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A Teen With Two Cars in Va., Where 'No One Takes the Bus' The light blue RAV-4, the green Volvo, the black BMW – all sat quietly until the stroke of 2:10 p.m. Then the afternoon bell rang and the halls of Arlington's Yorktown High School came alive with students racing for their cars. Allyx Smith, 17, has not one but two cars: a 1988 Mazda 323 and a 1999 Dodge Neon. The Neon was in the shop yesterday for a tint job. "In my house we have a total of, hum – I need to count again – seven cars," she said, ticking them off on her fingers. "Yep. Seven." She rattled off her family's car inventory: Mom, a GMC. Sister, a 4Runner. Dad, a Celica and a Mercedes. Aunt, an Accord. Throw in Allyx's two, and that makes seven. "In this school, most everyone has at least three cars in their family," said Allyx, her friends nodding in agreement. "No one takes the bus. A lot of us have a lot of activities and other stuff to do." A region of affluence can afford a lot of wheels. So the roads are filled with teenagers driving what parents call "knock-around" cars – low-riding, dinged-up, stuffed-animals-blocking-the-rear-window cars – all of which add to the morning and evening crush hours. A teen has to cruise, after all. Consider: Fifty-nine percent of all households in this region had two or more At Yorktown, there is a student whose parents bought her a stick shift. She couldn't figure out how to drive it, so then they went out and bought her an automatic. Overall, Yorktown administrators estimate that nearly half of their 1,500 students drive to and from school, shunning the buses available to nearly all.
"We wanted her to have something safe to drive locally in," said Vickie Smith, Allyx's mother. "We didn't want to add to traffic at all." As classes ended at Yorktown, a stream of teenagers fled the school for their cars. Luisa Suarez and a friend jumped into her Mazda to do some errands. Suarez started the engine and took off, the Mazda merging into the mix of hundreds of other cars out on the road. Van Pool an Oasis of Sanity in World of 'Vehicular Anarchy' It was time to leave Rosslyn, and where was Cindy? The white 15-seat Dodge Ram van idled by the curb, an early stop in the 34-mile daily odyssey from Ballston to Columbia. Cindy Kong, a conference coordinator, was one of the most punctual van pool members, so her absence was troubling. Aaron Asrael, van pool coordinator, felt almost physical pain at the thought of leaving anyone behind. But, according to the mores of this community on wheels, he might have to make that call. "There she is!" said Tom Cooley. Kong climbed in and Asrael clucked gently, as if to a wayward family member, "We were worried." At 4:59, she was all of three minutes late. A van pool is a social compact for the commuter age. Because of traffic – and its related stresses and expenses – these 11 travelers have created a nuclear unit outside family and office. It was the sanest response they could think of, and they are not alone. The Washington area leads the nation with 15 percent of commuters – more than 300,000 people – traveling daily by car pool or van pool. In exchange for sacrificing flexibility, these riders say they have gained peace of mind, friends, a place to read or nap. Anne Bjorkman saves coupons for Bonita Knight. Irene Seastrum gets advice on home improvement contractors from Asrael. When family members die, van poolers attend the funerals. They do not miss their cars. Together in traffic, "you laugh and cut up and commiserate," Richard Carter had said earlier, "and that reduces stress. Misery shared is misery diminished." It's also much cheaper. The 68-mile round trip would cost a solo motorist about $8,000 a year, including gas, parking and other costs, according to federal estimates. The van poolers each pay about $1,400 a year, and thanks to this pool, several own one less car. They hire their van from VPSI Inc., which specializes in supporting van pools. With Kong aboard, they squeezed into rapidly thickening traffic, heading into the city for more riders. Delivery trucks, double-parkers and intersection blockers interrupted the flow downtown. "This city suffers from vehicular anarchy," grumbled Asrael, 59, a senior manager at the National Science Foundation, who helped found the van pool 15 years ago. Perfected over the years, the route was a masterpiece. A fabulous tour of D.C. neighborhoods led eventually to Interstate 95 in Maryland and ended in a park-and-ride lot in Columbia. Arrival: 6:22 p.m., about 12 minutes behind schedule, for a total of 97 minutes from Ballston, less for those who boarded later. Asrael is thinking of retiring next year. His fellow riders, he'll miss. "I won't miss the commute."
HOV Violators Take Chances on an Encounter With a Trooper Virginia state trooper Eric Reiley pulled onto the Route 7 off-ramp of westbound Interstate 66 to look for HOV violators, a practice that he likened to "shooting ducks in a barrel." Reiley characterized HOV violators as a symptom of bad traffic: Many otherwise conscientious citizens knowingly break the law to avoid congestion. The Virginia Department of Transportation estimated last spring that 22 percent of vehicles driving in the I-66 HOV lanes at rush hour and 12 percent of those driving in the I-95 HOV lanes were solitary drivers. In a 30-minute period yesterday, Reiley stopped 20 HOV violators and missed more than 20 others who passed by as he was writing $50 tickets. All those stopped said they were unaware of HOV restrictions. "Most of them know," Reiley said. "They just don't want to wait in line." At 6:28 p.m., farther west on I-66, Reiley stopped Brenda Sweeney, of Warrenton, who was driving home from her job at an accounting firm. It was the second time that day that Sweeney's commute had halted on I-66: She had been caught in the inbound backup caused by the shooting. "Today," Sweeney said, "just wasn't my day." Troubleshooters Make a Dent in Highway Commuting Mess Up ahead, smack in the middle of the Woodrow Wilson Bridge on the Capital Beltway's outer loop, a six-car pileup was threatening the very heart of rush hour. With one hand on the steering wheel and his other cradling a microphone, Paul Hubbe moved his vehicle through a maze of stalled traffic, hitting the openings as quickly as he could maneuver the squat machine that weighed close to a ton and was equipped with flashing lights, a blaring horn and a public address system. "Ford pickup truck: Pull over to the right," Hubbe announced on the PA in the Maryland State Highway Administration's sleek new emergency-response vehicle, a $70,000 yellow diesel truck. He reduced all humans he encountered to the make and model of their vehicle. "Thank you, Caravan," he announced to a cooperative driver. "I appreciate it." Hubbe leaped out of his vehicle and helped clear the scene in 10 or so minutes, sweeping up debris, pushing one vehicle to the shoulder off the bridge, even gently asking a state trooper to move just ahead as he scribbled down accounts of the mayhem. Not long ago, the traffic would have remained stacked up for hours. But as those delays have increasingly become a part of daily life in greater Washington, Hubbe and others have joined in a growing organized effort to make the best of the worst. Six tow trucks patrol sections of the Beltway. Two other emergency-response vehicles roam the highway, as well as trouble spots along the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, Route 50, Interstate 270, or any other of the 3,100 miles of state roads in Montgomery and Prince George's counties. None of this existed until 1989, when the first traffic operations center was opened in College Park and trained personnel began concentrating on traffic management. By 1995, the Coordinated Highways Action Response Team had metamorphosed into an entity of its own, with a 1999 annual budget of $4.8 million for equipment, salaries and maintenance. The goal: to help quell the sheer unpredictability that commuters find maddening. Congestion is so bad on the Beltway that an accident like the one on the Wilson Bridge, causing a lane or two to close, seems to have a phantom life, continuing to affect traffic for hours after. But, at least on a psychological level, the traffic jams seem to last much longer in the lives of commuters. Take Kraig Dorsey, the 34-year-old office-supply company mover who spent three hours standing beside his vehicle during yesterday morning's commute after a man apparently shot himself in Virginia, closing down I-66. Then, as awfully bad luck would have it, he found himself standing beside the Beltway in the late afternoon when his truck broke down. "I'm stuck again," he said. Guilt Over Late Arrival Home Adds to Working Mom's Stress Shawn Simmons lit a cigarette. She took a tense drag. She was talking quickly, sipping a Pepsi. She had been held up at work – 20 excruciating minutes – partly because the newspaper was writing about her. Now as she headed over the 14th Street bridge, back toward her home in Woodbridge, she had two co-workers in her minivan, but the HOV lanes that might have given her an edge in rush hour gave her nothing at all. Anyone at all can use them after 6 p.m. Which meant Simmons, a single mom, would be late for her day-care pickup. She knew this. But then co-worker Valerie Niles posed the big questions: How late? What time might she be dropping off her passengers in the commuter lot at Potomac Mills? Hope blinded her. "6:25," she answered. She had a sinking feeling this would not be so. But as the car sped down Interstate 395, there was less traffic than usual. She let out a giddy laugh. "This is unbelievable!" Simmons said. "Maybe a lot of people left early because they thought it was going to snow," suggested co-worker Sheryl Parker. But then came a commuter's daily headache: the Springfield Mixing Bowl. More cars. Less speed. Minutes dragged by. "I gotta call Ruth," said Simmons, reaching for her cell phone. Ruth Levitz owns Young World day-care center in Woodbridge, where Simmons's daughter, Jordan, 7, is enrolled in a before- and after-school program. "Hi, Ruth," she said into the phone. Then: "Smack-dab on Interstate 95. Hopefully we'll be there by 6:40." When she hung up, guilt set in. "I figure kids are in day care long enough," she said. She lit another cigarette. She tried for calm. But it was 6:49 when Simmons pulled up in front of the day-care center. Her daughter was standing at the door, looking out the window, waiting. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry," said Simmons as she rushed inside. "Where have you been?" Jordan asked. Jordan was hungry. Simmons surrendered to Jordan's request for a snack, and she would later go along with the idea of a quick dinner out. The family's schedule was off. She was weary. She thanked the day-care director profusely. "Without her," she said, "I couldn't do it." The issue of late fees was left hanging for now. Simmons and her children headed home in their green minivan. But when they pulled up in front of her neat brick town house, she let out a puzzled gasp. A moving van was parked next door. Her neighbor, Bill Caulfield, was out on his front stoop, balancing a cardboard box. "So you're really moving?" she asked him, with a touch of dismay. He nodded with a shrug. "Shorter commute," he said. From a Bird's-Eye View of Traffic, There's No Solution in Sight So far down below, a tanker truck had jackknifed at Braddock Road and Burke Lake Road, blocking Braddock's inbound lanes. Upper Wisconsin Avenue – and its side streets – were a parking lot between the Capital Beltway and Bradley Boulevard because of an accident just inside the Beltway. A water main had broken on Bladensburg Road in Northeast Washington, and the road would probably freeze overnight. And an accident on the Woodrow Wilson Bridge snarled the Beltway's outer loop for an hour – all the way to Van Dorn Street in Alexandria – even though it was cleared quickly. "I think this afternoon was solidly average," Stan Fetter said, flying above it all for Metro Networks Inc. in a Cessna Skyhawk. "And that ought to scare people, because what I would call average today would have been much worse than average a year ago. The curve is getting a lot worse. There's got to be a sea change in the way we coordinate growth and transportation. Until we do, it's clear we're not going to make things any better." Taking a last look down on the evening rush hour traffic along Interstate 95 near Woodbridge, Fetter said: "I pity these people. When you see people sitting in traffic from Woodbridge to Washington, I don't know what's left of their lives after working an eight-hour day and spending two or three hours a day on the road. It's a sad commentary on the way we live." At the End of a Long Day, A Commuting Survivor As she approached her house in Prince Frederick more than 12 hours after she had left it, an exhausted Beverly Barth uttered a wistful plea. "Find me a nice condo on Dupont Circle for under $100,000," she said, "and I'd jump at the chance to move back." The journey from downtown had begun when she nudged her car out of a downtown garage on N Street and into an immobile column of traffic. She swung around a disabled car that had been abandoned and was blocking her lane. But still, the going was arduous. Progress came a single car length at a time. A traffic light changed from red to green. To red. To green. To red. To green. Barth didn't advance an inch. Then cars began creeping forward. Fifteen minutes passed. She moved two blocks. Another 15 minutes. Another three blocks. Suddenly traffic cleared. In another half-hour, she was out of town, heading home to her beloved bungalow bordered by lilac bushes. Free of Washington, her foot stayed on the pedal instead of the brake. Her back ached after two hours in the little red Hyundai that she has put 10,000 miles on since buying it in late October – the equivalent of three cross-country trips, virtually all of it commuting. She walked inside her home and slipped off her shoes. She took off her wristwatch. She pulled some cold chicken from the refrigerator and poured herself a glass of wine. In a few hours, she would do it all over again. Her license plate is her life. It says: SUR5OR.
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Alan Sipress
