Traffic is in the news in the Rogue Valley, but having just survived a trip to and from the periphery of the Bay Area, I have to say that when it comes to traffic, we just don’t how good we have it.
At about 3 p.m. on Saturday, we found ourselves in one of your good old-fashioned urban area traffic jams. Five to six lanes of traffic, creeping along somewhere between Richmond and Oakland. Must have been an accident, right? But around every corner and over every rise, all I saw were lanes and lanes of cars creeping forward. After 30 minutes or so of that, traffic picked up near Berkeley, reaching speeds that at least allowed a little air movement with the window down (it didn’t stay down long; exhaust fumes are even less enjoyable than the auto air conditioner). We never did see any evidence of an accident.
Made me wonder what in the heck all those people were doing on the road at 3 p.m. on a Saturday? Couldn’t they see they were getting in the way of people like me, who really needed to be there? 
In today’s paper was a story about a study of traffic “chokepoints” in Oregon. The Medford area registered two on the top 50: No. 33 is Highway 62 from I-5 to White City and No. 46 is the winding truck route from Highway 140 near White City to I-5.
While most of us have encountered the auto frenzy on Highway 62, we are far, far removed from the craziness of real traffic jams. We can only hope some of the projects now on the board will help us stay that way for the foreseeable future, but the skeptic in me thinks only $10 a gallon gas will do that.
Next time you’re in one of those Southern Oregon traffic jams, with six cars between you and the light, just remember, it could be worse, a lot worse.
