Gee & Ursula: Are Seattle drivers too slow, or is everyone else too fast?
Jan 29, 2022, 6:29 AM
In this aerial view, you are looking north from Seattle's Eastlake neighborhood at I-5. (Photo courtesy of WSDOT/Flickr)
(Photo courtesy of WSDOT/Flickr)
In a new national comparison of cities, it indicated that Seattle drivers are slower than drivers in Portland, though that’s partly due to lenient speeding laws in Oregon.
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The article was published on SIXT.com, which is an international provider of mobility services. The comparison between drivers in each set of two cities was based on four measurements: responsibility (largely measured by the number of insured drivers); congestion; collisions; and speed.
KIRO Newsradio host Ursula Reutin just returned from a trip to Florida, and says she noticed that drivers on the freeway there “drive like nuts” compared to Seattle.
“But the question is, are they driving crazy or do we, in the Seattle area, drive too slowly?” she asked.
“I love the way that people drive here,” host Gee Scott replied. “I love that we drive slower than other places. … You can make fun all you want to of the slow drivers. Yes, that’s me.”
Gee says he drives slowly because he’s never late.
“The reason why you guys are driving so fast — because you left too late. If you would leave a little earlier, let’s say give yourself an extra 5, 10 minutes, you wouldn’t be worried about speeding,” he said.
“I think it’s just we’re more polite in this region,” Ursula said. “Because the other thing I didn’t see when I was in Florida was anyone saying, ‘hey, yeah, come on, I see you.'”
“People just pretend like they didn’t even see us,” she said about when they needed to merge.
Producer Andrew Lanier stepped in to defend the speedy drivers.
“It is maddening to see people driving 55 in the left hand lane,” he said. “It is maddening to see them drive 50 in the right hand lane. I don’t care if that’s the slow lane, you still need to be driving the speed limit.”
“And by the way, I love polite drivers, I love people who allow space and they wave you on, but the thing is, it’s not my job to let you in. It is your job to find a way to change lanes when there is space,” he added.
Listen to Gee Scott and Ursula Reutin weekday mornings from 9 a.m. – 12 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.
