Brown: Even if most livable, Pittsburgh isn’t very drivable

I still remember the first few words my high school teacher Ms. McCarthy said to me after I… I still remember the first few words my high school teacher Ms. McCarthy said to me after I found out I had been accepted to Pitt, the words that came shortly after “congratulations.”

They weren’t about the school or attractions of the big city. No, she talked about the hills, the drivers and her adventures navigating the city in the old stick shift she had when she was college aged.

“If you can drive there, you can drive anywhere,” she said.

Ain’t that the truth.

Each day that I make my commute to work, I feel like I’m re-enacting the climactic chase scene from the classic Steve McQueen movie “Bullitt.” My green beater of a car substitutes for Frank Bullitt’s Mustang, and everyone else on the road gets to play the role of the baddie in the Dodge Charger.

And just like Bullitt with the bad guys, I fear for my life every time I have to share the roads with Pittsburghers. Overall, I don’t mind driving in Pennsylvania, but there’s something — a lot of things, actually — about Pittsburgh driving that drives me crazy.

Motorists in Pittsburgh adhere to a different set of laws than the rest of the state. The differences could be attributed to Pittsburgh’s old infrastructure, narrow roads and navigational challenges, complemented by hundreds of bridges. But there’s a lot more to it than that.

Take the “Pittsburgh Left” for instance, otherwise known as “Right of way? What’s that?” The process involves racing against oncoming traffic to make a left as soon as the light turns green — sort of like Frogger with a car.

Its prevalence is now largely driving lore, though it does, have a Wikipedia article devoted to explaining its intricacies. And it’s just the way you’re supposed to drive apparently.

The first time I witnessed a Pittsburgh Left, I was forced to stop midway through an intersection, slamming on my brakes out of necessity and awe. Why wasn’t I ever taught something so useful back home in suburbia?

When moving a little slower, such as during rush hour on Fifth Avenue, different rules apply. If you’re on the same road as a driver who needs to change lanes, it’s important to cut him off, ignore turn signals — real Pittsburghers don’t use them anyway — and then proceed to honk incessantly to demonstrate your machismo.

The unique driving behavior in Pittsburgh could possibly be attributed to the city’s lack of an interstate beltway, leaving its two main interstates heavily crowded. Perhaps Pittsburghers are simply accustomed to not being able to get anywhere quickly. Nor can they get there very efficiently, because the alternative to the interstates consists of a circuitous colored belt system around the city. That’s why they say, “You can’t get from there to here in Pittsburgh.”

At highway speeds, proper etiquette seems to dictate that the left lane isn’t a passing lane. Rather, it’s a moseying lane designed for drivers to pull alongside those right of them to check out the Steelers and Pens garb glued onto their dashboards.

After sitting in a left lane waiting for the driver ahead of me to switch lanes on several occasions, I began to notice what’s popular these days — mostly gold-and-black beads hanging on rearview mirrors and miniature Stanley Cups right under them. When you can’t face Heinz Field or Mellon Arena five times a day to pray, I guess the dashboard is the next best option.

On the highway, much like in slower driving, changing lanes is a task best completed without turn signals across multiple lanes at once. Only girly men and those with poor upbringings use signals, so it’s best to avoid any unnecessary wear on the turn signal stalk.

And when all of the moving is said and done, parking should be done wherever there’s room, evidenced by the battle scar on my car’s rear bumper. But I didn’t need that paint on my car anyway. Real men forge their own parking spaces. It’s every man for himself.

Because the city was built before the invention of automobiles, many residences are without driveways, leaving their inhabitants to fend for street parking. This past winter highlighted this difficulty, as residents attempted to lay claim to parking spaces by planting chairs on the curb in front of their houses. Moving these place markers even resulted in some creative forms of vengeance. As the Pittsburgh Channel reported, a car was left buried under an avalanche during the recent Snowpocalypse after the driver presumably moved a chair and stole the spot. On top of the covered car in question, the owner found a note that read, “Now yinz know not to break the rules.” Classy, very classy.

After driving here for two years now, I’ve given up on trying to understand all of the absurd little unwritten rules. There’s no point in trying to make sense of it.

I just go with the flow — turn signals or not.

E-mail Jacob at jeb110@pitt.edu.