Afraid to Drive the Big Bridge?
This is one of those stories that absolutely boggles my mind. Apparently, if you are afraid to drive your car across the Bay Bridge, the State of Maryland will provide you with a driver, free of charge, for that leg of your trip. Or, rather, they were doing this up until recently. They’re now bidding out the process to private contractors who may charge as much as $50 to do the task.
Seriously, can you really be that afraid of the Big Bridge that you’re unable to drive it? And keep your license?
I’m not a big fan of driving across bridges, but I don’t think I’d feel better having someone else do it.
The bridge as you head into Newport, Rhode Island? That was scarier by far, for me.
I’m not too afraid to do it but personally it CREEPS ME THE HELL OUT to drive in that ocean-bound lane on the north bridge when they reduce westbound traffic to 2 lanes. I do not like driving 60 miles an hour on an undivided highway several hundred feet above the ocean. Gives me visions of someone having a blowout and an inevitable head-on collision, followed up with a plummet into the water.
So I have some sympathy for sufferers, though I am not down with this plan of paying someone to drive them across the bridge. Sounds like a good small business niche for someone to fill…
Now, if you are afraid to drive across the bridge, why would you even want to be a passenger to cross it?
And I’m with Don on that, the thoughts of a high speed wreck that far above the water does make me nervous.
Being scared or not is not the question – although it’s interesting.
No one questions how Maryland can provide this “free” service. Things the government provides are NOT FREE – they cost someone… cough cough, you, Maryland taxpayer, are paying for people to get driven across the drive.
Privitize it. See how bad people really want it, services will compete and the price will drop.
I’m not afraid of just driving across it but I am afraid of driving across it AND enjoying the view at the same time, so I’d take the free driver just so I could look out the window and enjoy the view and maybe take a couple of pics.
Easy for you to say with your last name. :)
I’m not afraid of driving on bridges. I’m just afraid of other Maryland drivers who don’t know how to stay in their lane. Where do you swerve off to when one comes into your space?
My dad has severe vertigo which gets really rough if he has to drive over a tall bridge. He’ll go far out of his way to avoid them or simply avoid the trip completely. I’m sure back when he was driving more he would’ve paid if there were a driver at the standby.
Maybe the reason it was a free service is that when you have to pay you’ll get vertigo sufferers who want to save money attempting the drive on their own. That’s fine unless one of them flips out, comes to a stop in the middle of the bridge and ends up costing taxpayers more in lost time than the expense of the driver would’ve been.
Uh – yeah. Could you maybe be less judgmental in your posts? I started having inexplicable anxiety attacks driving over that damn bridge. IT’s genetic – my mother had an acute fear of heights. I make myself do it but i like to know that there’s the option of bailing out at the last minute, so to speak. Why are m’blog posts always so seemingly critical of people that might be different than you and your bloggers? You should try to be a bit more open minded to things you don’t know or understand. I’ve been offended on more than one occassion reading your blog.
Sorry to hear you’re offended, Betty.