This came to me via a forward, but it was too funny not to post:
If you live in St Louis, you'll understand this. If you've ever visited St.
Louis you'll understand this. If you've never been to St. Louis, consider
this your Visitor's guide To Driving in St. Louis.
1. There are 75 "official neighborhoods" in the City of St. Louis. St.
Louisans commonly give directions (especially for restaurants) to strangers
based on these neighborhoods which aren't marked on any maps that are
handed out by the tourist board, the AAA or Mapquest.
2. There are 54 school districts -- on the Missouri side alone - each of
which has their own school bus system and scheduled times to block traffic.
3. There are 91 official municipalities in St. Louis County. Each
Municipality has its own rules, regulations, and often their own police
departments.
4. More importantly, most have their own snow removal contracts so it's not
uncommon to drive down a road in winter and have one block plowed, the next
salted, the next piled with snow and the last partially cleared by
residents wanting to get out of their driveways.
5. Snow plowing is never a problem in the City of St. Louis. They plow
nothing, and if the forecast calls for snow, they close everything. Except
on "The Hill" (refer to ..1 above) where each homeowner goes out to the
street and shovels out one car-sized rectangle and then stands watch over
it.
6. Any car parked longer than 4 hours in the city is considered a parts
store.
7. The City of Ballwin actually proposed that drivers use connecting strip
mall parking lots to get from place to place rather than drive on
Manchester road to cut the traffic on Manchester.
8. Laclede Station Road mysteriously changes names as you cross
intersections. As do McCausland, Lindbergh, Watson, Reavis Barracks, Fee
Fee, McKnight, Airport Road, Midland, Olive and Clarkson. Gravois Road can
only be pronounced by a native. Ditto for Spoede and Chouteau.
9. A St. Louisan from South County has never been to North County and vise
versa.. West County has everything delivered.
10. No native St. Louisan knows that Lindbergh runs from South County to
North County! And, if you tell them, they will not believe you.
11. Lindbergh belongs to every neighborhood except Kirkwood, who had the
nerve to creatively change the name to "Kirkwood Road."
12. There are 2 interchanges to exit from Highway 40 onto Clayton Road and
2 for Big Bend. Stay alert,people!
13. If you need directions to O'Fallon, make sure to specify Illinois or
Missouri. This is also true for Troy, Maryville, St. Charles,
Springfield,Columbia....
14. The Page Avenue extension and Airport expansion projects took over 20
years to get approved and St. Louisans lost track of how many political
figures claimed them as their own ideas.
15. St. Louisans were aghast when the federal government required them to
redo the highway signs
to indicate that the federal highways went to cities in other states
instead of local municipalities.
16. Drivers are starting to cut their OWN plates rather than go through the
Missouri Department of Motor Vehicles to get new tags. You can also
purchase tags from dealers behind QuiK Shops in the city. They are cheaper,
the clerks are nicer, and the service is faster.
17. Lambert Field and St. Louis International Airport really are the same
place. The East Terminal, however, is a different place.
18. Highway 270 is our daily version of the NASCAR circuit. (Same goes for
Highway 70.) You can go all four directions on Highway 270: North and South
in West County, East and West in South County, and East and West in North
County. Confused? So are the St. Louis drivers.
19. The outer belt is Highway 270 which turns into Highway 255 in South
County. The inner belt is Highway 170. Highway 370 is an outer-outer belt.
Highway 40 is the same as Interstate 64 (but only through the middle part
of St. Louis).
20. The morning rush hour is from 6:00 to 10:00 AM. The evening rush hour
is from 3:00 to 7:00 PM. Friday's rush hour starts Thursday morning. Never
ever try to cross a bridge in St. Louis during rush hour unless you have a
sack lunch and a port-a-potty in the car.
21. YIELD signs are for decoration only. No native St. Louisan will ever
grasp the concept.
22. If someone actually has their turn signal on, it is probably a factory
defect, or has been on for the last 17 miles.
23. Construction on Highways 40, 64, 70, 255, 270, 44, 55 and 170 is a way
of life, and a permanent form of entertainment.
24. All blue haired old ladies in Cadillacs (driving on Olive west of 270)
have the right of way.
25. If it snows or rains? Stay home!!
26. It is called a rolling stop at any stop sign intersection. Only native
St. Louisans can do it just right...
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1 comment:
I love it! So, so true! However, I have to be a language snob and take issue with #8. It is definitely *not* true that only native St. Louisans can pronounce Gravois, Spoede, and Chouteau (yes, I realize that #8 was probably tongue-in-cheek, and written by another cynical non-native). In fact, in my experience, it seems that only non-St. Louisans *can* pronounce these names (ditto for Carondelet, Des Peres, and multiple other proper names). My knowledge of German is limited, but I'm pretty sure "Spoede" is not pronounced "Spay-dee" (but I could be wrong on that one). However, the murder of the French names is disturbing, especially considering that the French were the first Europeans to settle St. Louis (right?). Gravois is most certainly not "Gra-voy", Chouteau is not "Sho-do", etc., etc. It's like no one even made a semi-intelligent attempt to pronounce the names correctly. And I thought we Deep Southerners were ignorant about our place name pronunciations! (Can anyone tell I absolutely *love* living in St. Louis, and the Midwest in general???):(
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