The left-turn phenomenon
There’s a funny song called Walking in L.A. — made funnier by the fact that I first heard it on the radio while walking in L.A. One verse goes like this:
Could it be that the smog’s playing tricks on my eyes,
Or is it a rollerskater in some kind of headphone disguise?
Maybe somebody who just ran out of gas,
Making his way back to the pumps the best way he can.
Walkin’ in L.A.
Walkin’ in L.A., nobody walks in L.A.
Nobody but me.
Of course, I do drive, out of necessity. But whenever it’s practical, I walk or take public transit. I get funny looks here when I tell people that. The truth is, L.A. sucks all the fun out of driving. Think about it: You can’t go fast. There’s no such thing as a “wide open road” unless you’re on the Glendale Freeway at 3 in the morning. You sit in traffic the whole way from A to B. And then you have to park.
Yes, there are many things about driving here that raise my ire, and I’m sure I will revisit this topic often. But let me gripe about just one factor today: the curious absense of protected left-turn arrows on traffic signals, even at major intersections. Arrows do exist, but only out in the newer suburbs and at the very busiest junctions in town.
Where there’s no arrow, the accepted procedure is to plant your car in the middle of the intersection and wait until either: a) there’s a gap in the oncoming traffic (which is often wishful thinking here), or b) the light turns yellow, at which point the oncoming traffic (hopefully) stops and the crossing traffic has no choice but to let you turn, since you’re in their way.
Simple enough. But at high-traffic times (which in many places is pretty much always) this leads to the maddening phenomenon that only two cars in a given direction can make a left turn on each cycle of the traffic light. Because two cars is all that will normally fit in the intersection (though occasionally a third car will squeeze through, amid a chorus of horns, after the light’s red).
What this means is, if there are ten cars waiting to turn left, the driver of the tenth car has to sit through five green lights before it’s his turn to turn — by which time he’s forgotten why he wanted to turn in the first place.