[Flyer]

Fear the Train!

*PING!*

As always, a FReep mail will get you on or off this Houston and Texas topics ping list.

[Fierce Allegiance]

Light-Rail-At-Work ping for ya!

[Dog Gone]

With 31 wrecks (as of this morning) it's undeniable that Houston mass transit is taking cars off the road faster than planners envisioned.

[Allegra]

This is all hilarious. Zodiac signs, even!

I'm also chuckling at the little arguments on the Locale page about where the majority of the accidents have taken place.

[Teacher317]

25? Now THERE'S a quality scientific sample size to represent a populaiton of 270,000,000! /s>

[weegee]

What is the customary gift when someone has 25 accidents? A silver neckbrace?

[weegee]

Avoid Main Street on Fridays.

I've got better advice that the Houston Commiecal will never print: "AVOID DOWNTOWN ALTOGETHER - Metrorail is a boondoggle and a quagmire".

[weegee]

The comical is making light of this tragic situation to try to defuse the critics.

If any of this data meant ANYTHING, the writer would predict in print the nature of the next accident "sex/race of driver, day/time, type of vehicle, etc.).

[Action-America]

Notice that more than 1/3 of drivers were from out of town (36%).

It just shows that Metro's choice of route was flawed, along with all their other mistakes (i.e. street level, way too quiet, should be painted black and yellow angled stripes, like a "DANGER" sign, etc.). I challenge anyone to pick 25 somehow geographically related accidents that occurred anywhere in Houston, except near the airports, where more than a third involved out-of-towners.

They put the Wham-Bam-Tram right through the middle of two of the areas of town that are a magnet for out-of-towners - the Medical Center and the Museum District. For that reason, a disproportionately high number of people driving in the area are not familiar with the area and are busy looking for street signs and landmarks, which naturally detracts from their safety observations, like watching out for a 49 ton train that shouldn't have been there in the first place.

By the time all of the lawsuits are over, the primary fault will be laid clearly at the feet of the Metro officials and designers, who came up with the insane design and route for the Wham-Bam-Tram. I expect that when all is said and done, they will all have to go into the federal WITSEC program (witness protection).

 

[judgeandjury]

A couple of errant drivers pulled out of driveways into the trains and someone ran a red light, but most of the crashes were due to illegal left turns. Repeat: illegal left turns.

If these drivers had paid attention to where they were going and obeyed all of the traffic laws, all of these accidents could have been avoided.

[theFIRMbss]

I'm a Scorpio,
white male, forty-three years old . . .
Some train has my name . . .

[T Minus Four]

contrary to water-cooler speculation, there's only one guy with the middle name Wayne

LOL! My husband's middle name is Wayne, so I'm often reminding him that he is probably a latent serial killer. It could only be worse if his middle name were "Lee"!

[iamright]

most of the crashes were due to illegal left turns. Repeat: illegal left turns.

Friends don't let friends go left!

[Jalapeno]

Add that wheelchair to the vehicles list. ;>