Get Defensive When It Comes to Unsafe Lane Changers

Dear Street Smart:

You have written about people who don’t signal or look when they make lane changes. Well, what about those who are in the left lane and, all of a sudden, they realize they have to turn right at the next street? So what do they do? They cut everybody off without looking or signaling. It happens to me all the time.

Larry Bakos, Canoga Park

Dear Reader:

In the state vehicle code, the violation you describe is listed under the heading Stupid Driving Maneuvers.

OK, the vehicle code doesn’t really use the term stupid . It was replaced last year with the politically correct term: cerebrally challenged .

People who zip across traffic in such a manner are violating a few driving rules, including the rule that says you cannot make a lane change or turn until it can be done with “reasonable safety.”

It also violates a rule in the vehicle code that says you must signal before making a lane change and that signal “shall be given continuously during the last 100 feet traveled by the vehicle before turning.”

There is not much you can do about such drivers except to “drive defensively,” as they say in traffic school. In other words, prepare for the other guy to drive like a bonehead.

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Dear Street Smart:

If Topanga Canyon Boulevard is a state highway and is governed and maintained by Caltrans, why isn’t it paved more often? It is misery driving on this road.

Ofer Koblenz, West Hills

Dear Reader:

You are among several readers who have complained that traveling this road is like entering the Baja 1000 race in the family station wagon. In fact, I hear the army is using that street to test the durability of its tanks.

Topanga Canyon Boulevard is, as you point out, a state highway and is maintained by the state Department of Transportation. But for the past three years, Caltrans has been trying to hand over to the city of Los Angeles responsibility for the section of the boulevard in the San Fernando Valley.

The city, however, is reluctant to accept the street, saying its resources are already stretched to the limit maintaining 7,600 miles of city streets.

So, the situation is sort of like a reverse custody battle: The two sides are fighting not to get custody. In the meantime, many motorists say the street is being neglected. Caltrans disagrees, saying the road gets due attention.

But if you have a complaint about a specific pothole on that road, call the Caltrans maintenance crew at (310) 478-2052 and say: “My tire was just swallowed up by this street. Get your asphalt over here!”

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Dear Street Smart:

Lack of visible business and house numbers are a big problem for motorists. Drive Ventura Boulevard at 30 m.p.h. in traffic and try to locate a desired address. If a driver slows down in the process, he is confronted with impatient drivers to his rear and must come to a virtual halt in his search for the right address.

A city ordinance requiring a standard placed number system would alleviate traffic congestion and greatly assist both pedestrians and vehicle drivers.

Charles W. Smith, Northridge

Dear Reader:

The problem you describe dates back to the early ‘70s, when people drove around in Volkswagen bugs, looking for addresses while listening to the Beatles on their eight-track tape players.

I know this because in 1973, the city of Los Angeles adopted the exact city ordinance you have suggested.

The ordinance, section 63.113 of the city’s planning code, requires all property owners to install street address numbers at least four inches tall and two inches wide on or near the street entrance of the business or home.

Furthermore, the ordinance says the city engineer can require any property owner to make the numbers larger than the minimum required size when poor lighting, building location and other reasons call for better visibility.

One reason for this law was so that firefighters and police can easily find addresses when responding to emergency calls.

I guess we can’t expect cops to respond to calls by simply following the sound of screaming and gunfire. Hey, this is L. A. On some streets, those sounds are coming from every other house.

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Dear Street Smart:

I have a big complaint about the Golden State Freeway in Burbank. The northbound Golden State gets backed up around the Alameda Avenue on-ramp just about every weekday afternoon because of poor design and selfish drivers.

The bad design combines a hill, a curve, an on-ramp and a “cheater road” all coming together at the same spot. The slowing is aggravated by drivers who exit the freeway at Western or Alameda avenues and drive parallel to the freeway on a merging/transition lane, only to “cheat” and get back on the freeway later.

Is Caltrans aware of this problem?

Fred Baker, Burbank

Dear Reader:

Yes, Caltrans is aware of this problem, but that doesn’t mean something is being done about it.

It seems that the design of this section, with the exits and on-ramps built in a cloverleaf configuration that includes a “cheater lane,” was state-of-the-art when it was built 30 or 40 years ago.

But now we are learning that this design can’t handle today’s intense traffic flow. (By the way, is “traffic flow” an oxymoron?)

Caltrans traffic engineer Larry Loudon said the problems on this section of freeway were studied years ago. But he said the only way to solve the problems is to reconstruct and widen the freeway, which Caltrans can’t afford.

“We are unable to identify any cheap fix,” he said.

So it looks like we’re stuck with those problems until the state somehow gets a whole lot richer.

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Dear Reader:

The latest nomination for wittiest personalized license plate comes from yours truly. On a gray Toyota van cruising through Studio City, I saw the plates WE R FMLE. If I read it correctly, it means WE ARE FAMILY.

It could have been the vehicle driven by the Pointer Sisters, but with all the money they made from their hit single “We Are Family,” I expect that they’re driving something flashier than a Toyota.