Slipstream - July 2017

Five Speed Chatter: Is it a Battle or a Commute? (Part 1)
By Ash Seidl-Staley
Images courtesy of the Author
ince my wife and I have
S
moved to the quiet little
town of Forney, the time
we spend commuting to
and from work has grown exponentially. Technically,
Jenny’s commute has doubled. She went from spending
around twenty-five minutes driving through Plano
and on the President George Bush Turnpike to fifty
minutes driving on three separate highways from the
opposite end of the Metroplex. Before sympathy for
Jenny starts rolling in, you must know that my commute
has increased by a factor of eight! Given that I
had it coming -- I have been spoiled living in Plano for
the past six years. On any given day, it would take me
seven minutes to get to work, nine if there was traffic
or if I were to hit the solitary traffic light in my path.
Now, my commute, if I’m lucky that is, is fifty minutes.
But for a matter of simplicity, let’s just call the running
average an hour.
Now that I spend a heck of a lot more
time on Texas’ roadways, highways, and
tollways, I have finally come to realize just
how busy and overcrowded the Dallas/Fort
Worth area really is. I mean, can we get more
lanes on Highway 80, please? How about an extension
for the George Bush Turnpike that crosses Lake Ray
Hubbard and goes into Heath? Doesn’t
anyone realize that hopping off the highway
only to get back on two exits down is
part of the reason why there is congestion
in the first place? I think about questions
like these, as well as many others, as I travel
through Forney, Sunnyvale, Mesquite,
Garland, Rowlett, Richardson, and Plano.
Yes, you read that right, I travel through seven cities to
get to and from work each and every day. I can switch
my route some by swapping Sunnyvale and Mesquite
for Rockwall and Heath, but by doing that I’m really
just giving up highway speeds for a 45 mph speed limit
on a two lane road that may or may not have a tractor
on it. To be honest, most days it’s not the duration of
the drive that gets to me; it’s the terrible driving of the
people I am forced to share the roadways with! I mean,
really, is this a commute or a full on battle royale?
During the past few months both my patience and
my sanity have been tested by a cornucopia of crappy
driving. I will be taking the time this month, as well as
next month, to discuss some these occurrences, and to
describe some of the things I’ve noticed about DFW’s
drivers. I’m sure that we all deal with some of these on
a daily basis, so discussing them here might prove to
be therapeutic, right? I sure hope so; those of us with
terrible commutes could use some relief every now and
then. Most of the terms and concepts I use to describe
these horrible driving habits will be familiar to you, but
I am sure that there are some that you might not have
seen, read, or heard since your last driving exam with
the Department of Motor Vehicles.
Let’s start things off with a simple one: The Tailgater.
We all know about the drivers that pop up out of
nowhere in the rearview mirror. Usually, you miss them
coming up into your car’s sacred spaces because they
can’t seem to stay in one lane for very long and instead,
weave in and out of traffic for miles and miles. But once
they are behind you, tailgaters cannot help but make
their presence known. They honk their horns, flail
their hands about, and scream “get the (expletive) out
of the way” while listening to something obnoxious on
KISS-FM. Tailgaters constantly accelerate and brake,
basically pump-faking your back bumper, which in turn
makes you nervous, a little frustrated, and a whole lot
of angry. Now I don’t know about you, but there have
been numerous times where I will be apprehensively
going 47 in a 40, and still have a SUV crowding my back
end! Like, seriously, how is 7 mph over the speed limit
not fast enough? For some I guess it is not.
The Texas Driver’s handbook offers up the term
Velocitation Effect in an attempt to justify the speed
demon inside all tailgaters, but I’m not convinced.
The velocitation effect is the effect that traveling at a
constant high rate of speed has on a driver that makes
the driver feel like any reduction in speed is way too
slow. As a result, the driver fails to slow down enough to
safely drive on a city’s roads. I think tailgaters are more
inclined to just be unsavory reprobates than velocity
addicts, but what do I know? What I do know is how to
make tailgaters even more aggravated than they already
are, which is by brake-checking them, and/or purposefully
decelerating to the actual speed limit while making
sure that there is a car next to you doing the same.
I tell you what -- there is nothing better than blocking
a tailgater for a few blocks, watching him swerve out of
multiple lanes trying to get around, see him finally get
out from behind the blockade and speed off, only to be
pulled over by the Rowlett police department for going
56 in a 40!
Stay tuned for part two of this article next month, in
which we will be discussing wolf packs, drivers that
swerve, the problems with cruise control, and, thanks
to Governor Abbot, Texas’s newest laws as they relate to
texting and driving. Until then, stay safe during battle
and as always . . . Wrench on Mavs!
28 July