Getting There

It’s now my third week of working at home, so needless to say, there’s  not a lot of commuting going on.  Once a week, early Sunday morning I drive into the city to spend some time in my office, checking mail, tidying up, doing a few housekeeping chores, and remembering that I do actually have a job.  And thankfully, still a paycheck.  May it continue.

My Sunday commutes have been startling and dramatic.  Pre-Corona, the 80 Freeway between Vallejo and San Francisco is a commuting hell.  Heavy traffic usually at top speeds of 40 on a good day.  The 35 mile trip typically takes 1 1/2 to 2 hours each way.  Since I drive carpool, I (and my passengers) get a break, usually coasting along at about 50 and being able to breeze past the toll lanes.

The last three Sundays have been amazingly different  Cars are few and far between and there are even stretches of the freeway where I see no cars in front of me or behind me.  I feel like I’m in one of those futuristic post-apocalyptic movies.   Except this is now.

This is the 80 freeway where it divides and enters the toll plaza area going into San Francisco.  Cash lanes are closed, since there are no toll-takers  Cash only drivers without Fast Track drive on through and are sent a bill in the mail.

Approaching Toll Plaza before Bay Bridge into San Francisco.

Here are the toll lanes pre-Corona.

The city’s streets and sidewalks are quiet and empty, many buildings boarded up.  I drove on Post Street past Union Square where Tiffany’s, Saks, and Williams Sonoma are all hidden behind boarded windows.

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Returning home was an easy 40 minute drive.  The clear skies, the hillsides abloom with golden California poppies were a welcome sight after the grim city streets.

April begins this week with another month of covid-19, closed cities and empty freeways.  But with hope, too, for solutions and the return to health and our lives.  Good people are working all over the globe to make it happen, and we will get there.

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Most of us don’t use hand signals when we’re driving – we rely on our signal lights. Well, most of us. There are some drivers out there who love switching lanes without signalling. Maybe it adds to the thrill of freeway commuting for them.

But even if you conscientiously use your signal lights, there are still times when you need to use your hands to communicate with another driver. Like when your lights are not working, or when you really want to emphasize what your intention is, or when you want to acknowledge a courtesy. You know – saying “thank you”.

I encounter this situation every day when I drive carpool. Leaving San Francisco in the evening for the harrowing commute home, I have to enter the Bay Bridge from the car pool on-ramp into a lane of fast-moving traffic.  I always turn on my signal, check my mirror, and usually turn my head for look.  Most drivers let me in, and I acknowledge the courtesy with a wave and mouth a ‘thank you’.  I wonder why more drivers don’t say thanks – if its because they don’t know how or if they are uncomfortable engaging.   This link has some good tips on how to do it:  SAYING THANKS AT THE WHEEL   

And then there are drivers who are just aggressive and don’t care.  They won’t let you in and they would never say thank you.  Sometimes those drivers can provoke other sorts of hand signals, which starts getting into the area of road rage.  Tempting as it is, do not go there.  It can be dangerous.  Some years ago a truck aggressively pulled in front of me on a treacherous part of a single-lane roadway.  I was furious and made a rude hand signal.  To my shock, the guy (a big guy) stopped his truck, which blocked my progress on the one-lane road and started to get out.  I backed up – fast – and he got back in the truck and went on his way.  Scary.

My favorite hand signal came recently from a motorcycle driver.  Annoying as motorcycles can be, they are vulnerable out there on the freeways and those riders are seriously flirting with death every minute. We need to watch out for them as much as we can.  I always pull over a bit when they’re coming up alongside me, and on one commute last month, I did just that as a biker passed me.  He extended his left arm and I thought he was signaling a turn in front of me, but that was not what he meant.   I later learned that he was making a ‘biker’s wave”.  His arm smoothly extended to the left, the bike slightly tilted, and his gloved hand gave a slight downward shake.   I loved it.

I often think of this small gesture when I’m out there running late on a crowded freeway with hundreds of cars and people – all of us separate and yet together with the pressures and stresses of our lives.  It’s a reminder,  that sometimes that small wave, that bit of a nod can make all the difference.  A reminder that after all, we are all just trying to get there.

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I drive 35 miles to work a couple of times a week and take public transport the other 3 days (ferry, bus, BART). I don’t usually come out ahead time-wise one way or the other,unless it’s Friday light (getting rarer and rarer), or I drive in early Saturday morning. Making the 35 mile trek takes me about an hour and half, any way I do it. The advantage of taking public transport is that it is almost always consistent – leaves at the same time, arrives at the same time. And of course there are the environmental considerations. Dealing with traffic is always a gamble – there have been commutes that have taken me nearly 3 hours to go the 35 miles, and once in a lovely while I can make it in about an hour. But I’m always looking for ways to shave off some time and get there earlier when I drive. I often pick up riders and enjoy what advantages remain of using the carpool lane. I must admit to occasionally jumping into the carpool lane as a single driver to move past gridlock, and once fairly recently I did just that and wound up in the arms of the highway patrol. An expensive and humiliating experience I will not repeat. More about that in another blog.

I am not a habitual lane changer, although I do pass those 10 and 12-wheeler truck monsters who are always out there. But I’ve noticed as I meander along with the pack, usually at about 20 mph or less, that other lanes seem to be moving faster. I’ve switched to those lanes, and move ahead a bit speedier and then once again find myself falling back to the same sluggish pace, enviously eyeing an adjacent lane zipping by me. Makes me wonder if I’m just unlucky, just not picking the right lane, and I envy the drivers who always seem to be getting it right.

A Stanford University professor did a study using computer simulations to study drivers perceptions of freeway traffic, and concluded that one lane moving faster than another is an illusion. And that we all move pretty much at the same speed. Stanford Article

I decided to test the theory the last time I was in heavy slow moving traffic. I spotted a black van in an adjacent lane that appeared to be in a faster-moving lane and kept my eye on it to see if was indeed moving ahead. To my delight, MY lane began to pick up speed and as I passed the black van I felt a smug satisfaction in being the car in the fast lane. How sweet it was. I’d finally got it right! But only temporarily. The black van and his comrades soon passed me and I lost track of them as I navigated the sluggish stop and go commuter traffic. I felt depressed and discouraged to know I could never win at the fast lane game. But as we all trundled along to the toll plaza lanes near the end of my journey, there, two lanes over, was the black van again. Ha! He hadn’t gone faster at all. Maybe Stanford had it right. Perhaps one lane is pretty much like another. But I think we can all definitely agree that commuting in bay area traffic does indeed put us all in the same lane – the over-crowded, over-priced and unsustainable lane.

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