Stupidity in Atlanta

Discussion in 'Politics & Current Events' started by stanger, Jan 29, 2014.

  1. stanger

    stanger BigSoccer Supporter

    Nov 29, 2008
    Columbus
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
  2. VFish

    VFish Member+

    Jan 7, 2001
    Atlanta, GA
    Club:
    Atlanta
  3. JohnR

    JohnR Member+

    Jun 23, 2000
    Chicago, IL
    I'd say more clueless than stupidity. There's not a lot of snow experience in Atlanta.

    We're having a good time here in Chicago. It hit 33 degrees one day last week, otherwise it has not crossed the freezing point during the past 8 days, and is not forecasted to do so at any time over the next 10 days. Not so much opportunity to get rid of the 27 inches of snow we've had this month.
     
  4. JBigjake

    JBigjake Member+

    Nov 16, 2003
    Video was more low key, than whiney, unlike your post!
    http://www.ajc.com/
    Looks like there's a lot of articles, detailing Day One & a second day of problems.
     
  5. TerminusFooty

    TerminusFooty Member+

    Feb 4, 2012
    Club:
    Atlanta Silverbacks
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    We get one of these storms every year or so - usually late winter or early spring. I guess the city doesn't want to pay for all the equipment it would take to quickly de-ice the roads based on one storm every year or two. Also, when it snows the people have a tendency to freak out and start driving like they just downed a bottle of quaaludes, so that doesn't help.
     
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  6. JohnR

    JohnR Member+

    Jun 23, 2000
    Chicago, IL
    Like Seattle. Just wait for it to melt. It makes sense when snowfalls are so rare and usually melt so quickly.

    Driving in snow is tricky. Even Chicagoans screw up a lot. I have one car with all-wheel drive and one without. The former isn't bad, just accelerate and decelerate slowly and be careful on turns, and you will be fine. But the car without is a nasty bitch ... you can be seemingly the same thing as always, and then the back of the car is fishtailing, and then the car slides halfway into the other lane or toward a fence, and they isn't ********all that you can do about it.
     
  7. Dante

    Dante Moderator
    Staff Member

    Nov 19, 1998
    Upstate NY
    Club:
    Juventus FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I like how they call it a storm, in Upstate NY we call it the drive into work.
     
  8. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    My younger brother, when he was in college at U of I U/C, wound up giving his chemistry TA winter driving lessons after the guy had multiple fender-benders on this first drive to work after the first snow. For some reason, he wanted to drive FASTER in the snow and to hit the breaks harder.

    My older brother lived in Fort Worth Texas and they got four inches of snow. Having just moved there from Chicago, he drove in with little trouble (almost no cars on the road). The closest thing to trouble came when he was stopped at a red light and a cab-driver (most of the cabs down there are station wagons) approaching behind him applied the brakes. My brother swears he saw the guy's right knee come up to ear level before trying to stop. The guy did a 540 spin and stopped about 5 feet from my brother. And... full credit to the cabbie: he was still his lane.

    And my brother was the only guy who came into work except a woman who'd just moved there from Michigan.
     
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  9. stanger

    stanger BigSoccer Supporter

    Nov 29, 2008
    Columbus
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States

    Don't most cars have ABS breaking now? You would think this would help the uneducated southern drivers deal with snow. Unless, of course, they think they can still go 90 on I-75.
     
  10. Val1

    Val1 Member+

    Arsenal
    Mar 12, 2004
    MD's Eastern Shore
    Club:
    Arsenal FC
    I was in San Angelo, Texas some years back and we had a couple of heavy back to back snowfalls. The city couldn't do much except spread sand and after two weeks there was so much sand on the road when the snow melted that the sand was more treacherous than the snow had ever been.
     
  11. chaski

    chaski Moderator
    Staff Member

    Mar 20, 2000
    redacted
    Club:
    Lisburn Distillery FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Turks and Caicos Islands
    [​IMG]
     
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  12. Minnman

    Minnman Member+

    Feb 11, 2000
    Columbus, OH, USA
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    As insufferable as I am most of the time, it gets worse in winter. I just can't take the whining. Grow a pair, shovel your driveway, and get your ass to work/school. Also, don't people understand the concept of downshifting? I mean, I drive a FWD Passat, automatic transmission. It's pretty damned easy to slow down by shifting into 3 or 2. People who can't handle winter are idiots, lazy or just pain weak. Take your pick.

    Finally, I'm reasonably sure that Weather Underground just makes shit up. I mean, you see them post a National Weather Service storm warning or something, and it reads pretty much like you'd expect a NWS announcement to read; fairly dispassionate. But they also post these other 'wind chill warnings' and whatnot, that are just pure sensationalism. There was one here last night, and we have no effing wind at all. Assholes. I might need to move farther north again if this keeps up.
     
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  13. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    We're talking early 1980s in my anecdote. So if you'll excuse me, I'll have to find my teeth.
     
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  14. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    #14 Dr. Wankler, Jan 29, 2014
    Last edited: Jan 29, 2014
    When I lived in Southern Minnesota*, they used sand because it was usually too cold for salt to do much good. After a couple of weeks, the sand would polish the packed snow at intersections down to hockey rink-quality ice. You'd have to be a damn fool to cross at a crosswalk if you were a pedestrian, because cars couldn't count on stopping in time. You also had to be a damn fool to drive more than 10 MPH on all but the two or three busier streets.



    *mid to late 80s here.
     
  15. minerva

    minerva Member+

    Apr 20, 2009
    Denver, CO
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    this storm should not have been a surprise to anyone not living under a rock.
    nor should the fact that Atlanta doesn't have the infrastructure to deal with a storm like this been a surprise to anyone not living under a rock.
    so if you decided to drive to work or drive your kids to school that day, you are to total ********ing idiot.
     
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  16. JohnR

    JohnR Member+

    Jun 23, 2000
    Chicago, IL
    Really? You don't look a day over 80.
     
  17. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    The secret was changing my screen name to Dr. Wankler from TheCat'sPajamas.
     
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  18. JohnR

    JohnR Member+

    Jun 23, 2000
    Chicago, IL
    Removing Rin Tin Tin from your avatar was a wise move, too.
     
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  19. Funkfoot

    Funkfoot Member+

    May 18, 2002
    New Orleans, LA
    The trick I learned in college is, pick one of the roads that you are seeing and just stay on that one.
    I'm gonna go with "all of the above."
     
  20. fatbastard

    fatbastard Member+

    Aug 1, 2003
    Lincoln (ish), Va
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    The first winter after we moved to Charleston SC it snowed about 2" one night - my mom got up and drove to work. She said it seemed a bit odd that no other cars were on the road and even weirder that she sat in the lot at Levi's for an hour waiting on someone to show up to open the place before she ended up driving back home.
    The whole area shut down for 2 days, it was fun.
    We moved from there (many years later) to Erie, Pa - what a shock that I had to get to school when there was 4 feet of snow on the ground :D

    Erie, now that place was awesome at snow removal. But nothing else.

    Y'all make it sound easy to drive on icy roads that have never been treated (it is not)
     
  21. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    Tagged along with my wife to a conference in Erie for three or four days a few years ago. Not too bad. A Starbucks did a fairly decent impression of a real coffee shop, and the NBA D-League team provided a couple of decent games for us. Probably go back there next summer if we have time to do our "catch a baseball game in every park in the state" vacation.

    Of course, the town I live in now is basically Erie without the lake, so I have low standards
     
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  22. fatbastard

    fatbastard Member+

    Aug 1, 2003
    Lincoln (ish), Va
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Is the average resident's age still over 70?

    I haven't been there since the 80s so it might have developed a little class and something to do in that time - I did see some great concerts there (albeit in a hockey "Field House") - and Presque Isle is fairly nice, as was the pier at the end of State Street where we used to "cruise", and the fancy port that used to be a landfill.
    It wasn't the most exciting place to be a teenager :)
     
  23. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    I think the former landfill is where our hotel was. And re: the age... now that you mention it, the crowd at the basketball games actually looked noticeably older than the crowds we'd see at the Pittsburgh Symphony.
     
  24. Q*bert Jones III

    Q*bert Jones III The People's Poet

    Feb 12, 2005
    Woodstock, NY
    Club:
    DC United
    You've not really seen shitty winter drivers until you've seen immigrant West Indians try to drive in snow. 5 mph, if you're lucky, and they still drive through intersections with no regard whatsoever for pedestrians or cyclists.
     
  25. JohnR

    JohnR Member+

    Jun 23, 2000
    Chicago, IL
    I would mention the Asian parents of Northwestern students, but that will get me into politically incorrect waters. Let me just say they drive in sunshine as if they are already in snow, so in snow itself ... oh boy.
     

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