On Madison
I've been living in Madison for a week now, and I've made a few observations:
- Working mass transit is sheerest awesomeness. I'm quite happily taking the bus to and from work every day, which was starkly unthinkable in St. Louis where no bus has deigned to visit my parents' neighborhood in my lifetime.
- Driving in Madison is horrible. It's a good thing that mass transit is available, because downtown Madison is far worse to drive in than downtown St. Louis, with a far higher proportion of one-way streets, restricted bus-and-bicycle-only lanes, and even less parking.
- Drivers in Madison seem not to have heard of the turn signal. This is surprising since it appears that a set of these is installed in each driver's car. This is, however, similar to the trend nationwide, it appears to me.
- Drivers in madison, unlike those in St. Louis, actually obey stop signs. This is tremendous, particularly for increasing the survival rate of pedestrians.
- The Madison driver will generally also not enter an intersection unless there is room to exit it on the other side, which is a nice habit that prevents gridlock from spreading.