Modern Marvels

I believe that I have stated in the past that Trinidad driving is something a little different from other places.  You need nerves of steel and have to have a lightening quick reaction time to avoid potholes as wide and as deep as your tires or to avoid cars swerving into your lane to avoid potholes in their lane.  And on top of that, many of these cars are driving at excessive speeds.

With all of this also comes an incredible amount of traffic and congestion in the streets.  The rules of the road are really just guidelines.  Cars will cross into the oncoming lane, in traffic, to park on the wrong side of the street because they see a parking spot.  On streets where there is a steady flow of traffic and cars are driving along at 50 km per hour, someone will come to a complete halt, nearly causing a pileup, so another car can cross the street, even though there will be a break in traffic in a matter of seconds.

While I'm becoming adjusted to it, and just accept that this is the way that it is, there are still times when you get completely frustrated and there are times when you have to take a look at around and realize what is going on.

On May 1st, Trinidad completed what I believe is the first flyover in the country.  For folks in the states, a flyover is basically an overpass on the highway.  There is one point going from Port of Spain to San Fernando, a city south of POS, where there is always backed up traffic.  To alleviate the problem, the government started building the flyover.  I believe that it took 5-7 years to build (I have not confirmed that timeframe), but do know that it was extremely over budget and 2 years past the initial deadline.

Here is a picture of this incredible feat of modern engineering, taken from a video that I found on YouTube of someone driving on it.  That's how big a deal this is.

So some friends and I were going to a hash near Chaguanas, which is between POS and San Fernando, and we had the pleasure of driving on this new modern marvel for Trinidad.  We approached the flyover and expected to continue to zip along to our destination.  However, once we actually got on the flyover, the traffic came to a screeching halt.  

What caused this?  Well, along the shoulder, there were a string of cars pulled over with everyone out taking pictures.  And then we saw the flashing lights.  We approached a police car, which was also pulled off on the shoulder and a big black, tinted SUV stopped in the left lane.  We were all diverted into the right lane and as we passed, we saw that the police were also standing on the shoulder looking around at the view, and the SUV had a police light on the top of it, with no one in it.  

So in a nutshell, this great innovation of traffic flow was stopped so people could take pictures, including some police officers, who couldn't be bothered to pull onto the shoulder, but instead decided to park in the middle of a lane on a highway.  Only in Trinidad...