Wrong Way Firetruck

[Hoagie58]

Originally Posted by Weedydidi

The speed limit isn't 60 mph on South Boulevard, and pedestrians cross at intersections. There's no need for 100 yards - the length of a football field - worth of median.

Besides that, the medians are covered in raised concrete planters filled with shrubs. There's no way for pedestrians to get across them.

These medians were not erected for the safety of pedestrians or anyone else, they were put there to pretty-up South Boulevard for developers.

And BTW, adding turn arounds wouldn't have prevented this accident, as the firetruck was going straight.

The speed limit on 485 isn't 80 either, but it doesnt mean people don't drive it.

In regards to the turn arounds, they would be handy because rather than drive the entire 100 yds in the wrong lane, the fire truck could drive only the 25-35-whatever to get around vehicles stopped at lights.

I dont see the relevence of your objection to the medians. Were the road to not have a median, the fire truck would still have had to cross in to oncoming traffic to avoid stopped traffic. Generally fire trucks do not travel agaianst traffic at such a speed that an accident is not totally avoidable. IMHO our frustrations should be directed at careless drivers who aren't paying attention to what's going on around them, and aren't following common sense rules of the road.

Whyte: perhaps Doc Brown could focus some energy on developing those hovering trucks?

[Skyman8153]

Originally Posted by seattlerain

I see it here in the Seattle area quite often, and have seen it in Oregon, California, and Vancouver, BC.

I lived in the San Jose California area for 26 years and I NEVER once saw an emergency vehicle driving on "the wrong side" of the road. It's a law that drivers are responsible for moving off or out of the way of such a vehicle.

I've been a licensed driver with a safe motor vehicle record for 39 years. I always remember to look both ways if I'm pulling out onto a road with traffic moving in both directions. But in this case with this fellow, I can surely see how I would have done the same thing he did. If I'm making a right turn onto a multi-lane boulevard that is divided and as described in this article, there's a real good possibility that I'm NOT going to necessarily look to the "right"! Who on earth would expect to see a damned fire truck coming up the wrong side of the street!

Now that it's happened, I'll try to remember to look! But geez.... give that man a break. What about the driver of the fire truck? That person should realize this is exactly the kind of thing they need to be looking for when executing what is obviously a very dangerous maneuver.

My two cents worth.