Too many automotive vee-hickles
Remember yesterday when I got confused about what day it was? Well then there was today where I actually did all that stuff I was panicking about yesterday. Even though I left work a couple hours early, the trip up here was not the best. Can somebody tell me why they don’t let the northbound I75 SUV Speedway traffic go over the goddamn Zilwaukee Bridge on Friday afternoon / evening? Because routing it all around Saginaw on crumbling I675 is not working. Jaffic tram? Massive! We bagged it and snaked around on 84 and 13 and I dunno what else. What did we do before Google Maps on the iPhone?
I wonder when the age of the automobile will be largely dead. I’m mainly talking about regional travel here. Once upon a time, long before I was born, people traveled all over the Great Lakes area by ship! My grandparents and great-grandparents did. And they took trains. People didn’t have automotive vee-hickles when my grandparents were kids.
Nowadays, I challenge anyone to figure out how to take a boat to get around the Great Lakes area. I know that there are a few cruise ships that ply the Great Lakes but you book a berth on one of those to sight-see, not to get from Point A to Point B. Not to mention that getting from The Planet Ann Arbor to Houghton Lake would be impossible by boat. Train? Yes, you can pretty reliably travel various places around the region by train. I challenge you to try to travel from The Planet Ann Arbor to Houghton Lake by train.
I read an article not tooooo long ago that suggested that the age of the auto may be on the wane. I understood what the writer was trying to say but I have a hard time believing it when I am creeping along State Street heading north to the Ellsworth traffic circle and eventually the I94 18-wheel Clogway toward home at the end of my work day. I have a hard time believing it when I am trapped in a huge jaffic tram on one of the god-forsaken Great Lake State’s crumbling freeways heading north on a Friday night with all the other Weekend Warriors.
Anyway, here we are at the Houghton Lake Group Home and there is probably fungus amongus but the fungus in the photoooo is from our fave urban hike by Barton Dam last weekend.
October 10th, 2014 at 8:57 pm
Enjoy the weekend. Gosh the weather here has changed since you were here. Wind and rain at times, and gorgeous puffy clouds in many values of grey and white against the cerulean blue skies. Hoping for yet another kayak ride before Reg tucks them away. We will see. <3
October 11th, 2014 at 6:18 am
The ones who say the age of the auto is in decline, are probably the same ones who propose “the paperless office”! Have they gotten rid of the printers and copiers at your office yet?
October 11th, 2014 at 8:12 pm
I’m not seeing the wane of the auto in WA either; we are too far away from places we want to or need to get to. People can’t afford to live in the communities they work in, but the transit system sucks.