(no subject)

[apocalypsos]

You know, one of these days, I'm not going to be living in the DC area anymore, and some dumbass is going to make the mistake of standing in front of me on an escalator, and I'm going to jump on his head and tattoo "TOURIST!" in big black letters all over his forehead.

And when I give my defense as "Walk left, stand right! Walk left, stand right!" in court, I won't even be able to get away with it. *sigh*

In other news, another Christmas present down, seven more to go. :)

Comments

[miggy.livejournal.com]

My mom and I still bark that at people, and we only lived in D.C. from 91-92.

[rani23.livejournal.com]

I think if you got a D.C. jury, you'd get off with the "Walk left, stand right" defense. :)

Or at least, when I lived there, I would have voted to acquit. :)

[trishalynn.livejournal.com]

You'd get acquitted if you decide to do the same thing here in NYC, or in Las Vegas. It should be put in the Constitution. Along with "Stand aside and let everyone off the subway/metro before you try to cram yourself on it."

[derryderrydown.livejournal.com]

You'd get acquitted in London, too.

[tamnonlinear.livejournal.com]

DC: Where the escalators are often blocked by a pair of boobs standing abreast.

You can tell if the crowd around you is local or tourist by whether or not they laugh if you mime kicking the offender down the escalator.

[dragonsinger.livejournal.com]

Poor Trollprincess. (((HUGS)))

[silly-dan.livejournal.com]

I don't think there's a city big enough to have a subway where "walk left stand right" isn't a rule.

[storm_dancer]

Same thing for elevators, too! I like to plant myself right at the doors as the car stops, and smile benignly at people as they try to push past me to get on. Usually they realize they're being rude and step back to let me get off.

Asshats.

[thornsilver]

Can you explain?

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

The right side of the escalator is for standing on, the left side is for walking down. The tourists are the ones standing in your way when you're trying to walk down the left side (and the dumbasses trying to cram their way into the metro trains without letting people off first).

I swear, this is one of the fews ways I'll admit remotely assimilating to the DC area. People standing on the left side of the escalator has become my biggest pet peeve. *grrrr*

[strobineller.livejournal.com]

Paris. Lyon. Toulouse. Probably Lille, I don't see why it'd be different.

Also, I'm wondering if it's true in London. Shouldn't they do "Walk right, stand left" instead?

[tamnonlinear.livejournal.com]

Also: Unable to grasp the basics physics behind metro cars. When it starts moving forward, you will feel as if you are being pushed backward if you are not seated or holding on to a grab bar (is this really such a difficult concept?). This means that if you are a moronic tourist, standing about with the rest of your herd, idly chewing on the system maps, and have not taken the precaution of either taking a seat or holding on to one of the bright shiny slightly greasy poles, you will bang into your other passengers as you lurch about once the car starts moving. This is rude. Yes, even if you laugh and say "Ha, sorry about that!". Particularly if you do it more than once.

Please leave the car and go lick the rail with the white cover. We covered it up so the chocolate won't get stale. It's yummy and just for you. Thank you.

[thornsilver]

Maybe they should announce about it, like the announce about suspicious packages.

Oh, wait, they do it for letting people off the train, and there is no result. *pout*

[gentleman-lech.livejournal.com]

You have escalators wide enough for more than one person abreast? I'm jealous.

[opportunemoment.livejournal.com]

... logically, that's true. I never thought of that. But no, it's walk left stand right here too, although we don't have the exact same mantra.

[myniamh.livejournal.com]

Here (australia) it's Walk Right, Stand Left.

[silly-dan.livejournal.com]

I stand corrected (on the right).

[vass]

What naewinter said about Australia.

My peeve: on trams and trains and buses. People get OFF first. People getting ON wait for the people getting OFF. I'd say disembarking, but if they don't know not to get people stuck on public transport, they probably don't know the word either.

[foresthouse.livejournal.com]

Hehehe. My friend was in town last week with a visitor from Australia, and without even thinking, I yelled that at him. And then I was all,
*gotta love DC*

[trishalynn.livejournal.com]

I know! WyTF don't people listen? There are signs all over the bloody place. I feel like any minute now, I'm going to resort to barging through people and not even apologizing.

[cyprinella]

Metro used to have signs about it up on the escalators, but they took them down because they actually don't want people to walk down the escalators at all. Walking apparently increases the chance of a fall and such. There was an article in teh Post about it this summer.

[apiphile.livejournal.com]

You'd think people would notice by the way that everyone is standing on ONE side of the escalator that this was the correct side to stand on, even if they couldn't read the EIGHTY BILLION SIGNS IN SIX LANGUAGES AND NON-LANGUAGE DIAGRAMS or understand the ONE ANNOUNCEMENT EVERY FOUR MINUTES. I'm starting to suspect that tourists are either malicious or mentally retarded.

[teenygozer.livejournal.com]

Oooh!

Does that have anything to do with the toilet flush swirling around in the opposite direction down there, too?

;)

[diannelamerc.livejournal.com]

I was going to say... when I was there ('96-'99) they had little signs. And people were generally good enough about it that the occasional aberration stood out clearly and usually got mowed down enough times they finally got a clue.

Then again, I lived on the Dupont Circle stop, which (at the time) had the longest escalator stretch in the system (and in much of the world). Unless you had time to kill and/or were exhausted/injured *everyone* gave up and started walking by the halfway mark, even the tourists

[cyprinella]

Heh. I took my mom to that Metro stop the first time she was in DC with me and when we were leaving, she made me stop at CVS so that she could get a camera and take a picture of it. I had that escalator die on me once when I was a third of the way up and had an ankle injury. *That* sucked.

[diannelamerc.livejournal.com]

Ugh, yeah. Climbing the entire length up unassisted when it was dead really sucked. (They were good about switching them, though, so if only one was dead it was made the downward one. They would have had a mutiny on their hands if they didn't.)

Of course the last fifty feet or so is exposed to the sky, which means that more than once I was exhausted enough at the end of the day to want to just ride up by that point -- only to get hit by a face-full of pouring rain and have to climb like mad in sheer self-preservation. :-p

Hot damn! I just checked the web for that station (to see if they had the actual length listed (they don't) and saw this:

"Last train departs: Shady Grove- 12:10 a.m. Glenmont- 12:00 a.m.
(Trains leave exactly 3 hours later on Friday and Saturday nights.)"

Do you know how much money in taxis it would have saved me if that extension had been operating in my day? *shakes head*

[sothisislife.livejournal.com]

Here in Detroit, we don't have a subway, but at the airport on the escalators or the moving walkways we do follow that rule. The moving walkways actually spell it out for you in orange paint. When I come across a dumbass standing in left side I usually come up behind them and shout "EXCUSE ME" in their ear as loudly as possible, even if there is plenty of room for me to pass them.

[lizey.livejournal.com]

Australian shopping centres - evil standing still people galore.

Australian train stations - evil standing still people get knocked over.

[sashayaki.livejournal.com]

Love that icon! Hee!

[thoughtcr1me.livejournal.com]

Looks like it's about 195 feet, which is nearly 90 feet shorter than Wheaton. That's if my math is right. (unlikely at best)

Article here (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31605-2004May16.html), shows metro escalators at 90 feet/minute and DuPont's escalator taking 2:10 versus Wheaton's 3:00. Go figure.

I knew the damned thing was long, but I had no idea it was that long! :)

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

It probably has more to do with the fact that we drive on the left (and so overtake on the right).

I bet in France it's Walk Left, Stand Right.

[leahthegreat.livejournal.com]

Came here via metaquotes, and I live in D.C. After a long day nothing ticks me off more than the stupid tourists who stand on the wrong side of the escalator.