Red Means Stop

They call it the "Cleveland Creep." It sounds like it should either be a dance style from the 1930s, or on of those guys who's required by law to go from door to door informing all the residents that he's moved in to the neighborhood.

No, my friends, the Creep is not a person. It's a behavior. I don't really know if it's part of the vernacular, but one of Paul's classmates used it to describe this behavior and it was so perfect a description, that I had to embrace it wholeheartedly.

So what is it? The Cleveland Creep is the common practice, in this fair Ohio city, that occurs when drivers come to a red light at an intersection, but fail to stop at the solid bar of white paint before the crosswalk, and the creep well into the crosswalk, or even through it entirely so they are sticking out into the traffic area of the intersection.

As a well trained California driver, I approach the yellow or red light and slow down to bring my car to a full stop before entering the cross walk -- that inviolate and sacred space for the all-powerful pedestrian, whose lack of automobile inherently lends him or her a panoply of rights that no auto-ensconced person can ever hope to attain until they exit their vehicle. From my stopped position, I inevitably see the driver in the lane next to me continue past me for at least a half car-length. It is a behavior I watch with dismay as I observe it happening, multiple times each day.

"Why?!" I wonder, often aloud. Why would a person do that? "What is to be gained by blocking the crosswalk?" Does the 9-foot head-start make a difference when the light turns green?

There are a number of traffic rule practices that people in this region simply don't seem to consider applicable to them. The Creep is the most predominant, followed in close second by the blockage of the intersection completely. If memory serves, I was taught that despite a green light, if you can't clear the intersection in front of you, you're not supposed to progress into it. Again, you hold your place at the solid white paint bar behind the crosswalk until you can completely clear the intersection. The average Cleveland driver doesn't seem to comprehend this concept. Even with 2-3 cars sticking into the intersection ahead of them, many a driver feels that they need to join that conga line, and ensure that when the lights change, no car from the cross-traffic will make it through the intersection. "If I can't get through, then neither will you," appears to be the predominant sentiment.

But there's more ... so you're driving along at 35 MPH, in the right-hand lane, and all of a sudden there's a car parked in front of you, about 50-yards away. This has to be illegal, right? Nope.

There aren't shoulders on the surface streets here, so traffic can be a really fu(ked up experience. On your average 2-lane surface street, including busy thoroughfares, parking is usually allowed in the right hand lane. Please note that I said "LANE." Suddenly, you and the people in front or behind you need to stop and merge in to the left lane, but of course the people in that lane don't want to let you in, so you're sitting there with your turn signal on and trying to bully your way in to the clear lane, and traffic gets backed up even more.

In "Annie Hall," Woody Allen said that California's only contribution to culture was allowing a right turn at a red light. At this point, I'm dying for some culture. It makes you want to import LA-style road rage.

Thank goodness I only have a 5-mile commute.