transportation sucks

[toastykitten]

Today the 1.50 I paid for the MUNI train was rendered useless, since after the first stop, the driver announced that there was a disabled train in front of us and would we please get off? I walked to the nearest BART station, which was approximately half a mile away. As I got onto the BART station, I heard, "Please wait a few moments while BART police do a quick security sweep. Please help keep BART safe and secure by reporting any unattended packages," which is a direct result of the London bombings. Then I stood for almost half a BART trip before anyone got off the seats, and I had to sit next to the creepiest kid ever. It is entirely my projection, since he was a perfect gentleman, but he creeped me out nonetheless. You know how in certain movies there is a kid with pale skin, a nice bowl haircut, and wire-rim glasses, who everyone thinks at first is totally innocent but then it turns out he's a serial killer? (Oh, dude, now I remember who he reminded me of - Elijah Wood's character in Sin City! No wonder he was freaking me out.)

As I drove home, I contemplated ramming my car into the three people who decided to swerve in front of me without turning on their blinkers, or speeding up, leaving me to slam on my brakes hard. People! I do not drive a friggin' Lotus. Then I honked at the moron who decided to make an illegal pass into the left lane while he was a two-thirds of the way into the right-turn lane.

Today I cannot decide whether public transportation or driving is worse. I would like to go with the option that keeps me sane.

Comments

Thank you!

[lylehsaxon.livejournal.com]

Thank you! In reading that, I found myself feeling good about the Tokyo train system! Do keep in mind that standing is pretty much a 365 day a year situation here, but there are nice touches:

1) If you buy a ticket on one train line and they stop the trains and you have to transfer to another line, they give you a ticket for the other line for free.

2) Getting a license here is expensive and much stricter than in the US. That doesn't necessarily make everyone better drivers (although I would say just about everyone here is better at parking!), but - overall - people seem to have a healthy respect for having legal permission to drive and don't generally drive wildly.

Um... that's it I guess. I can feel something else that is out of reach at the moment, but I do know that I got more frustrated with commuting in the US than here (except for the times I've run into racists over here), but I'm not entirely sure why. Hmmm.... Predictability! Aside from conditions being good or bad, if they're predictable, they're easy to deal with?

L

Re: Thank you!

[toastykitten.livejournal.com]

When I failed my first driving exam (deservedly because I tried to pass into another car), my driving instructor comforted me by saying, "It's ok; you can go to Berkeley. Much easier there." It was well-known in high school that in Berkeley there was one tester who was really nice and would pass almost anyone.

Also, we don't get tested on parallel parking here, although we probably should.

I blame the driving tests for the poor quality of drivers in the Bay Area.