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Little London
Jan. 5th, 2008 03:38 pmHow London Fails: Driving and Roads
In Ottawa, left-turn lanes are aligned. This means that if I'm in a car waiting to turn left and another car going in the opposite direction is turning left, and we both have "left-turn" lanes, our cars should be perfectly aligned (from one end of our bumpers to the other). As a result, we can see past each other to determine whether it is safe or not to begin turning, or to safely wait for traffic to pass.
London street planners didn't really figure this out, so whenever I want to turn left and another vehicle, going in the opposite direction, is also turning left, we can't see past each other. There's the inevitable slow creep forward before I have to slam on the brakes to avoid getting clocked by an oncoming car.
The drivers here don't seem overly rude but they are impatient, and display this in two different ways. First, if you turn too slowly, you are likely to be honked at. Being new to the city and a bad navigator, I have had to do a lot of U-turns. To do a U-turn, you generally turn a little more slowly than you would if you were just doing a regular left turn. For the three times that I have done a U-turn with another driver behind me, I have been honked at for, I assume, turning too slow.
Second, when turning right onto a busy street, I thought the protocol was that you not only wait for a space in traffic for you to insert your car, but also allow enough time for you to get up to speed so that the oncoming cars don't have to slow down for you. In London, everyone waiting to merge will turn onto a busy street given a few car lengths of space, forcing me to cut my speed down to about one half or one third while I wait for them to accelerate.
This wouldn't matter if London was either pedestrian- or bicycle-friendly, but it's not. Forest City my ass. If you don't have a car, you're out of luck.
How London Rocks
Just called the Scot's Corner pub. I heard that a few places showed football games on weekend mornings, but they only opened at noon - much too late for Liverpool games. Got on the phone with the people at Scot's and asked three questions: "Do you get Setanta and Fox Sports World?" ("Yes, we do"). "Do you show British Premership games?" ("Yes, and Scottish Premiership, too"). "What time do you open on weekend?" (they gave the best answer: "Our official opening time is 10:30, but if there's a game on we will open as early at 7:00am. We open when the games start.")
I hope they have a decent breakfast.
Miscellaneous Stuff
Went to the gym again this morning for my first day back among the weights since December 31st. My knee responded very well. I didn't notice the metric values, though, and nearly killed myself on the cable pull when I thought I would be lifting 35 pounds with my bad leg and was actually lifting 35 kg. Adjustments were made, disaster narrowly avoided (to be fair to myself, the cable pull only had the numbers on the weights, and not the units of measurement).
Went to Chapters to find a Slow Cooker Recipe Book for The Missus to use while I'm away (I'm planning to go home next weekend, so I can give it to her then). While there, I bumped into a fellow classmate that I met yesterday at orientation and I told her about the London Food and Wine show in two weeks time. She seemed really interested and thought that other people would be, too. Sounds like my idea of getting a group together for this will work.
Need to finish my readings tonight so that I can spend tomorrow mucking about with my laptop.
In Ottawa, left-turn lanes are aligned. This means that if I'm in a car waiting to turn left and another car going in the opposite direction is turning left, and we both have "left-turn" lanes, our cars should be perfectly aligned (from one end of our bumpers to the other). As a result, we can see past each other to determine whether it is safe or not to begin turning, or to safely wait for traffic to pass.
London street planners didn't really figure this out, so whenever I want to turn left and another vehicle, going in the opposite direction, is also turning left, we can't see past each other. There's the inevitable slow creep forward before I have to slam on the brakes to avoid getting clocked by an oncoming car.
The drivers here don't seem overly rude but they are impatient, and display this in two different ways. First, if you turn too slowly, you are likely to be honked at. Being new to the city and a bad navigator, I have had to do a lot of U-turns. To do a U-turn, you generally turn a little more slowly than you would if you were just doing a regular left turn. For the three times that I have done a U-turn with another driver behind me, I have been honked at for, I assume, turning too slow.
Second, when turning right onto a busy street, I thought the protocol was that you not only wait for a space in traffic for you to insert your car, but also allow enough time for you to get up to speed so that the oncoming cars don't have to slow down for you. In London, everyone waiting to merge will turn onto a busy street given a few car lengths of space, forcing me to cut my speed down to about one half or one third while I wait for them to accelerate.
This wouldn't matter if London was either pedestrian- or bicycle-friendly, but it's not. Forest City my ass. If you don't have a car, you're out of luck.
How London Rocks
Just called the Scot's Corner pub. I heard that a few places showed football games on weekend mornings, but they only opened at noon - much too late for Liverpool games. Got on the phone with the people at Scot's and asked three questions: "Do you get Setanta and Fox Sports World?" ("Yes, we do"). "Do you show British Premership games?" ("Yes, and Scottish Premiership, too"). "What time do you open on weekend?" (they gave the best answer: "Our official opening time is 10:30, but if there's a game on we will open as early at 7:00am. We open when the games start.")
I hope they have a decent breakfast.
Miscellaneous Stuff
Went to the gym again this morning for my first day back among the weights since December 31st. My knee responded very well. I didn't notice the metric values, though, and nearly killed myself on the cable pull when I thought I would be lifting 35 pounds with my bad leg and was actually lifting 35 kg. Adjustments were made, disaster narrowly avoided (to be fair to myself, the cable pull only had the numbers on the weights, and not the units of measurement).
Went to Chapters to find a Slow Cooker Recipe Book for The Missus to use while I'm away (I'm planning to go home next weekend, so I can give it to her then). While there, I bumped into a fellow classmate that I met yesterday at orientation and I told her about the London Food and Wine show in two weeks time. She seemed really interested and thought that other people would be, too. Sounds like my idea of getting a group together for this will work.
Need to finish my readings tonight so that I can spend tomorrow mucking about with my laptop.