I punched in at work at 10:06am.
Eastern Massachusetts is a flood water mess right now.
There was a road closure in Tewksbury at the intersection of route 38 and Shawsheen Street where the Shawsheen river apparently flooded. My wife called me and warned me about that one so I avoided it. Thanks sweetie!
There was a road closer on Middlesex Turnpike, probably in Bedford, that detoured traffic onto Concord Road in Billerica and Bedford and right into my commute. I could probably have avoided that one but it would have forced me to cross the Concord river in two places, one of which was already over it's banks last Friday. I can't even imagine how bad it is now. There is a brand new bridge in that spot and I wonder how much of it is still there.
Neither of those caused me too much trouble. Maybe 10-15 minutes total added to my commute. This next problem however...
I was on Concord Road in Wayland, MA just before Plain Road. The traffic was stopped. I knew it would have something to do with the intersections of routes 20, 27, and 126. This is often a problem spot for me, but I have never seen it back up as far as it did today.
I jumped onto Plain Road and took it all the way to route 20. As soon as I took the right turn into traffic I hit a detour that put me onto Old Connecticut Path. That was fine with me because that was the road I was planning on taking anyway.
Big Frickin' Mistake.
There is a traffic light on that road right where routes 27 and 126 merge together. About a mile North of that spot those two roads cross route 20. That's the intersection I was avoiding by going this way.
The intersection of the three state highways was backed up all the way to the Old Connecticut Path stop light and beyond. Almost all of the cars on the road with me were taking a right turn to head North back to route 20. The cars coming from routes 27 and 126 (though mostly 27) were blocking the intersection. The result was no cars could turn right due to the back up, and no cars could cut across due to the blocked intersection.
What did that mean to me? I got stopped in the back up at 9:02am. I crossed the intersection at 9:53am. FIFTY-ONE (51) MINUTES AT A TRAFFIC LIGHT! That's what it meant.
Let me say that one more time. Fifty-One minutes at a single traffic light. I would say the overall affect of this experience was to put me into a stabbin' mood. As in I wanted to stab all of the people blocking the damn intersection.
I tried to pass the time taking pictures of flooded spots, but there were only a few of them that I could actually see. Here are some pictures taken on Old Connecticut Path in Wayland.
This spot was worse than this picture makes it look.
Check out the highly skilled photographer's finger.
Another one that was worse than the picture looks.
I drove past this spot on Friday and I am 99.999% sure there was no little brook there at that time.
So there you have it folks, the actual events of 3/15/10 between 7:18 and 10:06 am. Yippeee.
May you and yours and all your stuff stay dry.
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