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app_priori t1_j2dtzp7 wrote

Reply to comment by dcash116 in Driver hits 2 women near White House, killing 1 by MrSpontaneous

My issue with DC driving is that the city is laid out in an imperfect grid. There are many avenues that cut diagonally across city blocks. I find myself even confused by what the GPS is telling me to do sometimes - it will tell me to turn but I then see that making that turn isn't very safe because cars are incoming from the other direction along the diagonal. The stop lights are sometimes ambiguous - are they for my lane or the other lane?

I don't own a car and mostly walk or use the train, but I think if the city was laid out in a perfect grid without all these weird cross avenues, it will ease a lot of the confusion. Avenues like New York Avenue, Florida Avenue, Pennsylvania Avenue, etc. can disorient drivers, especially those who are not familiar with these streets.

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dcash116 t1_j2e5byr wrote

You’re absolutely right, and unfortunately that’s something we can’t easily fix, but we could easily reduce the amount of roads that cars can use. I second your frustration about using GPS, but that’s on Apple and Google; and we see how slow they are to improve the key flaws in their software.

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app_priori t1_j2e5qpp wrote

I would start by squaring off some of the roundabouts, like the ones around Thomas Circle and Logan Circle. I know, roundabouts are much more efficient than regular intersections but most American drivers don't really know how to navigate roundabouts. I know I struggle with them when driving.

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