DC Driving

Faithful reader KS sends us this hysterical breakdown of driving in DC. An excerpt for out-of-towners to understand why people hate driving in this town...

The DC road grid was laid out by a Frenchman, which explains why locals hate the French, and also explains much about US Foriegn Policy. Within DC proper, the roads are laid out in a grid, with other streets crossing the grid at weird angles, usually through a traffic circle. No one in DC knows how to drive in a traffic circle, and people from the surburbs are worse. Many streets are one way, and making a left turn can require travelling three or four blocks out of your way. Right turns are worse. Right turn on red is allowed, except at intersections that are posted otherwise.

...Avoid I-66 at any time. Just listen to the traffic report ONCE and it is the same every day. The sun is in your face in the morning, and for your return trip, it's once again blinding you in the afternoon.

Avoid Rt. 7, (Leesburg Pike or any other name it changes to) at all times as well. Same story as above except you have no breaks because on this road, there are people who commute from West Virginia.

Of course you could take the subway, known locally as The Metro. Remember that either the Orange or Red line will be shut down or single tracked due to an accident. Unless both are shut down or single tracked. This is most likely to happen during rush hour. The escalators rarely work, the elevators even more rarely. However, the trains are very clean, kept that way by highly motivated police who will not hesitate to arrest a 12 year old for eating a french fry.

The part about Route 66 needs to be expanded to indicate just how insane it is that the entire freaking highway is HOV (going in during the morning, and returning during the evening) during portions of rush hour, which leads to congested side streets for two and a half hours, alongside an empty highway that suddenly turns into a parking lot immediately after HOV ends.