Miscellany: Musings on Gainesville Traffic

Getting out of a college town the week before Christmas is a chore. Getting back in the day before classes start is even worse. Getting anywhere when a football game ends is nigh-impossible.

In Gainesville, as elsewhere, there are such things as "onlooker delays" (AKA rubbernecking). My mom and I have once witnessed a three-mile stretch of crawling traffic on I-75 caused by, not a car accident, not road debris, but a homeless guy walking along the side of the highway.

I also cringe whenever I have to park at the movie theatre plaza. What genius decided to build a 16 screen megaplex with a dozen adjoining restaurants/shops and then decided to surround it with a parking lot smaller than my driveway (I'm only half-kidding)? Too many cars in too tight a space equals a bunch of fender-benders, near-misses, and half an hour just to get out of the lot when your movie finishes.