Staying in or braving traffic? (1 Viewer)

[Holadem]

The North-East is in the throes of a winter storm. It's been snowing heavily since 10:30am. People have been leaving work since noon. It's now 3 and most everyone is gone... to be stuck in traffic for hours. Not sure there is a point? Yet they keep leaving despite reports of monster gridlock.

I think I would rather be here till evening than be sitting in traffic for almost that long.

--
H

 

[Mort Corey]

You've definately got a better chance of survival.

Mort (who doesn't EVER do traffic......or waits in restaurants)

 

[Holadem]

Well I'd rather wait in a bar to be honest, but the closest one (normally 10 min away) is about 2 hours away in this traffic from all accounts...

--
H

 

[DaveF]

I'm at work 'til 7pm tonight. Then slush and slide home via the freeway. Last time (two weeks ago), even the busy streets were a mess. The highway's my best chance.

(Rochester, NY)

 

[Clinton McClure]

Several of my fellow co-workers are flying out to Boston in the morning. Looks like it's gonna be fun for them.

 

[Jason Seaver]

I bailed from work early because someone offered me a ride home. Otherwise, it was an unknown wait for the bus and then who knows how long the normally 45-minute trip would take.

Probably telecommuting tomorrow, even though I don't get very much done when I do.

 

[Garrett Lundy]

I've got to work tonight. At least I've got studded snow tires.

 

[Jimi C]

I had off today thankfully. Hope they have all the roads cleaned up for the morning drive tomorrow. Drove to my moms today to shovel her driveway. Traffic wasnt too slow.

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Picked up my mom after being let out of work early. Got her out of work at 2:15. A normally 10 minute ride took until 3:20. A normally 5 minute ride back to my house took another 45 minutes. This was in a Jeep with 4 wheel drive engaged. Today was brutal.

 

[Jay H]

I think in conditions like yesterday, everybody leaves early so I'm in the mindset to NOT leave early and then I'll have the roads to myself at my normal departure hour. Of course, we had our holiday party last night so no way I'm missing free food and with everybody skipping out, a better chance at the door prizes!!!

I also try to do the polar opposite of what "everybody" says to do, i.e. stick to the main roads and highways. I will drive all the back roads because they are generally empty, unlike the zillions of other bozos in SUVs going 50mph in ice on the highways. I have a Subaru and I do quite fine with 4 snow tires. I passed some huge ass Expedition in the trees off a side road I have to go up with the cops there and the folks there standing around. I had to smile and wave..

Jay

 

[alan halvorson]

Studded snow tires? Where do you live? My state, Minnesota, banned studded snow tires 30 years ago due to the damage they did to the roads. I had to dig out all the studs on my tires. I really would like to go back to studs as they are wonderful on ice, but they are noisy when it's dry and we have enough problems maintaining our roads as is without adding damage from studs.

 

[Joe S]

I left work around 1:30 yesterday, decided to avoid the highway. Took a different route and got home (about 22 miles) in an hour. There were some slick spots, mostly at traffic lights, and a hill I had to avoid when I saw a truck stuck on it.

Stayed home today and cleaned up the mess. More coming on Sunday.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

I was about to ask the same question. I remember helping my dad pull the studs out of his snow tires when I was a kid back in the '70's. I didn't know they were still legal anywhere.

 

[DaveF]

The snow out here was of no consequence; a few inches that didn't clog roads.

But there's now a weather alert, with 6" for tomorrow morning and 14" - 22" predicted for tomorrow night! I may not make it church tomorrow morning. And the fridge turned itself off last night, so we're out to replace groceries and (hopefully) stock up this afternoon.

On the plus side, I might get to do some cross-country skiing in my backyard this week!

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

Studded snow tires are legal throughout the west. Regular SALT on the roads is banned here as it caused more damage than studded tires did.

Here's a link with a schedule of the dates that studded tires are legal in various western states.
http://itd.idaho.gov/highways/Winter...dedTire.03.htm

 

[alan halvorson]

Which is what happened in Minnesota. I just don't see salt causing more road damage than studded tires. I've experienced both. Salt does cause an awful lot of damage to car bodies and I suppose it doesn't do a lot of positive things to the environment.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

The salt rusts out the steel in bridges causing them to collapse. Replacing a bridge is a lot more expensive than adding some asphalt from time to time.

Didn't a salt-rusted bridge in Minneapolis just collapse, killing dozens of people?

 

[alan halvorson]

Yeah, a pretty big one. Total killed was 13. The official cause of the bridge collapse hasn't been released yet, but very likely rust was at least a contributing factor. It might not have been had the bridge been better designed. For one thing, it was difficult to observe potential rust areas because bird dung covered it and these areas were difficult to reach - nobody wanted to crawl over the bird crap.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

It collapsed alright, but it's still wild speculation at this point to label rust from road salting as the cause.

 

[Jay H]

I believe a lot of the states in the northeast allow studded tires between certain months. I.E. Don't be driving them in July!

Jay