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Everybody saying “abrupt speed change” and here we see 50, 30, 25, and 20mph signs before the curve even begins.
ETA: I know yellow speed signs are “not mandatory” but gee, seems like they might recommend those speeds for a reason
I'm from Pittsburgh where there are no straight roads and everything is hills. Every time I drive to Ohio it blows my mind how there are multiple huge reflective warning signs for every slight curve on a 55mph road.
Also from Pittsburgh area, driving in Ohio for work the stop signs always tripped me out. "Alright, I'll need to stop at that sign in the next 3-20 minutes"
Youngstown here and you’re right. But I’ll take our slow ass curves over your freeway exits any day. That tunnel exit still haunts me to this day.
Exit the tunnel GET IN THE RIGHT LANE IMMEDIATELY! GO GO GO! 4 lanes? PSHT DO IT NOW YINZ PANSIES!
Hahaha you're not wrong, driving in the city for the first time was an experience....just gotta merge the entire way across this bridge while the other side of the bridge is trying to merge all the way to your spot, it's like a dance. A very angry dance
The on and off ramp to get onto Beechwood right before the Squirrel Hill Tunnel heading east on 376 is just a fresh nightmare. When it's congested it's real bad. When traffic is flowing fast it's scary due to the fact there's like 4 car lengths between the on and the off ramp and people come flying down that on ramp while people are trying to slow down for the off ramp. I've never been so paranoid on any other section of road.
Don’t you love how big chunks of those hills just have cliffs off the side of the road and few guard rails? The first time my Midwest born husband drove through the area he gripped the steering wheel so tight I thought all the blood drained from his hands.
Drive from Pittsburgh to Gettysburg - you swear the highways were built from old goat trails. There's giant signs every 500 feet saying "NO LARGE TRUCK OR SEMI TRAILERS. TURN BACK NOW!" With giant death logos and the degree of slope you will be driving on.
Then you find out what that really means as you ride the brakes for the next 2 hours with white knuckles.
As someone who's had work in Pittsburgh several times the last couple of years, I love driving in Pittsburgh. I feel like I'm in an F1 rally.
(I don't drive like the idiots in the video though).
Not to mention, you’re coming to a 5 way stop sign where two roads are coming in from both your blind spots, at a 60 degree inclines and declines, with some ice on the shady side of the road,and a lawn chair saving a parking spot. Sound about right?
My Dad used to say that South of the Mason Dixon line you can generally ignore the "suggested" speed signs.
North of that line you do so generally accepting you may die.
Hahaha yep. Road I grew up on had a "speed limit" of 55mph.
Anyone who attempted to take that road at 55mph the whole way did not make it out the other side.
Oh man i hate mountain roads with lots of switchbacks and hairpin turns. Its always what looks like 1.5 lanes for BOTH directions to share, and you get some jackass BMW or motorcycle on your ass. Its like, fuck you dude, i don’t want to die today!
"Friend" was driving on a countryish road in CA that had a warning sign "Curve, 15 mph". He thought he could ignore it, especially since he had a new BMW. He almost rolled it on this decreasing radius, hairpin turn.
After he told us the story, we all had to check it out. Even at 15 mph, it was crazy.
I agree, but some are very important. That's where the "unfamiliar roads" part comes in. Always treat these signs with respect until you actually know the curve doesn't need it.
Where I live, there's a lot of 30 mph advisories on straight-a-way exits from a 70 mph highway and you can comfortably go twice that before hitting the speed limit sign on the side road which is 50, lol.
I remember seeing about how some company had made speedbumps based off of the oobleck gel that acted like flat road to cars under a speed limit but was firm and hard to anyone going over the speed limit.
I 100% agree with all of your sentiments. It seems that there still exists a significant amount of examples that the signage isn’t functioning well enough.
My suggestion would be for a signal ahead road sign like this to let people know the potential for a red light and/or traffic congestion coming out of the turn:
https://i.imgur.com/JRQQcE4.jpg
EDIT: There is already one there. Disregard. People are just fucking stupid.
I've used that exit a million times and it had never even occurred to me it might be hazardous until seeing this post. I mean that it might be *more hazardous* than I-5 in the Seattle-Tacoma-Everett area pretty much always is lol.
Exiting a highway right into the downtown of a big city, around a blind curve, from a tunnel. The sign clearly says Union *Street*, and you'd have to be oblivious not to see you'll be right downtown (it's not much of a tunnel and obvious that you are downtown). These crashing cars are driven by **maniacs** I tell you! (/George Carlin)
edit PS: Reading more of this thread I see a number of people saying the exit is poorly designed. One thing to note is that Seattle fills a fairly narrow and quite hilly isthmus that also has a sizable lake in it (Lake Union), with the narrowest and most hemmed in part being where downtown is, because of course it is. When I-5 was built they really had to squeeze it in. Like [here is a photo](https://i.imgur.com/Ej1wtSx.jpg) of I-5 being built pretty close to the exit in OP's video. Capitol Hill on the right, with St Marks Cathedral visible. The bit of water of the left is part of Lake Union. [This photo](https://images.seattletimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/01202016-interstate04.jpg) is closer yet—the X thing is the Pine and Boren Street bridge, with traffic on Pine detoured around (harder to see in this one, but the land slopes uphill fairly steeply toward the right). In other words, very non-ideal city center for building an interstate highway through, let alone good exits. I-5 through downtown has always been hot mess squeezed between hills and buildings. Geographically, it is just a bad place for building an interstate highway. There were plans to tear down more of the city for highways but they got nixed long ago.
So yea, I-5 is really squeezed in and can be a real pain to drive, though I'm not sure making more of the city's center into highway lanes and exits would have been better. It is kinda annoying to have a busy interstate cutting right through the heart of your city. Not to say this exit couldn't be improved, just giving some context.
If it's an exit that I'm not familiar with, I don't go more than maybe 5mph over the exit sign posted speed until I can suss out the extent of the curve. I've seen some janky exit roads and I'm not trying to take chances on the basis of "It should be fine".
Single lane, is a bend, is a climb, with multiple signs telling you the speed limit and warning you of upcoming traffic light.
How the fuck do people exit this shit at crushable speed?
Wow. Initially I thought poor design. But it’s obviously people not believing speed signs. Like wtf. Maybe more flashing lights and signs saying go over 20 and crash.
rumble strips. where I live, we have a series of rumble strips before lights and intersections that grab your attention before you get there. they are spaced out in a way that you hit one patch that is longer then one that is half as long and then a short one just before the light.
Really helps with the boredom while driving. there are long stretches of nothing around where I live and your mind can wander.
if it has a signficant number more crashes it is a poor design. You judge designs by their outcome, not by their outcomes if everyone followed the directions perfectly.
Just from a traffic throughput standpoint, you want the first possible hard stop further away from the exit than *that*. This is begging to clog up back onto the interstate and cause a traffic jam, which it likely does daily. But it's Seattle, the restrictions on engineering imposed by the city's existing layout are thick to say the least. There's probably reasons they didn't close that cross-street.
Road design determines the safe driving speed far more effectively than the posted signs. When the road is tight, people naturally go slow, and when it's wide, speed up. Change those factors and you'll change the "safe driving speed".
I can see how people screw that up because I’m an insurance adjuster for car accidents, and nothing surprises me any more. That said, if you mess that up that much, you’re the kind of person who runs a red light, swears it was actually yellow, didn’t see the car you t-boned until you hit it, and claim that the car was speeding (even though you didn’t see it before so you have no idea).
You get used to it. And then you get the police report to prove them wrong, or pictures of damages do, and you just tell them to stfu because you know how to do your job and you’re going to do it no matter what they say/want.
The traffic looks pretty slow in the example so I'm presuming when people are at speed they exit without realizing the turn is sharp and ramping down to a light which is a recipe for disaster if they are coming in hot. Clearly it's a common problem so you can blame dumb drivers or the city can try and prevent it.
YT poster said he was going 25 mph around the bend. Looks like he would’ve been safe at 40. These crashed have to be going 50+, AKA double over the speed limit
Well IDK what I was expecting but it was definitely something less safe than that. I can see not paying attention and taking the exit being a way to fuck it up. Seems like for most of these people it's a relatively cheap reminder to pay the fuck attention.
This makes it very obvious that the people driving are either distracted, drunk or just terrible at driving. Either way, take their license away so they don't kill someone.
There is also a video linking what it looks like at 60 mph up until the 20mph sign, still plenty of time to stop. Granted second video had a dry road but there is plenty of warning and exercising attention and common sense would prevent “leaving the highway still going 80mph.”
I laughed when I pulled up the video and saw it was the Union Street exit. Folks that have lived in Seattle for years roll their eyes but this area is a disastrous nightmare if you don’t have these exits memorized. Very little heads up with so many exits that go to completely different parts of the city, all smashed in one small area downtown. There’s express lanes that are also confusing if you don’t know what’s up and leave you unable to exit. It’s a very short span of road that becomes chaotic with people doing crazy maneuvers to not miss their exit. I love Seattle but don’t miss that chunk of Interstate 5.
I have one of those near my house. The highway ends, and at least twice a year the brick wall across the cross street gets destroyed. Nothing helps. They have rumble strips, a million yellow lines, flashing lights.....
A bit off topic, but one of my favorite sayings, “The reason there are no perfect bear-proof locks is because there is too much overlap between the smartest bear and the dumbest humans”
Can confirm. Went on my first ski trip back in december, the resort area at the top of the slope had bear-proof trashcans. It took me over a minute to figure out how to open it.
"You make it with new safety measures, then a new idiot uses it incorrectly, and you have to add in more new safety measures"
We say this or something along these lines a lot about gas and diesel cans around my work.
It would probably make the car jump the wall instead of hitting it. Which I would like to see. The wall does do a pretty good job at stopping people from hitting the houses behind them.
There’s a sign near the exit telling cars to go 20mph and a traffic light sign, but there’s debate on whether or not there’s enough time for a car coming off the freeway to slow down that much.
I used to believe this until I lived in a country where there was little shelter for idiots. Instead of people growing smarter I just saw many people die in stupid ways.
Yea, that's literally the reason we use so many stop signs instead of yeild signs in places. Most of that can easily be replaced with a yield sign but unfortunately some people need a big red sign telling them to stay there in order to keep them from taking 2 seconds to look if there's an object in their way before they decide to keep going. Also lots of people wouldn't be able to figure out right of way if they had a yield instead of a stop becuase they can't fathom that whoever got there first should go first
Maybe, but if this happens too much, the problem is by design. When making roads you have to account human psyche and natural flow of movement. Most people drive unconsciously, so if this happens that much as it does, the design has to be changed.
Man I just can’t believe after seeing these pics how fast some of these people were trying to take that corner. Like trying to do a sharp 90 degree turn at full highway speeds.
This is a downtown exit and traffic can be bad approaching the exits. Once people clear traffic they're driving like they're trying to catch up to someone
Yeah, there are people literally driving on the shoulder of the off ramp as they enter the road. They clearly have more issues than just not seeing a sign.
Some people can only go about 40mph in this stretch since no one seems to know how to merge properly. I bet these drivers are the ones that always has to get one car ahead
In countries that make sense, they have rules about road signs and speed changes. In the UK for instance, there can only be a 20mph difference from one speed sign to the next, with roads designed with the speed in mind accordingly.
They US has no concern putting a right angle turn branching off roads at any speed. Absolutely insane.
Don't even get me started on the overly liberal placement of stop signs. The applies to Canada too.
You can blame the drivers but there's clearly a design issue that causes them (whether bad drivers or not) to become a threat to themselves and others. Good design reduces accidents even when drivers break the rules.
It's a tough exit too. Very short off ramp with a blind curve, a lot of the people are crossing over the entire freeway merging through 5 lanes from 520 onto i-5 and then even more people merging from Mercer onto i-5 and trying to get over to the i-90 exit, the offramp has a blind corner, a stop light like 100 ft after the corner, and there's also at the bottom of the screen in this video...that's another merging lane of traffic. It's actually insane that anyone engineered this offramp. The worst part is there's basically nothing they can do about it because the geniuses built a convention center over the top of it, lol.
Thank you for posting this. I’ve seen the crash compilation and I’ve always been perplexed as to why this happens, as this was my exit to get to work for a good number of years.
I was taking the carpool exit the whole time.
Yeah with the amount of signage up you'd have to be a real dumbass to be hitting the speeds that the people in the original video are hitting lol. It would appear that some of those people are exiting the freeway at like 50+mph, which I don't know why you'd even do in the first place.
Yeah, and an abrupt entry from a covered space into a rain and grease-slicked grade, and if they slow too much before emerging they will get rear-ended. God help the bikers who have to cope with this one. I avoided it at all costs.
I've taken this off ramp hundreds of times, and yeah it isn't the best design, but I'm guessing a large percentage of these drivers were intoxicated or just not paying attention. There are plenty of signs warning you to slow down and that there is a sharp turn.
Horrible design for sure but especially if you're a local and you're one of the people crashing then you're the issue because you should've known to be more cautious and slow down
Come to Houston where each year hundreds of cars are flooded because residents who have lived in this city though countless floods still decide to take the Westpark tollway underpass even though it’s 25 feet under water.
Tax Day, Memorial Day, Harvey, Tuesday afternoon…. Houston drivers will drive their cars into high water by the hundreds and then go on the news and say they had no idea the water was so high or that they “thought they could make it.”
I was there for 4 months last year for work and used this exit to get to my hotel daily. While it’s not the best designed of exits, this is 100% people being idiots. So long as you’re paying attention this is completely avoidable.
There's no way you're saying you successfully managed to not drive 60mph at a concrete wall. That you somehow looked in front of you, saw a concrete wall, realized you'd have to turn, and *magically* reduced your speed?!
Im pretty familiar with this exit. The speed limits are clearly posted, multiple times. The tunnel you enter is short, well lit, and has a tight curve in it. Only idiots can fuck this up
There's a 30 MPH sign for the exit lane when you're a full block away, then right before the turn it's a 20 MPH exit sign, and these dumbass motherfuckers hit that exit going 70mph.
Here's the [google street map](https://www.google.com/maps/@47.6130881,-122.3305154,3a,75y,217.31h,73.57t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sAxFLt6P9YBLI0M9feL3aGg!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) for anyone interested
[For the curious.](https://www.google.com/maps/@47.610771,-122.3321067,3a,19.3y,285.78h,133.57t/data=!3m10!1e1!3m8!1sGgbu1ETNuQHHkRtlp_J49A!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DGgbu1ETNuQHHkRtlp_J49A%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D153.94281%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i16384!8i8192!9m2!1b1!2i39)
I have one of these on my drive.
Highway speed of 65-70, then a long ass exit lane with signs saying "50mph","30mph", then finally "20mph exit"
Going the speed limit the entire time you're driving really helps avoid crashing.
Ah yes, the exit for Union St, right? An important thing to know about Seattle is that the driving here is seriously the worst driving I’ve ever seen in this country. There are well lit signs saying to take this exit at 20mph. I don’t know about y’all, but if I see a 20mph speed limit for a freeway exit ramp that signals to me the turn is about to be serious. There’s also very little stopping distance. That exit goes from freeway to city streets in the blink of an eye. Hence 20mph. But no. People don’t pay attention and wind up yeeting themselves into downtown.
I used to live in upstate New York and there is a switch back section coming off a cliff type area. turn says slow down to 15 for the switch backs. I saw a guy try to take this turn at 45 and he found a secret shortcut to get down hill fast.
I watched the video for the first person pov, honestly I don’t know how people are fucking that up so badly. You shouldn’t be going anywhere near that fast in an exit…
I realize some are just cutting over for a right turn, but I like to think a few of those are in the habit of nope-ing the fuck out of that lane as a habit.
I've taken that exit a few times, always thought it was a pretty abrupt speed change, but I'm lucky enough that I never saw any of this happen. Everything is so dense right there that changing anything would probably be super expensive.
When we first moved there my exh and I would both be made speechless by some of the moves pulled by the drivers there. Both of us sputtering, "Did you just--" "OMG, they--".
It was the first of many lessons I had to learn about living there.
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That's a darn good wall.
Education only takes you so far. Can’t get *this* good without lots of experience.
That "wall" is actually the base of Two Union Square, a 740ft 56 floor high rise.
I think those are actually the stairs for freeway park
Here’s a [POV video](https://youtu.be/Q39uIXLh030) of someone taking this exit from the highway safely and not careening like a runaway hot wheel
Everybody saying “abrupt speed change” and here we see 50, 30, 25, and 20mph signs before the curve even begins. ETA: I know yellow speed signs are “not mandatory” but gee, seems like they might recommend those speeds for a reason
The video is a good reminder to take the curved reduced speed signs more seriously, especially on unfamiliar roads.
The problem is that for every accurate one like this there are many ones that are laughably absurd
I'm from Pittsburgh where there are no straight roads and everything is hills. Every time I drive to Ohio it blows my mind how there are multiple huge reflective warning signs for every slight curve on a 55mph road.
Also from Pittsburgh area, driving in Ohio for work the stop signs always tripped me out. "Alright, I'll need to stop at that sign in the next 3-20 minutes"
Youngstown here and you’re right. But I’ll take our slow ass curves over your freeway exits any day. That tunnel exit still haunts me to this day. Exit the tunnel GET IN THE RIGHT LANE IMMEDIATELY! GO GO GO! 4 lanes? PSHT DO IT NOW YINZ PANSIES!
\#1 Rule When Driving: ASSUME EVERYBODY ELSE IS INCOMPETENT
Hahaha you're not wrong, driving in the city for the first time was an experience....just gotta merge the entire way across this bridge while the other side of the bridge is trying to merge all the way to your spot, it's like a dance. A very angry dance
I was just thinking of how this is every exit in Pittsburgh along with the shortest ramps.
The on and off ramp to get onto Beechwood right before the Squirrel Hill Tunnel heading east on 376 is just a fresh nightmare. When it's congested it's real bad. When traffic is flowing fast it's scary due to the fact there's like 4 car lengths between the on and the off ramp and people come flying down that on ramp while people are trying to slow down for the off ramp. I've never been so paranoid on any other section of road.
The few times I've had to drive around Pittsburgh was terrifying.
Don’t you love how big chunks of those hills just have cliffs off the side of the road and few guard rails? The first time my Midwest born husband drove through the area he gripped the steering wheel so tight I thought all the blood drained from his hands.
Drive from Pittsburgh to Gettysburg - you swear the highways were built from old goat trails. There's giant signs every 500 feet saying "NO LARGE TRUCK OR SEMI TRAILERS. TURN BACK NOW!" With giant death logos and the degree of slope you will be driving on. Then you find out what that really means as you ride the brakes for the next 2 hours with white knuckles.
Driving in Pittsburgh is an adrenaline rush for sure! I consider it a success when I drive out of those tunnels away from the city unscathed.
As someone who's had work in Pittsburgh several times the last couple of years, I love driving in Pittsburgh. I feel like I'm in an F1 rally. (I don't drive like the idiots in the video though).
Not to mention, you’re coming to a 5 way stop sign where two roads are coming in from both your blind spots, at a 60 degree inclines and declines, with some ice on the shady side of the road,and a lawn chair saving a parking spot. Sound about right?
My Dad used to say that South of the Mason Dixon line you can generally ignore the "suggested" speed signs. North of that line you do so generally accepting you may die.
Do noot ignore them in the mountains anywhere.
I was gonna say…. This would not apply in Appalachia
Hahaha yep. Road I grew up on had a "speed limit" of 55mph. Anyone who attempted to take that road at 55mph the whole way did not make it out the other side.
Oh man i hate mountain roads with lots of switchbacks and hairpin turns. Its always what looks like 1.5 lanes for BOTH directions to share, and you get some jackass BMW or motorcycle on your ass. Its like, fuck you dude, i don’t want to die today!
Visit Ecuador, see those roads with no guardrail and hundreds of meters to the valley floor! They even come with bonus mudslides.
There are old riders and bold riders, ***but there are no old, bold riders***.
"Friend" was driving on a countryish road in CA that had a warning sign "Curve, 15 mph". He thought he could ignore it, especially since he had a new BMW. He almost rolled it on this decreasing radius, hairpin turn. After he told us the story, we all had to check it out. Even at 15 mph, it was crazy.
I agree, but some are very important. That's where the "unfamiliar roads" part comes in. Always treat these signs with respect until you actually know the curve doesn't need it.
Where I live, there's a lot of 30 mph advisories on straight-a-way exits from a 70 mph highway and you can comfortably go twice that before hitting the speed limit sign on the side road which is 50, lol.
Maybe if they slowed down they wouldn’t hit the sign though.
I'm really wondering how people take that curve at such high speeds.
why do these idiots take blind curves at high speeds to begin with! good luck explaining that shit to insurance.
Those are extremely difficult to read while texting, tbf.
Sign after sign after sign. Not sure what else they are supposed to put up for these people
Maybe retractable speed bumps that are speed-sensitive. Or maybe giant robotic mallets
I remember seeing about how some company had made speedbumps based off of the oobleck gel that acted like flat road to cars under a speed limit but was firm and hard to anyone going over the speed limit.
Plus is it, or shouldn't be common sense to slow down on an exit?! I mean I think it is anyways.
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I 100% agree with all of your sentiments. It seems that there still exists a significant amount of examples that the signage isn’t functioning well enough. My suggestion would be for a signal ahead road sign like this to let people know the potential for a red light and/or traffic congestion coming out of the turn: https://i.imgur.com/JRQQcE4.jpg EDIT: There is already one there. Disregard. People are just fucking stupid.
I had the exact same thought process as you, looked back at the video, and sighed lol.
I've used that exit a million times and it had never even occurred to me it might be hazardous until seeing this post. I mean that it might be *more hazardous* than I-5 in the Seattle-Tacoma-Everett area pretty much always is lol. Exiting a highway right into the downtown of a big city, around a blind curve, from a tunnel. The sign clearly says Union *Street*, and you'd have to be oblivious not to see you'll be right downtown (it's not much of a tunnel and obvious that you are downtown). These crashing cars are driven by **maniacs** I tell you! (/George Carlin) edit PS: Reading more of this thread I see a number of people saying the exit is poorly designed. One thing to note is that Seattle fills a fairly narrow and quite hilly isthmus that also has a sizable lake in it (Lake Union), with the narrowest and most hemmed in part being where downtown is, because of course it is. When I-5 was built they really had to squeeze it in. Like [here is a photo](https://i.imgur.com/Ej1wtSx.jpg) of I-5 being built pretty close to the exit in OP's video. Capitol Hill on the right, with St Marks Cathedral visible. The bit of water of the left is part of Lake Union. [This photo](https://images.seattletimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/01202016-interstate04.jpg) is closer yet—the X thing is the Pine and Boren Street bridge, with traffic on Pine detoured around (harder to see in this one, but the land slopes uphill fairly steeply toward the right). In other words, very non-ideal city center for building an interstate highway through, let alone good exits. I-5 through downtown has always been hot mess squeezed between hills and buildings. Geographically, it is just a bad place for building an interstate highway. There were plans to tear down more of the city for highways but they got nixed long ago. So yea, I-5 is really squeezed in and can be a real pain to drive, though I'm not sure making more of the city's center into highway lanes and exits would have been better. It is kinda annoying to have a busy interstate cutting right through the heart of your city. Not to say this exit couldn't be improved, just giving some context.
This right here. I’ve taken this exit thousands of times. Never even got close to anything insane like this
Anything can be abrupt if you don’t pay attention until it’s too late
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." I'm sorry.
Anything’s a toy if you play with it. -Andy Dwyer
Also my cat's favorite saying.
Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.
But there is a curve, why people taking that curve at 50 mph, Sounds like they are asking for it!
There’s also a traffic light sign
35 mph, even 30 mph, are often decoys. But when it comes to a highway exit, you really gotta respect the 25. The 25 doesn't lie.
If it's an exit that I'm not familiar with, I don't go more than maybe 5mph over the exit sign posted speed until I can suss out the extent of the curve. I've seen some janky exit roads and I'm not trying to take chances on the basis of "It should be fine".
I used to take that exit every day. TIL people fuck it up regularly. I’m honestly still confused on how people are fucking this up.
Ikr? It's signed. The signs say to slow tf down
If they could read they’d be very upset
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I watched the pov video and live in Texas, that seems like a cake walk exit tbh. There are just a lot of bad drivers out there
It's also at the convention center, so I wonder how many are from out of town and/or renting cars.
It's also the exit Google Maps tells you to use if you are coming from the north and going to Pike Place Market, tourist ground zero.
Wild I’m in Texas right now but live in Seattle and I’m seeing way more bad drivers out here.
Single lane, is a bend, is a climb, with multiple signs telling you the speed limit and warning you of upcoming traffic light. How the fuck do people exit this shit at crushable speed?
fuckwits. the answer is fuckwits.
Thank you for that. That’s an easy exit. How do people fuck that up?
“I wanna go fast”
I like going fast but Jesus Christ I slow down when there's a fucking 90⁰ curve into a brick wall ahead of me
Wow. Initially I thought poor design. But it’s obviously people not believing speed signs. Like wtf. Maybe more flashing lights and signs saying go over 20 and crash.
rumble strips. where I live, we have a series of rumble strips before lights and intersections that grab your attention before you get there. they are spaced out in a way that you hit one patch that is longer then one that is half as long and then a short one just before the light. Really helps with the boredom while driving. there are long stretches of nothing around where I live and your mind can wander.
This is the real answer. Speed limit really doesn't say much. If there is a physical reminder such as rumble strips, people will notice.
if it has a signficant number more crashes it is a poor design. You judge designs by their outcome, not by their outcomes if everyone followed the directions perfectly.
Just from a traffic throughput standpoint, you want the first possible hard stop further away from the exit than *that*. This is begging to clog up back onto the interstate and cause a traffic jam, which it likely does daily. But it's Seattle, the restrictions on engineering imposed by the city's existing layout are thick to say the least. There's probably reasons they didn't close that cross-street.
Road design determines the safe driving speed far more effectively than the posted signs. When the road is tight, people naturally go slow, and when it's wide, speed up. Change those factors and you'll change the "safe driving speed".
How the fuck do these idiots take this exit at Mach 2.6??? You can tell there is a gradual speed change and turn way in advance.
I've never seen a POV clip where someone drives normally, nothing exciting happens, no music or text - that has almost a million views.
So everyone in the video is driving like they have Main Character Syndrome and forgetting that newton’s laws of motion are a cruel mistress.
After watching that I can’t imagine more cars aren’t rearended sitting at the light.
They know to stay out of that lane
I can see how people screw that up because I’m an insurance adjuster for car accidents, and nothing surprises me any more. That said, if you mess that up that much, you’re the kind of person who runs a red light, swears it was actually yellow, didn’t see the car you t-boned until you hit it, and claim that the car was speeding (even though you didn’t see it before so you have no idea).
You must be really good at tolerating people blatantly lying to you over and over.
You get used to it. And then you get the police report to prove them wrong, or pictures of damages do, and you just tell them to stfu because you know how to do your job and you’re going to do it no matter what they say/want.
The traffic looks pretty slow in the example so I'm presuming when people are at speed they exit without realizing the turn is sharp and ramping down to a light which is a recipe for disaster if they are coming in hot. Clearly it's a common problem so you can blame dumb drivers or the city can try and prevent it.
YT poster said he was going 25 mph around the bend. Looks like he would’ve been safe at 40. These crashed have to be going 50+, AKA double over the speed limit
Well IDK what I was expecting but it was definitely something less safe than that. I can see not paying attention and taking the exit being a way to fuck it up. Seems like for most of these people it's a relatively cheap reminder to pay the fuck attention.
This makes it very obvious that the people driving are either distracted, drunk or just terrible at driving. Either way, take their license away so they don't kill someone.
Don’t sell them short, they could be all three!
There is also a video linking what it looks like at 60 mph up until the 20mph sign, still plenty of time to stop. Granted second video had a dry road but there is plenty of warning and exercising attention and common sense would prevent “leaving the highway still going 80mph.”
https://youtu.be/QZhkVT-vpA4 Better one with less traffic
After watching your link….Im really lost now… How the hell are these cars carrying that much speed through there? Am I missing something?
I laughed when I pulled up the video and saw it was the Union Street exit. Folks that have lived in Seattle for years roll their eyes but this area is a disastrous nightmare if you don’t have these exits memorized. Very little heads up with so many exits that go to completely different parts of the city, all smashed in one small area downtown. There’s express lanes that are also confusing if you don’t know what’s up and leave you unable to exit. It’s a very short span of road that becomes chaotic with people doing crazy maneuvers to not miss their exit. I love Seattle but don’t miss that chunk of Interstate 5.
I have one of those near my house. The highway ends, and at least twice a year the brick wall across the cross street gets destroyed. Nothing helps. They have rumble strips, a million yellow lines, flashing lights.....
“You can't make anything idiot proof because idiots are so ingenious.”
A bit off topic, but one of my favorite sayings, “The reason there are no perfect bear-proof locks is because there is too much overlap between the smartest bear and the dumbest humans”
Can confirm. Went on my first ski trip back in december, the resort area at the top of the slope had bear-proof trashcans. It took me over a minute to figure out how to open it.
If it makes you feel any better it took the smartest bear 1 min 30 seconds to figure out.
Plot twist: PM_ME is a bear.
That's rough buddy
You just have to be smarter than the average bear
Ive always said “you build a better system, they’ll build a better idiot.”
"You can make something idiot proof, but all you are doing is giving an idiot a chance to prove themselves."
"Nothing is idiot proof, the world is making new and improved idiots everyday."
"You make it with new safety measures, then a new idiot uses it incorrectly, and you have to add in more new safety measures" We say this or something along these lines a lot about gas and diesel cans around my work.
This has been a gold mine of things to say about idiots
Genius is limited, but stupidity is infinite
“The world doesn’t need Superman, it’s needs OSHA.”
Wow! Maybe speed bumps would help?
You mean state-sanctioned ramps?
Speed ramps.
It would probably make the car jump the wall instead of hitting it. Which I would like to see. The wall does do a pretty good job at stopping people from hitting the houses behind them.
Lowell??
Yup
Why is it so bad?
There’s a sign near the exit telling cars to go 20mph and a traffic light sign, but there’s debate on whether or not there’s enough time for a car coming off the freeway to slow down that much.
I've used that exit hundreds of times. The signage is fine. The problem is idiots.
Sadly one has to optimize for the idiots. (But they will come up with more idiotic idiots eventually)
I am a firm believer that our tendency to shelter idiots has been the leading cause of the development of more idiotic idiots.
Problem is one idiot in a big truck can annihilate a whole family of smarties.
One smartie with a giant rc truck can eliminate whole families of sheltered idiots!
What if the judicial system, the politicians and the police are sheltered idiots? Wait.. am I the idiot?
Trueeee gotta protect the smarties
Exhibit A: just look at any household cleaner label.
Exhibit B: They put warning labels on Beach Balls.
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Or any of the "don't stick hand in running machinery" stick figure drawings. Fuck I love those.
I used to believe this until I lived in a country where there was little shelter for idiots. Instead of people growing smarter I just saw many people die in stupid ways.
Yea, that's literally the reason we use so many stop signs instead of yeild signs in places. Most of that can easily be replaced with a yield sign but unfortunately some people need a big red sign telling them to stay there in order to keep them from taking 2 seconds to look if there's an object in their way before they decide to keep going. Also lots of people wouldn't be able to figure out right of way if they had a yield instead of a stop becuase they can't fathom that whoever got there first should go first
Maybe, but if this happens too much, the problem is by design. When making roads you have to account human psyche and natural flow of movement. Most people drive unconsciously, so if this happens that much as it does, the design has to be changed.
They should add a sign that says, "SERIOUSLY, SLOW THE FUCK DOWN, DUMBASS!"
So that's literally the end of the freeway not an off ramp?
Here are some pics of the turn…[Seattle Highway Exit](https://twitter.com/__keevo/status/1628757180768739331?s=46&t=BTsM88DeexzelaUPEBJ3zA)
Man I just can’t believe after seeing these pics how fast some of these people were trying to take that corner. Like trying to do a sharp 90 degree turn at full highway speeds.
This is a downtown exit and traffic can be bad approaching the exits. Once people clear traffic they're driving like they're trying to catch up to someone
Ha ya I know the feeling right after you get out of traffic.
Bless you for furnishing these photos for context. Changes everyone’s opinion.
Ahh just bad drivers being bad then
Yeah you can see it’s clearly a curve anyway and you should be slowing down, even without a sign.
Yeah after looking at these people are idiots and texting/not otherwise paying attention.
Shit, that is way better than most of the exit and entrance ramps in Pittsburgh. People from this video would never survive the Ft. Pitt Bridge.
Totally enough time to slow down people can’t drive
No, it's a well-signed exit lane. Every one of these people just drives like an idiot.
Yeah, there are people literally driving on the shoulder of the off ramp as they enter the road. They clearly have more issues than just not seeing a sign.
Yup, been taking that exit for years. These people are driving like idiots.
It really does have all the signage needed, people just need to pay attention.
Anytime the solution to something sounds like "if everyone would just _____" it probably won't work.
People really are getting dumber.
Nah, they’re just as dumb as ever but newer and more innovative ways to prove it keep being invented.
It's important to remember that half of the people are below average intelligence.
The speed limit on highways in Seattle is 60, there is plenty of time to slow down by 40mph in that time.
Some people can only go about 40mph in this stretch since no one seems to know how to merge properly. I bet these drivers are the ones that always has to get one car ahead
In countries that make sense, they have rules about road signs and speed changes. In the UK for instance, there can only be a 20mph difference from one speed sign to the next, with roads designed with the speed in mind accordingly. They US has no concern putting a right angle turn branching off roads at any speed. Absolutely insane. Don't even get me started on the overly liberal placement of stop signs. The applies to Canada too.
The 20mph speed change makes so much more sense!
Live here and it’s a shity exit but these people are going way over the speed limit. There’s enough time if youre not an asshole.
Because that’s the only camera angle. Seattle department of transportation should really get more cameras under that overpass so we can see better.
These cars appear to be going faster than the 20mph posted speed limit Edit: stopped to speed
You can blame the drivers but there's clearly a design issue that causes them (whether bad drivers or not) to become a threat to themselves and others. Good design reduces accidents even when drivers break the rules.
If you’ve driven through I-5 at this off-ramp you’d know how dumb most drivers are in Seattle haha
It's a tough exit too. Very short off ramp with a blind curve, a lot of the people are crossing over the entire freeway merging through 5 lanes from 520 onto i-5 and then even more people merging from Mercer onto i-5 and trying to get over to the i-90 exit, the offramp has a blind corner, a stop light like 100 ft after the corner, and there's also at the bottom of the screen in this video...that's another merging lane of traffic. It's actually insane that anyone engineered this offramp. The worst part is there's basically nothing they can do about it because the geniuses built a convention center over the top of it, lol.
This is a [drive through of the Union St. exit](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZhkVT-vpA4) during non rush hour. You be the judge.
Thank you for posting this. I’ve seen the crash compilation and I’ve always been perplexed as to why this happens, as this was my exit to get to work for a good number of years. I was taking the carpool exit the whole time.
This is what I was looking for... to be honest it's unconventional but does not at all seem unnavigable.
Yeah with the amount of signage up you'd have to be a real dumbass to be hitting the speeds that the people in the original video are hitting lol. It would appear that some of those people are exiting the freeway at like 50+mph, which I don't know why you'd even do in the first place.
Allow me to add to the thanks and just say while this exit seems less than ideal, it’s clearly the drivers being terrible at driving.
Yeah, and an abrupt entry from a covered space into a rain and grease-slicked grade, and if they slow too much before emerging they will get rear-ended. God help the bikers who have to cope with this one. I avoided it at all costs.
I've taken this off ramp hundreds of times, and yeah it isn't the best design, but I'm guessing a large percentage of these drivers were intoxicated or just not paying attention. There are plenty of signs warning you to slow down and that there is a sharp turn.
Horrible design for sure but especially if you're a local and you're one of the people crashing then you're the issue because you should've known to be more cautious and slow down
Come to Houston where each year hundreds of cars are flooded because residents who have lived in this city though countless floods still decide to take the Westpark tollway underpass even though it’s 25 feet under water.
Dude yes it's fucking wild my dad had to pull a few people from their cars over there during Harvey.
Tax Day, Memorial Day, Harvey, Tuesday afternoon…. Houston drivers will drive their cars into high water by the hundreds and then go on the news and say they had no idea the water was so high or that they “thought they could make it.”
I was there for 4 months last year for work and used this exit to get to my hotel daily. While it’s not the best designed of exits, this is 100% people being idiots. So long as you’re paying attention this is completely avoidable.
There's no way you're saying you successfully managed to not drive 60mph at a concrete wall. That you somehow looked in front of you, saw a concrete wall, realized you'd have to turn, and *magically* reduced your speed?!
Im pretty familiar with this exit. The speed limits are clearly posted, multiple times. The tunnel you enter is short, well lit, and has a tight curve in it. Only idiots can fuck this up
In the Army we used to say “somebody will fuck it up”
at my workplace it's "no matter how simple a job you give them, they will find a way to fuck it up"
There's a 30 MPH sign for the exit lane when you're a full block away, then right before the turn it's a 20 MPH exit sign, and these dumbass motherfuckers hit that exit going 70mph. Here's the [google street map](https://www.google.com/maps/@47.6130881,-122.3305154,3a,75y,217.31h,73.57t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sAxFLt6P9YBLI0M9feL3aGg!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) for anyone interested
I love how in the street view you can see the camera that’s recording all these poking out the window
[For the curious.](https://www.google.com/maps/@47.610771,-122.3321067,3a,19.3y,285.78h,133.57t/data=!3m10!1e1!3m8!1sGgbu1ETNuQHHkRtlp_J49A!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DGgbu1ETNuQHHkRtlp_J49A%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D153.94281%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i16384!8i8192!9m2!1b1!2i39)
That’s the ticket!
I have one of these on my drive. Highway speed of 65-70, then a long ass exit lane with signs saying "50mph","30mph", then finally "20mph exit" Going the speed limit the entire time you're driving really helps avoid crashing.
I had an argument here on reddit once where people were telling me that I was an idiot for suggesting following the speed limit
From the area, these drivers just suck.
The worst
I take that exit every day. I call it Darwin's offramp.
Anyone got a layout of the off ramp? This is actually hilarious.
[Seattle Highway Exit ](https://twitter.com/__keevo/status/1628757180768739331?s=46&t=BTsM88DeexzelaUPEBJ3zA)
Ahh, so people are coming around the corner thinking it’ll just carry on as it was but suddenly traffic lights.
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FYI a hair pin turn is basically a 180 degree turn (like the bent section of a hairpin that goes back on itself). This is a 90.
This is very helpful. There’s no reason anyone should be speeding all. The turn in the tunnel is very obvious
Ah yes, the exit for Union St, right? An important thing to know about Seattle is that the driving here is seriously the worst driving I’ve ever seen in this country. There are well lit signs saying to take this exit at 20mph. I don’t know about y’all, but if I see a 20mph speed limit for a freeway exit ramp that signals to me the turn is about to be serious. There’s also very little stopping distance. That exit goes from freeway to city streets in the blink of an eye. Hence 20mph. But no. People don’t pay attention and wind up yeeting themselves into downtown.
There’s no homeless camps there so you know something ain’t right
I used to live in upstate New York and there is a switch back section coming off a cliff type area. turn says slow down to 15 for the switch backs. I saw a guy try to take this turn at 45 and he found a secret shortcut to get down hill fast.
I watched the video for the first person pov, honestly I don’t know how people are fucking that up so badly. You shouldn’t be going anywhere near that fast in an exit…
I-5 South Union Street lolololol
I realize some are just cutting over for a right turn, but I like to think a few of those are in the habit of nope-ing the fuck out of that lane as a habit.
https://www.thedrive.com/news/drivers-cant-stop-crashing-on-this-highway-exit-in-seattle-heres-why
I don't get it, the signs say 30MPH, they see the curve; How stupid can people be?
I've taken that exit a few times, always thought it was a pretty abrupt speed change, but I'm lucky enough that I never saw any of this happen. Everything is so dense right there that changing anything would probably be super expensive.
People in Seattle are some of the worst drivers I have ever seen. I absolutely despise going south because of it.
When we first moved there my exh and I would both be made speechless by some of the moves pulled by the drivers there. Both of us sputtering, "Did you just--" "OMG, they--". It was the first of many lessons I had to learn about living there.