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How I nearly got Tom Brady'd
By Kaz on Fri, 09/10/2010 - 7:35pm
Friday afternoon at about 6:15 PM, just past the intersection with Warren St on the outbound side of Commonwealth Ave, a woman driving a green Volvo station wagon struck and nearly ran over a 49cc scooter driver...me.
I was driving home from work this evening on Commonwealth Ave. I waited near the front of the line at Warren St for the light to change. As it went green and we started moving, I crossed over the Green Line Tracks and noticed a green car coming from the carriage lane onto the main lanes (as many people do at that intersection instead of continuing on the carriage road up past Summit to Washington). Most people recognize that they are merging into another lane of traffic and stop or slow to come into the main road just past where the T tracks switch from the side of Comm Ave to the center of the road.
This green Volvo station wagon didn't and before I knew it, she had hit my right elbow and rear view mirror with her driver side mirror hard enough to cause it to fold inward while I hit my horn and edged left in the lane as far as I could without hitting the car in the left lane at the time! I found myself between the two cars and less than an inch from her knocking me over on my right side until she finally stopped enough for me to pass her as I'd come even with her driver's window at that point. I was able to look in and see her bright pink phone (smartphone?) in one of her hands!
When we reached the red light at Washington St, she was in the left lane and I was able to pull even with her in the right lane where I'd remained. I yelled through her window, "What the fuck?!?".
She put her window down and said that I had come over into her and hit her! Astounded, I yelled at her that there were TWO lanes on Comm Ave and I was in the right one. I pointed at the carriage lane where we were at and said, "You came from over THERE and merged into ME!!".
Her defense: "I'm bigger than you are." And I was floored that she'd say something that stupid! I didn't know what to say. I grabbed my gut and said, "No, I'm bigger than YOU!". She responded, "Oh, really?", and continued, "I have a car!".
My brain was going a mile a minute at that point. I wanted to say "What is this? Boston Harbor?? I have to give way in my boat to your yacht??". I just yelled back, "What are you talking about?!?".
The light changed and she started to put up her window and drive forward (still with her pink phone in her hand!). I managed to yell at her, "Learn the rules of the road, you dumb bastard!", and drove forward too.
As we passed Washington St, there was an MBTA SUV in the left lane following a train on the B Line and it came to a stop. The people in front of her had already moved over into my lane, but I was able to pull up behind the last one and block her from coming over too. As I passed her stuck in the left lane, I gave her the finger and kept driving. I lost her in my rear view mirror cresting the hill before turning towards home from there.
This was just a surreal experience. I was so baffled by her "I'm bigger than you" comment that I didn't even think to get her plate or suggest we stop and let an officer tell her that she was wrong to run me over like that. I guess I was also just glad the situation didn't go any further south through some defensive driving on my part and a little bit of luck. This prevalent attitude that "bigger = right-of-way" has to stop though. She was completely in the wrong here and wasn't willing to apologize or even consider that she might have been wrong in the situation that almost wiped me out with multiple cars all around.
Well, if your 40-50 year old blond female friend who drives a newer green Volvo SUV with beige interior and a black pet barrier for her trunk (and it might have a scratch on the front of the driver's side mirror) tells you about how she almost killed a guy on a scooter Friday evening, feel free to point her to this story. I'd love to here what other pontifications she might have on how cars don't have to obey the traffic laws because they're bigger than scooters, bikes, pedestrians...
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Comments
I must have *just* missed this...
I got off the train at Washington probably one light cycle before you got there.
Glad you're okay. Sorry to say I'm not surprised by her attitude. Many drivers in this town clearly are of the opinion that if they can hurt you more than you can hurt them, they can drive that way.
What you should have done was pull around in front of her, and pulled out your own cell phone to report a hit-and-run to 911. Any chance you got her tags?
Unfortunately no
I was frazzled enough by the situation that I lost my train of thought on what I should do and went with what I wanted to do instead (short of break her window open and drag her out of the car). So I didn't get her plates at all.
Did you happen to be on the train that went through the red light just as I was getting to Warren? He went during the point of the cycle when inbound Comm Ave gets a protected left instead of waiting for the MBTA green signal after Comm Ave traffic goes and before Warren St traffic goes.
Understood...
We always come back with the snappy/proper come-back as soon as the bully is out of sight.
I was the in the back train, so I'm not sure. We did seem to sit at that light forever (I recalling wondering what the heck is taking so long?!, admittedly with somewhat saltier internal language). There was a train immediately behind us since as least Packard's, so given the timing I suspect it what that second train running the light. At Washington I did notice a car with a woman driver who pulled far beyond the stop line in the left turn lane before stopping. That car could have been called green. Did you happen to notice some chick struggling up the hill with way to many groceries? :)
this boiled my blood...
this boiled my blood...
This is why
I sold my scooter. This kind of shit happens. Its not worth dying over. There is no one in government or in law enforcement there as an advocate for you.
Another reason to get rid of the trolley on Comm Ave.
Put it under ground, or get rid of the tracks, make some nice large lanes with safe parking and merging, and just have buses do the route to Kenmore. Hell, the bus stop in Kenmore is big enough for it.
(I know this doesn't excuse the bad driving here.)
Warren St. Intersection needs Redesign or better signs
The B branch should definitely be put underground. The C branch should have been put underground as part of the Beacon St. reconstruction over the last few years.
Glad to hear you're alright, Kaz. The location where this took place is terribly designed, and really needs better and more paint and signage (a diagram type sign showing people how traffic flows might be particularly helpful).
I have often seen people go the wrong way on Comm. Ave here (westbound on the eastbound side), because they just can't get figure out that the T is going from the right side of the road back to the middle of Comm. Ave. It seems to occur even more frequently at this time of year, when there are lots and lots of drivers who are driving around Boston for the first time. It's part of the trifecta: UHaul truck hitting Storrow overpass, late-model sedan from New Jersey driving in front of the T somewhere around BU and this.
As I said, glad to hear you're okay.
Kenmore busway
"Hell, the bus stop in Kenmore is big enough for it."
The Kenmore busway isn't even big enough for the routes that currently pass through there. Any time it gets busy there are buses blocking other buses from reaching their berths, buses being delayed from leaving on time by other buses ahead of them, and buses that simply can't get into the busway because it's completely filled. T staff parking their cars there doesn't help. How frequently would buses have to run on that route to pick up the passenger load that the B line carries? *Not* a good idea.
You are right.
I meant to say it takes up so much damn space, there should be room for 20 bus routes there.
That being said, they should get rid of many stops or routes that go through there. Many of those routes go right next to the same green line stops anyway.
I mean, even the 60 bus goes the same place the green line goes.
(edit): I shouldn't say we don't need those buses. It wouldn't be fair to ask people to walk an extra 20 minutes to a green line stop and then wait another 20 minutes for a train filled with 2,675 people of whom 1,564 probably got on without paying.
Wider traffic lanes often
Wider traffic lanes often make things less safe by encouraging the same morons whom already cause all the accidents merging to drive faster. The whole avenue at this stretch BADLY needs a redesign of markings, merge and intersection alignments, signage, signals, and possibly the elimination of parking in favor of neck downs or other features which control driver behavior. Sometimes it's worth losing a few spaces here and there if it eliminates frequent accidents from backing up traffic countless times a week and saves people from injury.
Bury the public transit
Bury the public transit riders underground, like the trolls they are!
America was built on the
America was built on the backs of private automobile ownership!
I get misty-eyed with patriotism every time I look out over Boston drivers.
more urban highways - just what we don't need
getting rid of the trolley on Comm ave?
You are kidding right? I am not sure how turning Comm ave in such highly congested area into another clogged up semi-highway like Storrow or 9 would make it any safer especially for bicycles and scooters. More buses??? what??? If anything, the B line should have some stops eliminated, receive signal priority and added turnstyle type scanners placed before entering the stop. That's how they roll in Europe and no one complains.
The solution to the B line delays isn't
in eliminating stops - it's in adding more trains. Fewer stops means more people trying to board at the remaining stops. More trains means fewer crowds waiting for trains, and thus less dwell time for each train. So, you would actually get faster service if you had more trains.
Also, adding more trains is much more cost efficient and can be done a lot sooner than putting the line underground.
And, signal priority control would greatly help also, but apparently the T doesn't want it and Boston and Brookline are unwilling to force it on them.
Betting that you weren't driving a $95K Audi
Provided by a "charity":
http://www.boston.com/sports/football/patriots/art...
Now, that's my kind of non-profit!
What the F? Looks like
What the F? Looks like everyone in that deal is bending the rules to benefit themselves rather than the charity.
Maybe this will help Bostonians realize that big league sports fandom is mostly about a bunch of rich companies and players taking their money every possible way they can think of.
Thanks for clearing that up
Thanks for clearing that up for us - we had no idea.
I don't see the problem with Brady and his Audi
The carmaker is donating the use of the car to Brady; how does this hurt the charity? It's not like the charity's funds are somehow being used to give a wealthy pro athlete a perk he doesn't need. Audi gets the benefit of having its cars driven by celebs like Brady; I imagine they were not sorry about the publicity surrounding this story.