the art of driving in Seattle

Warning: the following may contain disparaging remarks about the roads and driving skills of people in Seattle. While not wanting to give offense to my Seattle native friends, the following are my narrow-minded and passionate opinions about traffic in the Emerald City. Consider yourself warned.

Ever since moving here, I have made some keen observations about traffic, roads and driving here in Seattle- especially in comparison to Chicago. You would think as a transportation planner's wife, I would have some sympathies in that direction, but I have to say my views continue to exasperate and stupefy my husband.

Pedestrians: What the heck? They think they run the streets here, as if all cars are moving in subjection to them, like they are the ones that have given us permission to be on THEIR streets. You weigh 150 pounds, I am driving a 2 ton piece of metal. If my light is GREEN, it might be in your best interest to get the heck out of my way. Don't cross the street just anywhere and don't assume you can step off the curb just as my light is turning YELLOW!! I am coming from Chicago where the art of running yellow lights was born and perfected (especially in the burbs!!) You can ask witnesses- if there is someone in a non signalized crosswalk, I will be the first to come to a screeching halt and block all traffic my direction and yell and honk at traffic coming in the opposite direction to fight for the right of that person to cross in a crosswalk. But people here think they can cross anywhere and you will come to a screeching halt. This is because as a pedestrian, all you have to do is approach the curb and people will come to a screeching halt for you. I have had this happen to me and I try and embarassingly wave them on "GO you idiot, you have the right-of-way, you are setting a horrible precedence!"

Streets: I tried to give myself a couple of months to understand the layout of the streets in my common "routes". This is pointless. I have never seen a place made of so many crazy intersections, one way streets that turn into 2 way and then back to one way, streets broken into 10 fragments and all named the same, streets that curve and change names, then curve and change names again, streets you cannot turn off of or cross, streets that forbid left turns at one intersection, then at the next and the next. How am I supposed to turn left? How am I supposed to get anywhere without getting lost 4 times? I was told by a woman who is big into history and has lived here for more than 25 years: the 2 original city planners could not agree on a layout for the streets of Seattle. One was an alcoholic. They finally smashed the 2 plans together and that is what we got- a drunken, smashed-up system of roads that make you dizzy to look at on a map, let alone drive. I have to Google 2 separate trips- one to get there and one to get home because you can never just come back the way you went.

Driving: It has been said of Seattlites that they are passive aggressive. Wow, that's an understatement. In Chicago, everyone drives both aggressively and defensively. This means that traffic flows fairly well- in and out like a river that flows around obstacles like parked cars, cars turning left, cars merging into traffic, etc. A river of honking, cussing, speeding and swerving, but a flowing river nonetheless. Driving downtown Chicago is like playing a video game to me. All senses are on high alert, you need to poise your hand on your horn for needed communication, you have to watch every corner of peripheral vision for possible obstacles (pedestrians have to watch the heck out for you) and you must have excellent instant reflexes. In Seattle, no one uses their horns, not even if someone unknowingly pulls right out in front of you, nearly killing you and themselves. I find that I can't honk or communicate with other drivers or pedestrians without feeling like a great big schmuck. So I just swallow it and it smolders until we get a post like this (passive aggressive). The concept of merging seems foreign here. No one seems to get the idea that to keep traffic moving, they have to speed up or slow down and let people in. Instead, it seems to make sense to them to keep moving at your speed so you have to come to a screeching halt and stop all traffic behind you as well. I wouldn't even write this if it hadn't happened to me repeatedly, both on and off the freeway.

Cars: Pure amusement. For every Hummer I saw in Chicago, I see a Mini or Smart Car here. For every Lexus in Chicago, I see a Subaru. For every SUV, a compact car and/or hybrid. There are equal amounts of BMWs and Mercedes. I've had no Limo sightings here, a daily occurrence in Chicago. I had a Hummer sighting the other day for the first time. It was like spotting a black bear as you drive along through the mountains. I looked for obvious vandalism on it- I'm sure it's been keyed a few times. No clue how it fits into the parking spots at places like Safeway or the mini garages in the homes here.

For all the wonderful things about Seattle that I tell people, I have to stop short on the driving experience. So when you come to visit, just leave the driving up to us. Meanwhile, I am doing my best to convert the city to the speeding, swerving, honking river one passive aggressive driver at a time.