The 5 takes a route through downtown, and I’m starting at 3:55pm. I think I’ll take the 405, hopefully I’ll miss the major traffic leaving downtown. The route is 98 miles vs 93. I suppose I added a few instead of removing a few…
As I headed up the 405 departing from the 5, traffic was flowing along, 60-75 mph, thick, but I knew this wasn’t the worst of it. I reviewed an e-mail from Sperry suggesting there was no good way to get to his place from where I was, but he though the 405 to the 101 might be the best. Reviewing this message I revisit the comment “the 405 and the 101, that is the busiest intersection in the country.” Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea…
4:15pm I’m cruising along up the 405, checking out the signs. Its overcast, looking darker to the north. By the time I hit long beach, things are pretty darn slow, rolling in the 40s. A sign points out 30 minutes to LAX, 60 minutes to 10. Back to the map… where the heck is the 10? I hope that’s past Thousand Oakes!
Bad news the 10 is about 10 miles south of the 101. Maybe Sperry’s estimate of 3 hours driving was accurate. I hope not…
4:30 pm Just about the time I hit the 710, things got worse. Speeds were down to the teens with the occasional 25mph section.
Have you ever listed to the traffic report in a foreign city? “There is an accident on the
4:40 pm Traffic is dragging along. Speeds now decreasing below teens on occasion… This reminds me of a conversation I had the evening before with an Orange County resident. “The cause for all these cars out here is thanks to GM and the other car makers purchasing a bunch of land out here and shutting down the trains” Well that happened quite a while ago, and the city has taken great care to beef up the interstates… Let me tell you 6 lanes each way on the 405? That’s two city blocks wide! And in 1 mile? That’s got to be approximately 3168 cars… stopped... And you know this is LA, so 1 person per car, the same number of people wondering “How could there be this much traffic?”
4:50 pm I’m still on the San Diego Freeway, headed up past LAX. If you’re not aware, in California, it’s legal to “Split Lanes” if you ride a motorcycle. This is something I’ve always said is stupid. People are just asking to die doing that. By this point I have been passed by custom low riders, Sport bikes, Harleys, and even dual sports. I’m about an hour into this drive, and I’m thinking… I should have brought my bike, I’d be passing all this traffic!!!
5:00pm Somewhere along this stretch I pass the Pavilion at the Hughes Center. There are a lot of Hughes things around this place, I took a couple day cruise one time out of the building where the Spruce Goose spent its life.
5:10 pm Soon after I come across another sign. 25 minutes to the 10, 60 to the 101… Almost there! Only 60 minutes to go!!! I’m only in this for an hour 10 so far!
5:35 pm As I approach the 10, I’m thinking, once I get past this highway things will loosen up, this traffic has to be caused by a bunch of people switching lanes and merging. Adding a bunch of cars from another highway never helps keep things moving. I hit the 1 mile to exit 10, I counted the time it took to travel that mile.
5:45 pm 10 MINUTES!?!?! At this rate I’ll still be on the road tomorrow!!!
5:48pm About this time I get a ring from Sperry. He reiterates the information of this being the busiest highway intersection in the country. He asks how the driving is, I responded with… “I’m not driving! I’m parking!” He responds with “Don’t just focus on you hitting the brake, hitting the gas, hitting the brake, take a look around, enjoy the nice cars, the nice view.”
Well I had just passed between some buildings and had a glimpse of downtown, it was so hazy I could only make out a couple buildings. And of course at this point it started to rain…
Sperry also reminded me of the handset law in the state of CA. That sounds like a great plan, but 80% of the people on their cell phones “Including me” were still using the hand to hold the phone… We cut the conversation short, he was going to figure out what we would do for dinner…
5:50 pm Time is passing pretty slowly, I realize my ankle is getting a bit soar from this gas – brake – gas – brake…
5:53 pm Just as I approach the hills North of the UCLA campus, the rain stops. The traffic picks up. (Don’t get too excited, I’m talking about 20 mph.) A few more miles, and the sun peaks out, things are really looking up!
5:59 pm I look down at the speedometer, and I see 60 mph! Hurray! Hurray! I could handle 80, but 60 is good for this traffic.
6:01 pm I pull off the exit to the 101, I’m back in it. Stop – go – stop – go. Back to the map. It’s another 35 miles!!! Turns out traffic only sticks near the ramp.
6:04 pm Things lighten up again, and so I’m running 80mph.
I’ll end the story here. After all this was titled the 405 to the 101, not the 101… 2 hours 10 minutes and 70 miles to get to the 101. I could never live in LA…
No comments:
Post a Comment