Archive for January 5th, 2009

Not to turn this space into the NY Times’ “Metropolitan Diary” or anything, but I had a curious and gratifying moment yesterday. I’m currently in Sanibel Island, Florida, where my biggest traffic concern is generally trying to figure out if the thing I can see in the dead tree to my distant left as I drive is a peregrine falcon or a red-shouldered hawk. In any case, at the local bookstore I saw a flyer announcing a pickup-soccer game the following morning (the guy announced he needed a break from “family time”). Being a soccer nut and definitely suffering withdrawal symptoms, I resolved to attend. It turned out I was the only one who did, apart from the three early twenty-something guys hosting it. After an intense first-half of two-on-two, we were chatting in the shade. We were talking about what we did, and I mentioned Traffic, then preparing myself to make the explanatory pitch… Before I could, however, one of the three, Scott, perked up and said “you wrote Traffic?” Not only had he bought and read the book on a plane, but apparently a friend had bought it for him as well (was there ever more rapturous music to a writer’s ears?) We talked for a while about Boston drivers and such, then played a bit longer in the noonday heat, then went our separate ways. I think it was a draw, by the way.

As I note in Traffic, sitting in the backseat offers a more substantial benefit than front-seat airbags. A piece in Japan’s Daily Yomiuri notes how much safer still that becomes when backseat passengers are belted:

“The number of road traffic deaths in 2008 decreased by 10.3 percent from 2007. The dramatic decrease is partly due to the increased rate of passengers in backseats wearing seat belts, the NPA said.

If most of backseat passengers wear seat belts, the annual number of road traffic deaths will decrease below 5,000,” an NPA senior official said.”

From the delightful “automobile touring game” chronicled over at things magazine.

“Apart from the obvious problems of traffic and transportation, the growth created other confusing complications. Today, out of the city’s eighty-five thousand streets, there are about eight hundred fifty called Juarez, seven hundred fifty named Hidalgo, and seven hundred known as Morelos. Two hundred are called 16 de Septiembre, while a hundred more are 16 de Septiembre Avenue, Alley, Mews, or Extension.”

That’s a snippet from David Lida’s First Stop in the New World: Mexico City, Capital of the 21st Century. I have been to the city many times — and on the most recent trip was delighted by the car-free Sundays program in the center — but this book deepened my knowledge and appreciation.