Snowed

It's been decades since RantWoman reliably had snow around Thanksgiving and RantWoman is not entirely sure she is nostalgic. RantMom informed RantWoman that it's EVEN COLDER in the city of RantWoman's youth. RantMom is not nostalgic either.



But never mind.

1. GOOD FOR THE MAYOR for telling people to shovel their walks! RantWoman needs to transact a small amount of commerce and will be most grateful if she finds shoveled walks in her 'hood.

2. GOOD FOR METRO and SDOT for trying to synchronize plowing with bus routes.

3. Now about those Snow Routes. Before RantWoman decided just to cancel everything that required bus travel she went and looked at a few snow routes.

Yesterday in honor of snow, RantWoman went...NOWHERE! Well the Friendly Neighborhood Center for Extreme Computing does not count because it's across the breezeway. RantWoman went NOWHERE involving bus travel and cancelled / rescheduled everything that would have obliged her to go anywhere. Even so, RantWoman DID go visit Metro's snow routes page:
http://metro.kingcounty.gov/up/rr/adverseweather.html

RantWoman thinks the page is a VERY good idea. However, RantWoman is the sort of humor-impaired bus consumer who really wants to know, IN WORDS not just pictures, where the heck the2,3,4 DO go when the Snow Route information says they "do not serve First Hill" but do clearly serve route segments on either side of First Hill.
RantWoman, as it happens lives at the end of Route 4. The snow route says the bus does not serve stops south of Judkins but RantWoman can clearly see off her balcony that the bus is stopping in its usual place.

RantWoman immediately got a headache. RantWoman does not have a zippy high resolution smart phone. RantWoman suspects a lot of other people trying to figure out snow routes don't either, and RantWoman is really not sure she pictures anyone trying to download maps to their phones.

RantWoman read through the text descriptions with her screen reader They say things like No service up First Hill or No Service South of Judkins street. In the former case, since the route clearly has service on either side of First Hill, RantWoman would want to know where the heck the bus does go. In the latter case, RantWoman lives South of Judkins Street and can clearly, even with snow and RantWoman visual fog see that the bus in question is starting and ending at its normal location. So what gives? RantWoman can blow things up on her computer screen almost to a resolution where she can find the snow routes. However, it's really darned hard visually to find the dotted red lines next to the street names.

RantWoman supposes she should be glad this is the worst thing she has to whine about, but this is RantWoman here. How hard would it be to build in links to text descriptions such as along Jackson St to 12th Ave S and then....

4. RantWoman has been spending a certain amount of time warning everyone she knows who is new to town:


--The proportion of Seattle drivers who have ANY clue about how to drive on snow is embarrasingly low. The proportion who insist on driving anyway is appalling. Even if you personally just moved here from a solid snow state and have "turn in the direction of the skid" hard-wired into your brain / arm circuits, you will be safer and your life will be much happier if you do not even try to drive while the snow is about.


--IF you just moved here from a snow state, you will think it is preposterous that Seattle can be shut down and children everywhere dispatched for snow days if there is HALF AN INCH of snow about. RantWoman remembers her hometown rule: snow days happened if there was 18" of new snow--in one night. This happened ONCE in RantWoman's school career and people were already on spring break. Irrepressible Nephew on the other hand, gets snow days whenever the weather sneezes. RantWoman is SUPPOSED to e relieved that he is not out on the streets described above. RantWoman thinks Irrepressible Nephew and all his classmates NEED their time in school. Auntie RantWoman is clearly a Bore and a Scold.


--If your employer declares a snow day, TAKE IT, even if what the weather is doing only seems like heavy frost to you. For the reasons why, see item 1. Do not tempt RantWoman to reminisce about trying to take advantage of her office clearing out to get work done in QUIET and then collecting one bus misadventure after another trying to get home. RantWoman had to walk about the last 10 blocks and all the streets with steep down slopes were closed to car traffic.


5. If RantWoman needs a topic for further ranting, she can contemplate the logistics of getting to a hospital if one really needs it if none of the regular bus service involves First Hill where there are lot of hospitals and medical facilities. RantWoman remembers staff who were able to walk to work working double shifts at a neighborhood nursing home during the Snowpocalypse a couple years ago. RantWoman was also a little surprised that one of the newcomers she was talking to, a doctor, said his organization did nothing specifically to orient new staff about snow or severe weather. RantWoman supposes she can just store these point for now and save them for future conversations.