock after awhile, and just resign yourself to the fact that you're not going anywhere anytime soon. Can't find a parking spot big enough for your truck on the block you need to make a delivery on, it can take 10 or 15 minutes just to go around the block and make another pass. 

At my job we'd start loading the trucks at 4:30am hoping to pull out and get on the road before 5:30 for the 50 to 60 minute ride into the city. If you missed that window and didn't pull out til closer to 6am it could take you 2 or 3 hours to drive that same 40 miles. (60 km) You could move around the city fairly easily til about 7:30 or 8am when the auto traffic started to get really thick with people coming to work. By 8:30 it was packed in tight all day long. 

In the afternoon it was even worse than the morning. You needed to finish your route and get into that tunnel or on that bridge by 1:30pm if you wanted to be able to drive back to the shop in 60 - 90 minutes. If you were still in the city after 2pm or 2:30 fuggedaboudit, you would be inching your way back in bumper to bumper traffic for at least 2 and a half hours. Worst part of a traffic jam like that is it's so fucking boring not moving anywhere that you start nodding off at the wheel because you'd been up since 4am, or earlier for the guys that lived farther from the shop. 

 

Best times to travel to and from the airport in NYC

 

How Can We Address NYC's Growing Gridlock Problem? - Parking Tickets

 

How NYC Manages The Most Congested Streets In America - NYC Revealed, this was actually fascinating. But it'd be more interesting to me I guess as a New Yorker. Apparently we have now overtaken LA, Boston and Houston as the city with the worst traffic in the country.

 

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6 hours ago, BlackSmith said:

Just don't drive in Manhattan. It's a nightmare. Most other boroughs are okay I believe. Just expect to deal with a lot of double parking.

Staten Island's not too bad. Manhattan's by far the worst obviously, but most of Brookyn's an absolute fucking traffic nightmare too. I still have nightmares about trying to get around Downtown Brooklyn and Brooklyn Heights. Queens isn't really that bad where you are down by the airport on the south shore, Saint Albans and all around there, but still if I never saw Sunrise Highway ever again I'd be totally fine with that. The other end of Queens in towards the city like Astoria, LIC, Jackson Heights, Maspeth, Rego Park, Ridgewood up that way, basically anywhere north of the Jackie Robinson Pkwy can be a fucking nightmare to get around too. And it's not just the city, even the main thoroughfares through Nassau County are all congested and backed up anymore. The small local streets are ok though. I'm just glad I got the hell out when I did. I would never ever go back.

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1 hour ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

Apparently we have now overtaken LA, Boston and Houston as the city with the worst traffic in the country.

It doesn't help that literally none of you seem to actually know how to drive. Having been up there twice now in the last three months, I'm convinced something in your water prevents y'all from learning even basic vehicle operating procedures.

...and for the record, the shoulder is not, I repeat...NOT a third lane!

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4 minutes ago, SurgicalBrute said:

It doesn't help that literally none of you seem to actually know how to drive. Having been up there twice now in the last three months, I'm convinced something in your water prevents y'all from learning even basic vehicle operating procedures.

...and for the record, the shoulder is not, I repeat...NOT a third lane!

Take it up with the DMV. They're letting everyone & anybody get their licenses. Also doesn't help that the country's mostly car-centric so there's gonna be way more idiots on the road than needed.

1 hour ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

Staten Isand's not too bad. Manhattan's by far the worst obviously, but most of Brookyn's an absolute fucking traffic nightmare too. I still have nightmares about trying to get around Downtown Brooklyn and Brooklyn Heights. Queens isn't really that bad where you are down by the airport on the south shore, Saint Albans and all around there, but still if I never saw Sunrise Highway ever again I'd be totally fine with that. The other end of Queens in towards the city like Astoria, LIC, Jackson Heights, Maspeth, Rego Park, Ridgewood up that way, basically anywhere north of the Jackie Robinson Pkwy can be a fucking nightmare to get around too. And it's not just the city, even the main thoroughfares through Nassau County are all congested and backed up anymore. The small local streets are ok though. I'm just glad I got the hell out when I did. I would never ever go back.

I'm glad that I won't miss the city life once I leave NYC in a couple of years.

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23 minutes ago, AlSymerz said:

I'm so glad that our largest city in only 6M people and not all of them want to drive at the same time. However I'm even more glad I live in the country and don't drive a truck through capital cities any more.

Yeah the New York City metroploitan area is estimated at 23.6 million and covers parts of 4 states. That's practically all of Australia clustered around one city. It's gotten out of hand and become unmanageable. Google Maps tells me I'm 55 miles out (88km) in the farthest NW corner of NJ now, not far from Pennsylvania, but I'm pretty sure I'm still included within that NY metro statistical area. There are definitely people out here who commute back and forth into the city every day. Glad I'm not one of them.

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16 minutes ago, SurgicalBrute said:

...and for the record, the shoulder is not, I repeat...NOT a third lane!

If it's like Australia the shoulder is the fast lane!!

 

Just now, GoatmasterGeneral said:

Yeah the New York City metroploitan area is estimated at 23.6 million and covers parts of 4 states. That's practically all of Australia clustered around one city. It's gotten out of hand and become unmanageable. Google Maps tells me I'm 55 miles out (88km) in the farthest NW corner of NJ now, not far from Pennsylvania, but I'm pretty sure I'm still included within that NY metro statistical area. There are definitely people out here who commute back and forth into the city every day. Glad I'm not one of them.

There is people not far from me who commute 2 and a half hours to the city every day to work. Fuck that!! I used to spend 10-14 hours a day driving but that was my job, no fucking way I'd drive 2 hours just to get to work.

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17 minutes ago, SurgicalBrute said:

It doesn't help that literally none of you seem to actually know how to drive. Having been up there twice now in the last three months, I'm convinced something in your water prevents y'all from learning even basic vehicle operating procedures.

...and for the record, the shoulder is not, I repeat...NOT a third lane!

I've had so many people try to pass me on the shoulder over the years and more than a few who've hopped up on the sidewalk to get around me desperate not to get stuck behind a truck. You've gotta have eyes looking 360° and check your mirrors constantly. A big problem we have is with all the heavy traffic people are always stuck in, sitting, not moving, when they finally see some open space where they think their car will probably fit they'll literally just jam it in there without even thinking. Or they'll be stuck in traffic for awhile until they're running late, and then they'll speed like crazy as soon as they don't have someone directly in front of them blocking their path. And many drivers will start rationalizing to themselves "well that guy changed lanes and cut me off and I probably could have made the light if he hadn't, so I should be entitled to go and I'm just gonna go, nevermind that the light is red" Driving can be a bit of a free for all up here.

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In the UK we have pretty much the same experience of inner city nightmares when it comes to trying to get anywhere.  I live fairly rurally so don't have much issue with driving locally but my job usually has me driving into city centres on a few occasions each year.  Birmingham is a nightmare.  It is the constipated arsehole of the country that unfortunately has a hectic ring piece meaning it is just as hard to get anywhere near it as it is to move at all once you are in there.  I have only ever driven to Greater London and would never even think about driving into central London.  They are constantly redesigning Edinburgh's roads every time I go up there but at least I have now found places on the outskirts that are easy enough to get to the city from if an overnight stay is required for an early meeting the day after.

Manchester is probably a close second to Birmingham and Mancs are fucking insane drivers, all with a genuine death wish it seems. Liverpool (which is my nearest major city about 30 mins away) isn't too bad to get in and out of if you time it right.  I usually go down via the dock road around the back of all the old industrial buildings (at least what's left and not been turned into apartments or hotels).  There's a couple of routes I can take from here also to get in the city centre and I have been around the area long enough now to know some shortcuts and backstreet routes also.

Never driven in another country and don't intend to.  When we were over in New York a few years back we hit the underground or a cab to get anywhere.  We are planning our next trip to be the Bergen to Oslo railway and stay at a couple of places on the line that are only accessible by snowmobile to and from the station - fuck traffic!

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11 hours ago, BlackSmith said:

Take it up with the DMV. They're letting everyone & anybody get their licenses. Also doesn't help that the country's mostly car-centric so there's gonna be way more idiots on the road than needed.

Hey, I agree.... I'm from Baltimore and believe me, we get our fair share of stupid, many of whom can't seem to comprehend how merging works or that the fast lane is for passing not sightseeing. When I had to drive into Brooklyn recently for work though, and then they took me out through Manhattan and the Holland Tunnel to leave...that seemed like a whole new level of exceptional. I mean, I was actually happy to see Jersey City 😁

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Holland Tunnel is weird because with so much traffic going through at a snail's pace it feels like you're down there underground forever. Years ago my company bought another smaller company with a plant located in that shithole they call Jersey City. And I had to drive back and forth from Long Island over the Manhattan Bridge, down Canal St through the HT daily for a few weeks, and I hated it.

Don't think I've even used that tunnel since then, I'll always take the Lincoln Tunnel 50 blocks north on the rare occasions I have to go into the city from here, even if my destination is downtown, which these days would probably only be for a rare metal show. But I stay up here in the woods as much as possible.

Do have one old friend here in Jersey, but he's only marginally interested in extreme metal so I don't drag him to too many shows. He dragged me to Jinjer that time in Greenpoint Brooklyn 16 months ago and then ran into some dude he knew from Nashville 20 years ago that I ended up having to drop off in the fucking Bronx at 1am on our way home. So he still owes me for that. We went to Overkill together in Stroudsburg PA last March I think it was (could have been March the year before) but he likes them too so there were no debts of gratitude incurred on that one. I think we were the only ones there as old as the band.

He wants to see Wardruna really bad, which I suppose I could handle, not super familiar, I think they're like mystical and ambient or something, not black metal or anything, but we missed their last few US dates because of Covid. I know he had his eye on a Denver date they had scheduled but not even sure if they ever came over and played those dates. Says his favorite band these days is Nightwish, but I don't think I could suffer through that for him, I have to draw the line somewhere. 

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15 hours ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

This is the BQE (Brooklyn Queens Expressway) I've spent hundreds of hours on the BQE. That's downtown Brooklyn in the background, Manhattan (NYC) would be off to your right out of the frame over the bridge. Those cars and trucks are just sitting there, barely moving. It's like this every fucking day.

Transform or tear down? The BQE reconstruction, explained - Curbed NY

Even if you expand the number of lanes I bet this freeway would still be congested. It's better to invest more into public transportation which NYC already has a lot of.

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On 3/26/2023 at 9:54 AM, MacabreEternal said:

In the UK we have pretty much the same experience of inner city nightmares when it comes to trying to get anywhere.

“Many phenomena - wars, plagues, sudden audits - have been advanced as evidence for the hidden hand of Satan in the affairs of Man, but whenever students of demonology get together the M25 London orbital motorway is generally agreed to be among the top contenders for exhibit A.”
Neil Gaiman, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

 

I don't like driving, I do it because I have to but I don't enjoy it like some folks do. And the amount of driving you do in USA is nuts. Where 2.5 hrs drive single way for a gig is considered short. No thank you.

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3 hours ago, Sheol said:

the M25 London orbital motorway

My first  -  of many -  terrible experiences of driving when I lived in England was just after we arrived. I hired a car at Heathrow and headed off with the wife and two little kiddies for Leicester. I got onto the M25 somehow going south instead of north and there didn't seem to be anything I could do about it. We ended up at Windsor and had to do it all again heading the other way.

That was scary and stressful. But sometimes you've gotta laugh at disaster. Like driving through a tunnel on the Leicester ringroad in a rust ridden Citroen Diane that my wife had bought for 75 quid and the drivers side front panel came loose. It was hanging on by one strip of metal. I drove on - there was no choice - as it dragged on the road. The cars behind slowed down as their drivers expected the panel to come off and hit one of them. So did I. But we made it through and I pulled to side of the road, got out of the car and kicked the panel right off then drove on. How we laughed. We sold the car for scrap  the next week for 100 quid. Win!

 

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Forgive me Doc for being a buttinski, but starting from Heathrow the M25 in either direction won't deliver you to Windsor Castle, you'd want the M4 for that. The beauty of the M25 is that it's a loop, so even if you get on going the wrong way you'll still make it to your exit (or slip road) sooner or later.

I feel qualified to give out British driving directions because I have the little lady on my phone's GPS set to guide me with the British accent. Only because a Kiwi accent wasn't an option. (let's face it a Kiwi accent is bit nicer than an Aussie accent even if they do say "fush and chups" while insisting that they don't) She helps me find the slip roads and anyone in my car with me gives me funny looks because they don't know what a slip road is, we don't use that term over here. I argue with Emma sometimes (I call her Emma after Emma Peel from The Avengers) raise my voice to her and defiantly refuse to go the way she's recommended because I think I know better, and then usually I'll come to realaize she had been right all along. Good thing is I don't have to sleep on the couch after these disagreements, I can just turn the bitch off because she's not the boss of me.

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2 hours ago, AlSymerz said:

My GPS voice is named Karen. I never bought into the whole "Karen" thing a few years ago, and the vehicle is older than that short lived fad, but I do wonder how many other people changed their GPS voice because of the name.

They tried to charge you for it?

I don't know if my Google Maps lady comes with a name of her own, I just call her Emma because that sounds British to me.

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8 hours ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

the M25 in either direction won't deliver you to Windsor Castle

But if you head south and take a slip road off in desperation, somehow you end up in Windsor. I have no idea how it happened, but it did. I was lost, lost I tell you. There was no GPS then of course and I can't remember how my poor wife was navigating, my infant daughter had a cold and my three year old son was car sick. I no doubt shouted. It's all a woozy blur.

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