It all started about three weeks ago, when the morning traffic report in San Diego on KPBS reported that there was a traffic hazard. Not just any traffic hazard, though: 74,000 pounds yes, seventy-four thousand pounds) of CHICKEN FEED had spilled out of an overturned truck.
I had already noticed the apparently significant quantities of foreign objects on the freeways around San Diego since moving here (recently. Just out of a slight defensive impulse, I feel the need to note that I was born and raised in California, albeit Sacramento, which is a whole another discussion. But it's not like I just wandered out here in search of an endless summer from some small, dead-end midwestern town. Or worse, New York. OK, I digress. Ok, often.)
Now, let's think about this just for a second. Any object laying about in the traffic lanes of an otherwise normal freeway is, by definition, a foregin object. ( see, e.g., www.m-w.com : 4: alien in character : not connected or pertinent ).
And for that matter, significant is relative: more objects in the roadway than, say, one a day, is a little abnormal. But San Diego's freeways are out of all proportion for this, as anyone listening to the morning traffic reports can learn. (Remember, this is Southern California, where The King isn't ablubbering rocknroll icon, or a shitty, watery, fizzy-yellow beer, but The Car. Nowhere is the more true than in San Diego, where the people are truly addicted to their freeways.) Cars and using them are so pertinent to daily survival here that people will sit in parking lot-style traffic on I-8, where they can occasionally look over to Friars Road and watch the traffic roll by, on an almost precisely parallel route, at 50-80 mph.
See, I think it's like this: Southern Californians, and especially San Diegans, love the potential of being able to go 90 mph on the freeway, even if that's rarely the actual case.
When I started thinking about this, here's the radio report that caught my attention today:
Sunday 7/20/03, 10:46am: 5 South at Del Mar Heights Road, reports of a "traffic hazard": a filing cabinet in the middle lane .
While sitting here and writing this, the following traffic report came on the radio: In Alpine (so ostensibly I-8, there is a FIRE licking onto the road, and here's what seemed to concern them most: no access to the Casino from the westbound side. Here's what Caltrans has to say about it:
Incident: 0670 Type: Structure or Grass Fire Location: VIA LA MANCHA AT WILLOWS RD Zoom Map: 1234 6F Info as of: 7/20/2003 4:15:16 PM
ADDITIONAL DETAILS
4:07PM - PER 63, TRAFFIC BACKING UP EB AT E WILLOWS OFR // BCG
3:28PM - W WILLOWS TO THE CASINO IS GOING TO BE CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
3:28PM - THE FIRE IS MAINLY CONTAINED ON THE NB SIDE OF THE RESERVATION
3:02PM - 1039 TO STAM FOR XTRA UNITS
3:01PM - PER 83, COORDINATED W/S/O SGT // THEY HAVE UNITS ENRT OR 1097, JUST NEED 1-2 MORE, S20 COPZ ENRT
2:58PM - DIVERT TRAFFIC OFF FROM EB // REQ ADDTL UNITS
2:40PM - 1039 HEARTLAND
2:39PM - MALE SITTING AT BUS STOP CLAIMS HE STARTED FIRE WITH CIGARETTE
2:36PM - BRUSH FIRE JNO 8
RESPONDING OFFICERS STATUS
2:44PM - CHP Unit On Scene
3:24PM - CHP Unit On Scene
4:12PM - CHP Unit On Scene
Then I decided to look for it on Caltrans' CHP Traffic Information site, http://cad.chp.ca.gov , and found these additional examples:
Border Communications Center
Number of Incidents: 14
Last Updated at: 7/20/2003 4:13:53 PM
University Av On Ramp to 163 North
Traffic Hazard - Debris/Objects (3:20 PM)
Thomas Guide Map Coordinates: Page 1269, Grid 5B
Couple of Wood or Bamboo Room Dividers in Road (3:20 PM)
CHP Unit Assigned (3:31 PM)
5 South Before Clairemont Dr
Traffic Hazard - Debris/Objects (3:42 PM)
Thomas Guide Map Coordinates: Page 1248, Grid 7E
Surfboards 2-3 Lanes (3:42 PM)
CHP Unit Enroute (3:44 PM)
CHP Unit Assigned (3:44 PM)
Trfc Heavy Where Mission Bay Comes on-Traffic Hazard May Be There-Trfc Slow 3:47 PM
IT'S SUNDAY AFTERNOON. Do you know where your surfboards are?
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