Deerfoot. I hate you Deerfoot.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

I blame the merge morons.. You know the ones who light up their brakes at the start or middle of the merge.. Or they try to merge going 20 km/h less than the flow of traffic.. I almost rear ended one the other day because I was shoulder checking when she panicked.

Worse is when they come to a complete stop at the end of the merge lane. Instead of one vehicle trying to merge you have a multiple trying to guess when the other guy is going to merge.

[burn_this_city]

A guy my co-workers knew got killed on his bike because a woman locked up her brakes when he was trying to merge and he swerved into the guard rail.

[Superflyer]

Originally Posted by Madman

I personally think there a couple problems that compound upon each other to create the worst road on the planet.

The biggest thing, as stated above, is the idiots who think its their duty to do 99km/h in the left lane. Yes, we get it, you are a perfect citizen and I am a giant a$$hole in my gas guzzling big truck riding your ass.

The other thing is the terrible design of the road itself. I don't know if it was in the original concept to make it as non-straight as possible, but if it was they sure hit the mark. There also must have been a discount if the city bought more interchanges and placed them as close together as possible. Having one major interchange on-ramp basket weave directly into the off-ramp of another interchange 3 seconds down the road is mind boggling.

The ultimate though, is when these two factors combine into one giant cluster f of traffic madness. It's these boobs who merge onto Deerfoot and feel the need to instantly get into the left lane the moment the on ramp touches the freeway. Then they run into the off-going boobs who panic and brake because they can't get into the lane for the off ramp at the absolute starting point of the lane and think the world is coming to an end.

I think that this is the one. I really think that it is people that cannot merge and slow everyone down and then the people that wait to the last second to turn off Deerfoot from the far left lane.
I hate people.

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

I blame the merge morons.. You know the ones who light up their brakes at the start or middle of the merge.. Or they try to merge going 20 km/h less than the flow of traffic.. I almost rear ended one the other day because I was shoulder checking when she panicked.

A lady did this to me a couple of weeks ago. I was behind her merging from glenmore east onto deerfoot south. She was going about 70 when we rounded the final corner (so we're basically meeting the deerfoot traffic at this point), and I thought to myself "this isn't going to work, she's going to have to seriously start accelerating soon", and then she honest to god, starts slowing down as she looks for a spot to merge in. So all of a sudden me and the guy behind me had to accelerate as much as we could behind her, and then dart out into deerfoot at about 80km/hr, meanwhile she looks over and starts flailing her arms at us, and slows down even more, as cars start flying from the right lane (which she was now in at this point) to the middle lane, causing all kinds of problems that could have cause a crash.

[Tron_fdc]

To be fair, a lot of it has to do with drivers that don't make a gap for merging traffic. If everyone goes bumper to bumper and won't let people in, merging traffic is forced to stop.

Pay attention to people trying to merge, and if you create a gap it flows a lot easier.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by Tron_fdc

To be fair, a lot of it has to do with drivers that don't make a gap for merging traffic. If everyone goes bumper to bumper and won't let people in, merging traffic is forced to stop.

Pay attention to people trying to merge, and if you create a gap it flows a lot easier.

Some people expect the space required to land a jumbo jet just to get their prius on to deerfoot. Sometimes traffic doesnt allow much more than a couple car lengths between and people need to make the best of it. I consider myself uncutoffable. You can try to box me out but I'll always get my nose in and you're done.

BTW hows the hypertech treating you??

[Dion]

Originally Posted by Tron_fdc

To be fair, a lot of it has to do with drivers that don't make a gap for merging traffic. If everyone goes bumper to bumper and won't let people in, merging traffic is forced to stop.

Pay attention to people trying to merge, and if you create a gap it flows a lot easier.

Make the motions that you're going to merge and drivers will let you in. I stick my nose out and wave thanks forcing the other driver to make a space. Sometimes you have to be a bit agressive.

[V]

Originally Posted by Dan02

Indeed the biggest problem on deerfoot and most of Calgarys big roads is peoples inability to merge correctly, or even at all.

How about the fact that we've got spots where people are trying to merge onto the Deerfoot at the same time others are trying to merge off? Yeah, like that's not going to be a problem. What a ridiculous design.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by V

How about the fact that we've got spots where people are trying to merge onto the Deerfoot at the same time others are trying to merge off? Yeah, like that's not going to be a problem. What a ridiculous design.

Agreed. The Southland merge with Deerfoot drivers looking to merge onto Anderson or Bowbottom trail has to be the worst.

[Clarkey]

I'm glad I don't have to take Deerfoot very often. Some people love it, but I hate it.

[flip]

Originally Posted by Tron_fdc

To be fair, a lot of it has to do with drivers that don't make a gap for merging traffic. If everyone goes bumper to bumper and won't let people in, merging traffic is forced to stop.

Pay attention to people trying to merge, and if you create a gap it flows a lot easier.

Most people don't know that merging is legally 50-50. If you hit them because they are going bumper to bumper they are half at fault.

There is no right of way when merging whether you are the merger or the mergee. (are those real words?)

[Madman]

Yeah, the merging thing is a killer.

I let everyone in who is trying to merge. I'm not going to go out of my way and give you 57 cars to get in; so if you don't take your opportunity when it is given to you and go into panic mode because there isn't a 700 second gap, I will revoke your merging space. (Extra brownie points to those trying to merge if you actually use your signal light.)

The other rule is the ###### bags who think that because I let one person merge in front of me, that they should be allowed in front of me as well and race up to drive beside me - only to realize that I would rather smash into the car I just let in than have your fru fru SUV be in front of me. WTF is with people thinking that getting that one car ahead will get them to their destination 20 minutes earlier?

[Tron_fdc]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Some people expect the space required to land a jumbo jet just to get their prius on to deerfoot. Sometimes traffic doesnt allow much more than a couple car lengths between and people need to make the best of it. I consider myself uncutoffable. You can try to box me out but I'll always get my nose in and you're done.

BTW hows the hypertech treating you??

Well, my tires are almost bald, so I'm going to have to replace them, but other than that it's awesome. Sledding season is upon us now though, so I'll have to dial it back to stage 2 for my sled deck.

But yeah, driving a diesel truck in traffic does have its advantages. I can see pretty much everything that's happening around me, and if I need to merge I can usually make my own room.

[Resolute 14]

One thing they absolutely need to do, and which should frankly be the top priority in this city, even above the ring road, is to eliminate the bottlenecks.

I have no idea what ###### planned this out, but from Memorial to 130th, Deerfoot goes from eight lanes to six to four to six to four to six to eight. Traffic always dies where it goes to four lanes - over Glenmore, and at Anderson. Fix that, and you are going to solve a lot of other problems, at least in the south. Specifically, a reduction in shockwave jams because we wont be stuck with six or eight lanes of traffic merging into four.

[FurnaceFace]

I recall reading something about this where in busy cities like say L.A. the traffic "memory effect" can continue on all day long as there is so much traffic there is never a big enough lull to clear it up.

[habernac]

Originally Posted by Dion

Agreed. The Southland merge with Deerfoot drivers looking to merge onto Anderson or Bowbottom trail has to be the worst.

the McKnight/64th/Beddington trio may have an argument for that as well. Let's face it, the whole thing is a giant piece of crap.

[V]

Huh, the one's I was thinking of was merging onto Deerfoot from 17 Ave SE while folks are merging onto Memorial from Deerfoot. What a mess. Looks like there are a few examples of them.

[Kerplunk]

Originally Posted by V

Huh, the one's I was thinking of was merging onto Deerfoot from 17 Ave SE while folks are merging onto Memorial from Deerfoot. What a mess. Looks like there are a few examples of them.

Ya, that one is horrible because there is so little time to do a merge. If people would space out a bit and sneak into the spots/switch spots between lanes, it would be fine. We know that isnt going to happen though....everyone bumper to bumper, with the one twit in front hitting the brake.

[Madman]

Originally Posted by V

Huh, the one's I was thinking of was merging onto Deerfoot from 17 Ave SE while folks are merging onto Memorial from Deerfoot. What a mess. Looks like there are a few examples of them.

The awesome part of that interchange is the non-banked northbound corner under 17th. So you more than likely need to slow down a little to make that sucker, (and people in the right lane will slow down more because its a tighter corner).

[fredr123]

Originally Posted by 4X4

I guess there were three. You, me and REDVAN. I got nailed to the cross for bringing this up about a year ago. I remember comments like "suck it up" and "speeding is illegal" and "I can go whatever speed I want in the left lane and to hell with the rest of you".

In case anyone wanted to relive that CP classic "Get the F * * * Out of the Left Lane"

Originally Posted by photon

Actually I guess it's a pretty well known phenomenon in traffic. The actual point of slowdown can be far removed in time and distance from the actual problem.

I saw some simulations of it done once, where someone at one end of a busy road (say deerfoot up near canyon meadows) slams on their brakes, which causes the next person to do it, etc, causing a small area where everyone has to slow down to 20 or stop even. Then over a half hour this region will "move" down the road as it works its way out.

I can't find it now, but it was pretty interesting stuff.

Originally Posted by flip

IIRC someone here posted a study from the Japanese that came to the conclusion that 1 car can disrupt traffic for up to 2 miles or something.

All it takes is one idiot.

Shockwave Traffic Jams