Minneapolis is still the best because...

I am tired, slightly hungover, and a bit crabby, so I thought it would be the perfect time to write down some of the utterly stupid things about the city that I otherwise thoroughly enjoy.  This will expand over time I imagine.

1.  There is no logic to the timing of the walk/don't walk signs on stoplights in relation to when the actual light turns yellow or red.  Rather, some lights still afford me enough time to cross after blinking.  Others place me in the middle of the intersection if I start even after the walk has just turned to don't walk.  This is stupid and dangerous.

2.  There is no lapse time between when one light turns red and when the perpendicular avenue's light turns green.  This is dangerous for walking (see point 1).  This also is illogical because people come barreling through red lights when your lane has been green for a good 3 seconds.  This is stupid and dangerous as well.

3.  There are diagonal streets running through the city that create what can only be described as a clusterfuck of lanes at points where they intersect with nice, normal E/W and N/S streets.  It is confusing to decide  which light is yours and people can be turning left one of three different ways at the same time that another lane is going straight.  How does this madness occur?  Because these intersections are under the jurisdiction of the previously scorned stoplights.  This is stupid and absolutely terrifying to witness and survive while on bicycle.

4.  The street signs identifying diagonal intersections are useless and confusing.  When one road cuts diagonally through the intersection, two of the three streets will have signs on them with labels of two streets each.  Did what I write make sense?  Probably not.  It doesn't in real life either.  So lets say I'm heading south on Damen Ave and there is an E/W intersection with Irving Park Rd and Lincoln Ave cuts through diagonally.  The signs marking Lincoln Ave will read "Lincoln Ave" (as it should) but then immediately below (or above) in identical print it will also read "Irving Park Rd".  And on the Irving Park street sign, it will also list Lincoln Ave even though that street is not in fact Lincoln Ave.  It is Irving Park.  It should only read Irving Park.  Lincoln Ave should only be identified by it's own name and not the names of the streets immediately surrounding it.  This is not only stupid but completely idiotic and I intentionally avoid making turns at diagonal intersections because of this.  So I guess it's inconvenient too.

More to come...

5.  After a particularly frustrating afternoon making my way through downtown, I have another complaint.  There is no continuity of the bikepath into the downtown Chicago area.  I understand that Minneapolis is no better, but at least we don't have three layers of streets stacked on top of each other.  Finding your way to a nearby bike-safe route is so involved that I need to consider where I am in terms of up/down in addition to the usual (and may I add sane and normal) side-to-side and back/forth directions.  I went up and down a total of five levels before I ended up moving on the right streets to get me to the right place where I could go back down another street level to the bikepath by the lake.  Also, none of this is designated on the $%*#ing bike path maps.  This is stupid.