The other day I was rather on edge on reaching the office. I needed a strong cup of coffee. So glad I hate smoking or I’d have lung cancer by now for sure. You see, on the way to work, I had three incidents that nearly resulted in accidents. The main problem on my route is unusual intersections.
The worst has a sweeping bend close to where I have to turn right from a side road. Problem is that the road disappears around a bend and of course so does your visibility. Even with a speed bump not more than 75 metres around this bend, the Jenson Button types put foot immediately after the bump and approach you at such a lick that, as soon as you have decided that nothing’s coming and you can start to cross, they are nearly in your face. It’s particularly nerve-racking if I am driving an older generation turbodiesel that has a dollop of turbo-lag that adds on a third of a second or so to your pull-off time. That could just be enough to have the right fender lose its shape completely. On the left side of this same intersection is another curved road, so it takes quite a lot of neck exercises before it’s safe to venture across – sort of safe, anyway.
Then shortly after this one is another tricky turn. Similar situation, in fact. Problem here is that people wanting to turn right to join the main road are expecting traffic from the right (opposite side to my approach from the left) which has a major multiple lane robot feeding traffic from potentially three directions. So they keep looking right till it’s clear to proceed… and often forget to check the left side for cars like mine turning right across their bows. These vehicles have the right of way, which might be of interest to the insurance company but no-one else. There are only two other spots that require a beady eye on this arduous trip to work.
Am I glad I only live three blocks from work? You bet!