By Judi Curry
Many of you have said in the past that I am too negative; that I must be very unhappy to be able to find so many “wrong” things in the world. I wouldn’t want to disappoint you, so I have decided to add to my negativity to keep you happy.
For those of you that might share my unhappiness – I want to tell you that I am happier than I have been in a long time; people are remarking on how well I look which is nice to hear about this old lady since I just became a grandmother for the 19th time with the 20th due in a few weeks! So without further wait here it is:
I just spent a hilarious (albeit dangerous) ten minutes watching people try to navigate the new round-about in Ocean Beach. It reminded me of when I was a freshman in high school and we were watching mice go through a maze for the first time. Although no accident took place while I was watching, it is only a question of time before there are many. I think the architect that designed it must have been smoking some bad weed.
Moving through OB again, I was almost involved in an accident that was not my fault, nor was it the driver of the car and the drivers of the two motorcycles that I almost hit. I had come out of the Stumps parking lot on Voltaire, and turned right on Poinsettia to make a right hand turn on Chatsworth. I had a green light. Also having a green light was traffic on the other side of Chatsworth near the High School.
Because I had a green light, I did not look to the left before I made my right hand turn and did not see the car and motorcycles until after I had made my turn. One of the motorcyclists came up to my window and said, “You went right through the light without stopping.” I told him I had a green light. He said, “so did I.” I suspect that that intersection was designed by the same architect that designed the round-about. A three way signal should be at that spot. Usually when you have a green light you don’t look to the left before making a right hand turn.
Went back to the Gulls game Friday night. I really came out of there with negative feelings. The acoustics are terrible. Could not understand anything the announcer was saying. The seats were as bad as a torture chamber would be; a SLICE of pizza was $10.25; and the Gulls lost. Again.
But in spite of all the above, that is not the worst part of the evening. We have second row seats, right behind the goal. During practice four of the pucks flew over the protective glass onto the ground in front of us. No one was hurt, probably because no one was sitting in the front row – yet. During the game one puck went over the glass and was caught by a woman sitting in the front row. I imagine her hand stung for some time.
There is supposed to be a net on the top of the glass to catch the puck before it goes over the glass. In the three games we have been to so far this season, the net is not attached. I know it is not likely that the same architect designed this safety feature, but maybe a close relative did. This is another accident waiting to happen.
And I have to send praise to Santee! They elected not to allow “Birds” – scooters – in their city. I just can’t fathom why a person on a scooter thinks that the laws do not pertain to them? They don’t stop at signals; they don’t stop at Stop Signs; they ride on the sidewalks; they leave them wherever they want; they ride with two or more people on them. I can’t believe some parents ride a scooter with their child in front of them. Another accident waiting to happen.
And the bike riders are just as bad. I finally saw a bike rider in the bike lane on West Point Loma this month. In the year the lane has been there I have seen a total of 6 people in the lane. And I have seen at least 10 near accidents where cars are driving in a lane only to have the lane end abruptly and cars need to move over quickly with little warning.
It is all well and good to think that San Diego is going to be a bike community, but I’ll be damned if I am going to ride my bike to Ralphs or Grocery Outlet to do my weekly shopping and then ride my bike back home with my groceries. In fact, I’ll be damned if I am going to ride my bike around the corner with the potholes as large as they are on so many streets.
And once again I witnessed two potential accidents with bike riders not obeying the rules of the road – the failure to stop at stop signs; going through red lights, etc. Almost every time I am at the intersection of Cable and Newport I see infringement of the law. But… it isn’t just bike riders anymore – it’s pedestrians also. I saw a woman almost get hit because she was talking on her cell phone and crossed against the light. Then she had the audacity to yell at the driver that had the right of way!
And I am upset with the lack of police response in the Sunset Cliffs area. A few weeks ago there was a large party – probably illegal – that were lighting candles and attaching them to parachutes and shooting them up into the sky. Two people that I know of called the police department but no one showed up. A fire waiting to happen?
One of the things my friend Steve does regularly is to clean the beaches from Adair to Santa Cruz. Last week he found 11 used needles on the beaches. Another screwed up situation!
We could talk about the parking spaces that are being taken up by outdoor restaurants, or scooters, or….but, I think I’ll save that for another day. Just be careful out there. You don’t want to have your obituary to state that you lost your life due to an errant Gull puck or “Bird” rider or driver trying to quickly get over or green-signals at the same time or ….
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
The Round-About is at West Point Loma and Bacon.
I love this!
That roundabout is going to cause SO many issues. Wow.
And btw, I wrote the story for the Union-Tribune on the Santee no BIRD issue.
Great column!
Funny. I really liked your “Bird” article. We’ll have to meet one day!
The net over the glass is not attatched?? Oh boy! All the Personal Injury attorneys are on alert to sue everyone connected to That! Those pucks are hard and going fast. A person could die if hit just right.
Congrats to you and the parents on the new babies, the one who is here, and the one arriving soon!!
You are right! Those pucks come speeding over the glass at breakneck speed. Sure looked dangerous.
Thx for the congrats!
I’m not from Rouen but was burned at the stake for opposing round abouts while on the CCPG. Also, FYI I was against Bird and other toy companies from the start. In fact, I gave Bird the bird while also on the CCPG. Great work!
Leave it to the city “engineers” to make a traffic situation worse by “improving” it. I drove through there the other day and cannot believe how poorly designed that round about is. Having spent a lot of time in the UK, I had grand visions of how great this was going to be. I am sorely disappointed, it is an absolute sh!tshow at that intersection.
I often wonder if the local bike “activists” have infiltrated the city’s government in order to push their misguided agenda. “All bikes all the time. It is the only way forward, until it doesn’t suit my needs!”
Talk to bike activists you personally know to get a better idea. By and large, they simply want to be able to safely ride where they’d like and yes many would like to see less cars on the road. As with any group, some go overboard.
We have roundabouts on this northern end of the 395 highway in a few places and they are absolutely wonderful…as long as people remember in their little pointy heads that whomever is to their right has right-of-way and to use their turn signals. The far fewer numbers of vehicles might make a difference, too, I guess, even if it is a highway.
So how is this one different from the ones built up here I wonder? The death rates at two of these, Garden Spot Rd. in Loon Lake and Crawford St. in Deer Park, have gone to zero. Maybe there won’t be any new crosses added this year as side impacts at 60mph were brutal. Especially the 18wheeler ones where it’s more like washing off the highway than using a body bag…
As for bike riders, the comments on other recent threads have covered that topic fairly thoroughly, Judi. There is a cure for stupid, road kill. Same goes for cell phone addicts. In the late 60s I had a heroin-addicted auntie that nodded out a lot, too, and there sure is a similarity here. Complete obliviousness to their surroundings while looking down…
First snow this morning covering everything. With conifer limbs bending and the big brown dog vigorously rolling on her back in joy while tigerkitty bounded like a deer trying to avoid stepping in it (impossible) streaking for the front porch and her bowl of crunchies, I laughed at the two of them and stood there inhaling the first taste of winter. I can’t accurately describe how incredibly good it smelled.
sealintheSelkirks
I just looked at the roundabout in Deer Park on Google maps, and that is a proper roundabout. It appears that the circle is certainly large enough to accommodate about 10 cars, which is how it should work. It looks a lot like most of the roundabouts I used to encounter in the UK. The one at Bacon and W. Pt. Loma can handle 2 cars, max. The lanes are impossibly narrow, seemingly small enough as to block a firetruck if there is an additional car exiting where the truck would be entering. It seems to me that this intersection was designed with the sole goal of slowing traffic rather than alleviating the gridlock that occurs at the only entrance/exit from Robb Field. What a shame.
I have to admit, I support better and more bike infrastructure. The problem is, many of the lanes that have popped up in recent years were poorly planned out. A perfect example is up in Cardiff. The protected lanes up there have actually increased the # of car/bike collisions because all of a sudden the lanes break off in spots to allow a car to turn into (with pretty much no warning) and create confusion. The bike lanes in Hillcrest are a mixed bag. Lots of people are using them, but the problem they are right behind where cars are parked and often a car backs out not seeing a cyclist riding past. The protected lanes being built along 5th in Bankers Hill we’ll seen how that pans out when they’re done. I think it was prefect before when they were simply painted lanes and still plenty of room for car traffic. 30th in North Park is interesting. I have taken advantage of them and enjoy the fact they are there. I would never have biked along that stretch before. But, they are kind of a mix bag also. While I know many businesses are worried if they are going to survive, others seem to be doing just fine. Two places we frequent often (Redwing and Working Class) have said there has been no negative impact so far and last time I was there, the server at Working Class even said business has increased. She was saying as it is, a majority of their customers lived within walking/biking distance anyway so reduced parking has not been an issue for them.
Get it off your chest, Judi. You address what many of us feel but have no means of expressing. Keep it up.
Why put a round about there? A fun Friday or Saturday night would be to watch people try to navigate that after hitting the bars.
With all of the grousing about cyclists and errant pedestrians, you’d think cars are not a safety problem at all. Please tell that to my brother and his girlfriend who were run down by a speeding, inattentive driver who veered off the shoulder of the road, killing them both. Drivers kill about 38,000 people every year in the US. So if you want to focus on the bigger problem, Bird scooters and the occasional jay walker are probably the wrong place to start.
This is an interesting write on accidents. Whether it can be applied to bike vs car crashes I can see some of the points made:
The Deadly Myth That Human Error Causes Most Car Crashes
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/deadly-myth-human-error-causes-most-car-crashes/620808/
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Just thought it was worth the read.
sealintheSelkirks