[geeks] Boston Driving was RE: Working in Waltham

[Chris Byrne]

You mean no-one warned you? You poor bastard.

Often when I tell a traveller Im from Boston they'll say to me "Oh I have to
go there in X, any advice?" My universal response is "Don't try and drive.
Dont even think about trying to drive"

Honestly I've driven to and/or from most of the major (and a depressing
number of minor) airports on two continetns and there is no worse airport to
get out of than Logan during rush hour (or really any hour).

Here's the situation. Logan is the 7th busiest airport in America. It serves
as the only relatively convenient airport for an area spanning 5+ states.

Logan airport is on a small island just off the coast of Boston, attached by
two bridges to the north and two tunnels to the south. One of the bridges is
for rail traffic only and one of the tunnels is commercial traffic only, and
has a limited operating schedule.

The callahan tunnel is the primary link to the island as well as to the
northern half of the metropolitan Boston area, home to some two million
people (the entirety of the metro Boston area is about 5 million during the
school year. Boston is one of the largest college towns in America.)

Logans exit road consits of 8 lanes of traffic being squeezed through 5
tollbooths (oh yeah I forgot to mention it's a toll tunnel) which widen out
into 6 lanes for about 50 feet then immediately converge into two double
yellowed lanes within 100 feet.

Exiting those tollboths is like the starting gate at some crack addled taxi
drivers version of DEATHRACE 2000.

And of course assuming you make it through the gauntlet you then get dumped
out into the middle of a construction detour in downtown boston UNDER a
highway with no clear way of how to get onto another highway.

Driving in Boston is without a doubt the worst driving experience in the
nation. These are the people that invented the concept of owning a beater
that you only drove in the city or in the winter because you just dont give
a shit. These are the people who actually codified then published a game
predicated on the points system of bad driving where Hitting a Nun escorting
Schoolchildren automatically won you the game(yes it was the first. It was
orignally released in the 60's. )

And as far as navigation goes, my first recomendation is DONT. If that's not
possible and you absolutely for some reason MUST drive in Boston as a
non-native it is absolutely essential you find a native guide immediately.
Not that we know what we're doing either, but we'll yell and scream and make
rude gestures a lot along with telling you when its ok (or crucial) to run a
red lite or bang an illegal u-ie across 4 lanes of traffic.

See it's not that Boston drivers are bad. It's that they hate you. All of
you. Every last bit of you. You must all die for daring to invade the same
roadspace as they have claimed as their own.

Chris Byrne






> -----Original Message-----
> From: geeks-admin at sunhelp.org [mailto:geeks-admin at sunhelp.org]On Behalf
> Of Craig Leikis
> Sent: 17 May 2002 03:04
> To: geeks at sunhelp.org
> Subject: RE: Working in Waltham was RE: [geeks] more BGP stuff
>
>
> That's just freaky.  I've only been to MA twice, both times had meetings
> at Verizon Labs on Totten Pond and I stayed at the Westin.
>
> Gotta love the drive between Logan and Waltham. I was a nervous wreck both
> times and almost got killed more than once.
>
> Craig