We're not so think as they dumb we are.

So, I'm sitting at this intersection in the double left turn lane. The left turn arrow is red, but the light for traffic in my direction is green. Looking down the vast expanse of concrete and blacktop the lay before me, there is not a car coming for miles. Head spins left, right, then left again, and I 'm thinking, Do I do it? Would you? Have you?

Ok I didn't. Not there anyway. But I have. In intersections that were not so vast, a little later at night, you get my drift. But this is why I am ranting today. It's been a while since I have given my monthly traffic rant, and it's about time I went off on the left turn arrow. Like I can't make the decision to go when it's safe to turn. I just don't like the government telling me how to do things. We pay the price for the actions of asshole/stupid driver's that become a statistic when they have an accident. It's not fair.

So, as I am sitting there, I ponder the math. Imagine a busy intersection that still employs the now archaic notion of left turns on the green light. How many accidents actually happen here? One a month? A week? Lets be generous and say one a week. Now this busy intersection is near to a tollway entrance, and that means two things; speed and quantity. How do you guess how many cars go through it on a daily basis? Where do you even start? Well I'm guessing a cycle of the lights could be as high as 90 seconds. In that time, ten lanes of combined traffic, in rush hour, I'll bet it could be as many as 2 or 3 hundred. Let's be fair and say 200. Times 40 = 8,000. Figure a good 6 hours of heavy traffic, plus average flow for the remaining daylight hours, and sprinkling in the stragglers coming home from the bar late at night, and I come to an approximate total of 78,000 cars a day. Whew. But I'm not done.

312,000 cars a week with one accident means that you or I have about a .0003% chance of getting hit. Well, probably more like .00025$ you and .00005% me. I'm just saying. But it all boils down to one infuriating mantra, that the masses are all dumbed down to the basest of levels. That I have to sit at a red turn arrow for no reason, while not a single car passes through the intersection, all because some careless jackass/clueless idiot wasn't paying attention. Hey, I'm all for rules. Like no public urinating and the like. Rules that make common sense. And common sense tells me that if I can safely turn left at an intersection I should be allowed to do so. Next time, I am so going.