It occurred to me yesterday that modern knowledge of traffic and public transport is a lot like the knowledge that wizened old sailors and fishermen have of the sea.
“Aye, it’s too dangerous to try and sail out ot Yonder Rock Point when the wind is south-east, my boy! By the time you have reached Turnaround Point, the wind will have changed. It usually does by nightfall, and you’ll be stranded. And don’t try to sail on the other side of Turnaround Point, because that way are shallows and sharp rocks under water!”
“Oh, you’d be crazy to take Route 20 to Boston now. You’ll get to Thingum Turnpike by half past four and rush hour starts early there, so the roads will be jammed by the time you arrive. You could try driving through Namesville, but last time I heard, the roads were under construction, and you may lose half an hour. Whatever you do, don’t try to make up for lost time on the stretch of interstate after Namesville: that road is packed with police and speed-controls.”
Ahoy Matey!
I never thought of traffic patterns as currents, but they are similar. And we’re familiar with roads we travel on all the time the same way that sailors were familiar with the waters they sailed all the time.
Cool. I like the way you think.
I know some wizened old sailors[sup]*[/sup]. They have sextants and charts, know the Beaufort Scale by heart, and say “avast” without a hint of irony; they also have a weather fax, satellite internet, and a GPS that reads to the minute and three decimal places.
Maastricht, how do you know about Route 20?
One of them is a woman probably half my age who could shoot the sun and calculate our latitude within half a mile, has beautiful eyes, and could probably kick my ass.
I sometimes think about the vast disparity in knowledge between people now vs. in premodern times. My guess is that the average modern-day Joe Blow in a developed country is likely to have a breadth of knowledge that would have been unimaginable to all but the most learned of, say, the ancient Romans; whereas the average medieval peasant or pre-Columbian Native American typically had a depth of knowledge about things of immediate importance to them that was comparable to the experts of today. I wonder what effect that has on our psyches.
Pfft, you’re not from Boston. You almost had me fooled when you knew Thingum Tpke and Namesville, AND the fact that they’re running construction there. But not knowing that Rte 20 goes around Boston is what gave you away.
This doesn’t even require a cold-read. From April to October, they’re ALWAYS running construction everywhere. Of course, when they do it in Pennsylvania, it doesn’t really make a difference, but they still go through the motions. (Seriously…have you ever driven from PA into Maryland? There’s an actual visible line where the road suddenly improves at the border going into MD!)
Yeah, but they weren’t wasting half the project budget on having a cop in a cruiser. PA has the worst roads, but MA isn’t that far behind–Winter Street in Waltham isn’t a road so much as slalom course.
Driving to Indy for a ball game means we have to check the concert schedule. If a hot band is playing that night, the right lane will be stopped for a mile before Exit 10 for three hours before the show. Hollering “starboard” at those headbangers won’t help, either. They don’t know what you’re talking about. Arrr.
No, you don’t want to do the VOR-A approach. It brings you way south of the airport, and if you use RAGER intersection as the IF, you have to do a procedure turn. Just get vectors for the Localizer approach, take it straight-in and watch for the marker beacon.
Robot Arm, you mean there actually is a Rout 20 near Boston?! I was just making stuff up. Oh, and I remember that cool picture of you on that sailboat. So, can you say “avast” already without irony? Seems more difficult to me then just using that GPS
AskNott, see, that’ s the kind of knowledge I’m talking about. When you would hear a similar remark from a sailor, you would be all in awe about this mans deep connection with the sea. (" Aye! When the wind’s east and the tide is in, don’t sail near Dead Mans’ point, you’ll get caught in the undertow!") . But that’s really the same kind of knowledge.
I’d be fired if that were my job, after killing Jason off, and countless screaming Argonauts…
I know the routes, and general traffic patterns, but special events? For the past nine years I’ve lived a couple miles from the stadium where the Dallas Cowboys play, and it’s between my house and my mom’s/my sister’s, where we always have our family Thanksgiving celebration. Even though the Cowboys have played a home game on Thanksgiving my entire life, I have managed to be stuck in game day traffic damn near every year.
Bollocks, it goes right into Kenmore Square. Historical info, including nice postcards, for those of you so inclined
Mach Tuck, doesn’t Approach send you all the way out to Purgatory and back vectoring you to the localizer if there’s the least bit of traffic? Fuck, just cancel and go in VFR; it’s easier.
And none of these people can compare to subway geeks, the larger the city the better. Some can even quote timetables.
My experience with ATC is usually that they do everything they can to expedite things. Traffic can foul that up, but I’ve never been sent to Purgatory.
I was driving from Tacoma to Portland once. I had the radio on a Seattle station and a traffic report came on. Pretty routine; I was already heading out of Olympia and Seattle was 50 miles behind me, so I wasn’t paying too much attention. They said there was an accident on southbound 5 at mile 81 that had just been cleared. I was coming over the crest of a hill, so I look to the top of the next hill and I can see brake lights. But there’s an exit between me and them, so I take it. (It was exit 95, so traffic was backed up 14 miles.) I had my state map with me, so I just took the local roads down to where the accident was clearing up and got back on the freeway. I don’t know how many hours I saved.
“Avast” just means for everybody to stop whatever it is they’re doing. There are certain things that have to be done together or it can screw something up, like loosing the braces before hauling on the halyard or you can crack the yard. If anyone notices things aren’t right, they yell “avast” and everybody stops and sorts things out. Why not just “stop” or “halt”? Sounds too much like other words. “Halt” sounds like “haul”. Nothing sounds like “avast”.
My favorite bit of well-earned wisdom is this: A bunch of float-plane pilots were talking. The subject came up about what to do when operating on a river that’s flowing one way, and the wind is blowing opposite. Which direction do you take off or land? People were arguing various theories about airspeed and water-speed. Finally a grizzled old bush pilot speaks up “you take off and land downstream,” like the subject was beyond even questioning. They asked him why. “Well, if there are any tree branches that have fallen and gotten caught in the river, the current will bend them downstream. If you’re travelling that way, you can hit them and bounce off. If you’re going upstream they’ll catch on to a float or a strut and flip you over.”
