From a newspaper column in which questions about Seattle traffic are addressed:
Question:
Why did the city put up signs on southbound Stone Way just south of 50th saying the right lane is ending, when the left lane is the one that actually goes away?
Answer:
Brian Kemper, interim city traffic engineer with the Seattle Department of Transportation: "Thank you for calling our attention to this. We have reviewed the site and agree with the reader. We will replace the signs to correctly indicate that the left lane ends and traffic should merge to the right."
During the entire time spent on assessment, planning, installation and, dare I say it?, quality control, no one noticed this? Sigh. And oy.
Posted by Ryan at October 26, 2009 09:59 AMOh. Em. Gee.
Posted by: Carrie on October 26, 2009 11:10 AMThat's blog-worthy. Maybe there's a job opening the SDOT...
Posted by: Rebecca on October 26, 2009 12:16 PMThere seems to be a general tendency towards lower intelligence "out there" these days... or is it just that our tax dollars can't afford road work AND brains?
Posted by: Sheila on October 26, 2009 12:24 PMoh MY!
Posted by: rho on October 26, 2009 01:22 PMI'm with Sheila. It seems like there is a constant. You can have no money to fix things, but a bumper crop of intelligent people who fix things with nothing or you have money to fix things, but no one to figure out what to fix before it is noticed by the all seeing public.
(Maybe it is just that when there is enough money to fix things that the feeling of oversight is a bit less and things are more easily missed?)
Posted by: Seanna Lea on October 26, 2009 01:42 PMOh ugh. But, I guess it is verification that the world needs obnoxious people like me who have a hobby of pointing this kind of things out to city officials.
Posted by: Kristen on October 26, 2009 02:27 PMThank heavens someone asked!
Posted by: ccr in MA on October 26, 2009 05:19 PMSo not surprising. I used to work in software quality control and testing and quality checking is considered a waste of time that prevents the team from meeting deadlines. Not publicly embarrassing the organization is not a priority.
Posted by: Jen Anderson on October 27, 2009 08:18 AMDrivers in Seattle read signs?
Posted by: Rabbitch on October 30, 2009 08:47 AM