To cut a dull story short, I have been driving to and from work for the last couple of months. Well, I say driving, but it's more carpooling: two others at home work on Sheppard Avenue, so I drop them off in the morning and pick them up at night. Job's a good 'un (traffic, bad drivers and abusive rednecks notwithstanding).
Imagine my surprise, then, to discover I was navigating the worst intersection in North America not once, not twice, not thrice, but four (4) times a day. The Toronto Star takes up the scene:
Bayview and Sheppard is crazy, say the weary navigators of the most congested intersection in Toronto.It’s ridiculous, surreal and out-of-control.In peak hours it can take four red lights to get through it to the 401 tantalizingly visible from her nearby condo building, says Brenda Mazlow.The eight-year veteran of the intersection has given up making the “impossible” left turn from Sheppard Ave to Bayview and the 401 on-ramp.And the neverending condo buildings popping up in the area are making it worse, she says.The condominium boom is being blamed for the fact that five of the city’s 10 most congested intersections are on Sheppard Ave.Councillor David Shiner, whose Willowdale ward has two of the busiest at Sheppard and Bayview and Sheppard and Leslie, says it’s only going to worsen as more developments get approved.“You haven’t seen nothing yet,” Shiner said, during discussion Thursday about the clogged intersections at council’s public works and infrastructure committee.Shiner noted that just this week, the North York community council gave its blessing to 4,000 new condo units, the latest phase in a massive 20-hectare development on Sheppard between Bayview Ave. and Leslie St.
What the article doesn't mention is that Toronto is Canada's worst city for congestion, and at the bottom of a 21-strong list of North America's longest commute times. All of which makes the intersection of Sheppard and Bayview - by my estimation, anyway - the worst in North America (which, effectively, is the entire world).
Picture the scene. People are mardy, and want nothing more than to get to/from work. They'll do pretty much anything: cruise 400 metres down the otherwise-deserted centre turning lane, the more conniving ones keeping an indicator flashing though they have no intention of turning. Closer to the intersection itself, the opposite is true: folk creep up the centre lanes in order to lurk past the backed-up turning lane, and then, once past the lights and into no-man's land, lurch around the corner like a sozzled cowboy - much to the honking annoyance of law-abiding good eggs (i.e. me).
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| In the words of Janine from Ghostbusters: "Picking up or dropping off?" |
In all honesty, though, Toronto's worst intersection is nothing: without a hint of exaggeration, there are worse junctions in Wallsend, and I can only begin to imagine the utter horror that would result were you to transport South Gosforth's double roundabout to any given North American metropolis. They'd basically lose their shit, to use the vernacular.
Speaking of which, my favourite driving experience was nothing to do with intersections (though there was a good story about the man of the house accidentally blocking a junction downtown, at which point he - and a few dozen fellow drivers - completely lost their shit). Rather, my memorable event was in gridlock on the 401 highway. As is my habit in gridlock, I was rolling forwards to a stop rather than trying to stay within two feet of the bumper in front at all times. Having also allowed a couple of cars to join the highway from an on-ramp, the nice man and his wife/sister in the truck behind started beeping. I had no idea their ire was directed at me (I thought he was angry at the pushers-in, if anything) until he passed me when traffic sped up again, leaning out of the window and unleashing a torrent of barely comprehensible abuse.
Now, listen: I had the radio on, but I'm fairly sure he dropped an f-bomb or two before calling my driving abilities into question. Tony and I looked at each other, bemused. "Was that for me?" I wondered. I did what any real man would do: gave him a forceful toot of the horn, withdrawing a potential v-sign when I realized I actually didn't want to lose my life in a Tuesday morning road rage incident. Unfortunately, the retort I instructed our car to emit was so pathetically high-pitched that it made my Aygo's toot sound like a tanker's foghorn. Still, it remains the only time I've been able to use the horn without subsequently being admonished by my front-seat passenger.
"David, no, sto... You didn't have to beep that guy."
"But how else will he learn...?"
A telling silence results... and it tells me I'm right.
