PenFall

One of my favorite things to write on this blog was “Musings from the Yellow Line” which usually included a rant about some awful smells, the terrible drivers, amusing anecdotes, or any other general observations about riding the metro in DC. Unfortunately, the long ride into the city coupled with the issues I just listed has forced me to begin driving into work on a daily basis. I’m sure a few of you will contest my use of the word “forced” there, but that’s the truth. I had no choice. It often took me longer to get to work on the metro than it did driving. And those of you who partake in the long metro ride to work will probably agree that by the time you arrive at your destination (an hour or so later…) you’re extremely frustrated and annoyed. I had another option so I took it.

That said, there are of course a few downsides to driving, the biggest probably being the cost. Not only do you have to factor in the cost of gas and parking, but also any potential tickets for, you know, nicking the occasional tourist with your front bumper (kidding). Any other downside (traffic, metro buses, etc) are not so terrible, as long as it’s not too extreme. I accept the morning rush hour, but get frustrated when there are additional delays for something completely ridiculous. But I’ll get to that later.

So instead of “Musings from the Yellow Line” I’m switching to this - Musings from 14th Street. It might change too - you can expect to occasionally see a musing from 395N (exciting, no?).

Today’s musing (or rant…) is about my commute yesterday morning. When I woke up I had a few urgent work requests that I had to finish before even thinking about embedding myself in traffic. So I did, and ended up leaving home at about 8:45 - later than my usual departure time. Traffic on 395 was amazing actually, quite open and fast - I was pleased. Then, as expected, at the 14th street bridge it started backing up. This is no surprise - normally 395 starting at the 14th street bridge is always backed up until about 10am, but I noticed as I kept driving that the backup was on 14th street, not on 395.

Nice, no?

I’ve sat through traffic on 14th street plenty of mornings, but there was something wrong with this backup. It just wasn’t moving at all. As I approached the first light, I watched as it changed five times while I didn’t move an inch. About half-an-hour later I was finally close to Constitution and got a glimpse of what was causing the problem. Well, what I thought was causing the problem. A bus had nicked a car and was stopped in the middle of the street.

Then, as I merged and continued driving, I noticed the real reason traffic was so terrible.

Construction. Construction on 14th street in the middle of rush hour. Really? Really, DC? And to add to it, they shut down two lanes instead of one. Can anyone even see what they’re working on? The road looks perfectly fine to me.

It continues to baffle me the endless problems with driving in the city that are caused simply by poor planning. Would it be that hard to shift the construction hours to run later, starting at about 10am? Or, alternatively, ever seen those poor souls out on the Bay Bridge at 3am? Must not be much fun for them, but it certainly makes sense.

I write this as I prepare to depart for work again this morning, ready to sit in traffic for twice as long as is usually necessary as I got this DC Alert this morning: “Power outage downtown continuing through rush hour. Street closings: 12th St. NW from G St. to New York Ave. H St. NW from 11th to 13th St. Traffic lights out: Pennsylvania Ave. from 18th to 21st. Outage.”

Great. See you all in a few hours.