rec.autos.driving on 19 Dec 2005 16:23:53 -0800:
I know what you mean. Over here on the east coast we get the same thing on 95. The real fun starts when you get a flock of snowbirds (northern retirees headed to-from FL for the winter - especially ones driving RV's) who decide to camp out in the center lane at about 60 to 65MPH (posted limit on most of 95 in GA and northern FL where I generally roam is 70MPH and most traffic is usually doing 80+). Imagine a swift flowing stream with a rock in the middle. The cars flowing around the rolling snowbird roadblock looks alot similar to the water flowing around that rock. It sometimes amazes me that there aren't more accidents on that road.
A friend of mine works in a hotel along that road, and he's told me a few stories of these seniors who roll out of their vehicle to get a room for the night. Some of them are so shakey and physically unstable that they can barely fill out the hotel registration. And these people are *driving* 3000lb vehicles over long distances?
I sometimes have to pbutt by one of the interchanges on I-95 (on the surface street) and what some of these tourists do is literally amazing. There is this one intersection just east of the interstate where the left turn lane is seperated from the through lanes by a group of white dome reflectors. There is plenty of signage and pavement markings to tell people which lane is for left turns and which are for through traffic. Care to guess where a lot of tourists make their left turns from? (hint: it ain't the designated left turn lane)
