Why is everyone in such a hurry?

I may be imagining things but as years go by, it seems like eveybody on the road is in more and more of a hurry to get somewhere all the time.

Some may have a reason to be in a hurry, maybe they are late for work, there could be a medical emergency or maybe they just really really have to pee.

 Whatever the reason, don't let your situation effect the safety of others on the road

Make sure your following distance is sufficient (Two seconds between vehicles as a minimum)

 Don't let your thoughts or anything else in your vehicle distract you from the dangers of the road

 

Everyone wants to get home safe after all.

HOV Lanes - for High Occupancy Vehicles

 Finally, after two years of road construction our local HOV Lanes are open.

 

These "high occupancy vehicle lanes" are supposed to help relieve the rush hour congestion that persists most of the day heading into or out of Toronto.

I've been using both the HOV lanes and regular traffic lanes for a few months now and have noticed a few things.

They harbor some of the most arrogant, ignorant, unsafe, inconsiderate, brain-dead, idiots on the planet.

For some reason about one in ten users seem to have no regard for the law governing traffic and HOV lane use and don't realize that driving inches from my bumper will slow me right down below the speed limit even though I may have been doing well over the limit.

Every few minutes I see a car jump over the double solid "do not cross" lines and more often than not, it's a single person using it as his own personal passing lane.

Then there is the family that goes into the HOV lane because they have a car full of kids, the fact that the traffic is going twenty miles an hour faster doesn't bother them in the least cause they can't see behind them anyway with all the activity and distractions going on inside their vehicle..

Is It Spring Yet?

 Is It Spring Yet?

  

OK . . . so I have finally come out of hibernation and it's still cold out. What's up with that, I thought we were getting global warming but this winter is taking forever to go away.

The drive belt broke on my snowblower a couple of weeks ago with the last snow.

I guess it's as good of a time as any to say to WATCH OUT for motorcycles - second nature in the south where bikes are on the road all year but in the Northern States and Canada, you don't see too many motorcycles in the snow.

  

Be extra careful checking your mirrors and always check your blind spots before changing lanes or making sudden unsignaled turns

 

  Drive Safe and let them Arrive Alive

Here comes the snow

Winter is coming and there's nothing anyone can do to stop it.

All you can do is prepare for what's ahead.

Hey Buffalo, did you get enough snow yesterday or you want some more?

These shots were on I 90 near Buffalo just a different storm.

 

I used to drive a truck through Buffalo to Syracuse every day and saw some pretty ominous lake effect snow events like they just had yesterday which stranded motorists for more than ten hours along Interstate 90.

 

One particular trip through that stretch I saw more cars and trucks in the ditch or stuck in snow drifts across the road than I saw actually driving, fortunately I had a heavy load and was driving a ten wheeler that could drive through almost anything.

 

The amazing thing about these Lake Effect snow storms is that thirty miles up-wind on the other side of the lake, it can be a bright sunny day although very very cold as in the scene below which dumped four feet of snow on Buffalo in just a few hours.

 

In this scene, a cold wind is at your back blowing directly over Lake Ontario towards Buffalo, first forming streamers of what looks like steam rising off the lake and quickly forming a thick cloud almost like a dense fog bank just hanging several hundred yards off shore. That "fog bank" is the origin of an intense lake effect snow band that paralyzed Buffalo for days about fifteen years ago. I took this shot on returning from Syracuse after spending about three hours getting past Buffalo Airport.

Be ready for whatever you may encounter in winter driving or better yet, stay home and keep warm and toasty.

That's what I plan to do.

Construction,Construction, Construction

Each night I drive my son to work at the Ford plant near Toronto so I spend some time every night on the QEW Highway.

For anyone that uses the QEW, they know construction is the norm through the Oakville stretch.
Recently the timing of my trips put me in the thick of the congestion to get through the area. Miles and miles just idling along with the thousands of other drivers wasting fuel and polluting the air.


Alas, a change of shift, my son goes in a bit earlier now so I leave a little earlier. Now I see the construction crews just arriving with their coffee in hand planning out their strategy for causing absolute traffic chaos  paralyzing the west end of the city.