Rules of Houston

[RetArmySgt]

Rules of Houston, H-Town, 3rd Coast, Bayou or whatever you wanna call it.

• You must learn to pronounce the city name. It is "Hue-stun," not "Ewe-stun", or "house-tun" Oh yea, the street is pronounced "San Phil-ee -pay, "not" San Phil-eep"(San Felipe). Enunciate, you idiots!
• Forget the traffic rules you learned elsewhere. Houston has its own version of traffic rules...Hold on and pray. There is no such thing as a dangerous high-speed chase in Houston. We all drive like that.
• All directions start with, "Go down to Loop 610"... which has no beginning and no end.
• The Chamber of Commerce calls getting through traffic... a "Scenic Drive."
• The morning rush hour is from 6:00AM to 10:00AM. The evening rush hour is from 3: 00PM to 7:00PM. Friday's rush hour starts Thursday morning.
• If you actually stop at a yellow light, you will be rear-ended, cussed out and possibly shot. When you are the first one off the starting line, count to five when the light turns green before going, to avoid getting into any cross-traffic's way.
• Kuykendahl Road can ONLY be pronounced by a native Houstonian.
• Construction on I-10, I-45, US 59 and Loop 610 is a way of life and a permanent form of entertainment.
• All unexplained smells are explained by the phrases, "Oh, we must be in Pasadena!" or "God, I hate Baytown!" or "Mmm, smell that Texas City!"
• If someone actually has their turn signal on, it is probably a factory defect.
• All old ladies with blue hair in a pink Cadillac have total right-of-way.
• The minimum acceptable speed on Loop 610 is 85 mph. Anything less is considered downright sissy. In turn, the minimum speed on Westheimer is at least 45mph...
• The wrought iron on windows in east Houston is NOT ornamental.
• Never stare at the driver of the car with the bumper sticker that says, "Keep honking, I'm reloading." In fact, don't honk at anyone. IT'S LEGAL TO CARRY GUNS HERE!!!
• If you are in the left lane, and only going 70 mph in a 60 mph zone, people are not waving when they go by.
• The Sam Houston Toll road is our daily version of NASCAR.
• If it's 100 degrees, Thanksgiving must be next weekend.
• When in doubt, remember that all unmarked exits lead to Louisiana.
• If you live in Katy and I live on the south side of Houston we'll never hang out.
• The best thing about being drunk between 2-5 am is Whataburger will serve both breakfast and normal menus.
• You are always able to be pulled over by any police vehicle, even if you were just given a ticket.
• You don't have to wait for an exit to get off a freeway, just follow the ruts in the grass to the feeder like everyone else. This is how Houston residents notify Texas Department of Transportation where exits should have been built.
• Else-where, they are called frontage roads... Here in Houston, they are called FEEDER roads, so don't look stupid when we say "Exit the feeder road and use the loop-d-loop"

 

[Dcav]

Too funny.

 

[outdare]

It is way funny and true as well. I have learned the 635 swerve works here in Houston with great effect.

 

[e4for2]

635 swerve-is that where you exit right from the far left hand lane ?

 

[cowboy45]

Rules of Houston, H-Town, 3rd Coast, Bayou or whatever you wanna call it.

• You must learn to pronounce the city name. It is "Hue-stun," not "Ewe-stun", or "house-tun" Oh yea, the street is pronounced "San Phil-ee -pay, "not" San Phil-eep"(San Felipe). Enunciate, you idiots!
• Forget the traffic rules you learned elsewhere. Houston has its own version of traffic rules...Hold on and pray. There is no such thing as a dangerous high-speed chase in Houston. We all drive like that.
• All directions start with, "Go down to Loop 610"... which has no beginning and no end.
• The Chamber of Commerce calls getting through traffic... a "Scenic Drive."
• The morning rush hour is from 6:00AM to 10:00AM. The evening rush hour is from 3: 00PM to 7:00PM. Friday's rush hour starts Thursday morning.
• If you actually stop at a yellow light, you will be rear-ended, cussed out and possibly shot. When you are the first one off the starting line, count to five when the light turns green before going, to avoid getting into any cross-traffic's way.
• Kuykendahl Road can ONLY be pronounced by a native Houstonian.
• Construction on I-10, I-45, US 59 and Loop 610 is a way of life and a permanent form of entertainment.
• All unexplained smells are explained by the phrases, "Oh, we must be in Pasadena!" or "God, I hate Baytown!" or "Mmm, smell that Texas City!"
• If someone actually has their turn signal on, it is probably a factory defect.
• All old ladies with blue hair in a pink Cadillac have total right-of-way.
• The minimum acceptable speed on Loop 610 is 85 mph. Anything less is considered downright sissy. In turn, the minimum speed on Westheimer is at least 45mph...
• The wrought iron on windows in east Houston is NOT ornamental.
• Never stare at the driver of the car with the bumper sticker that says, "Keep honking, I'm reloading." In fact, don't honk at anyone. IT'S LEGAL TO CARRY GUNS HERE!!!
• If you are in the left lane, and only going 70 mph in a 60 mph zone, people are not waving when they go by.
• The Sam Houston Toll road is our daily version of NASCAR.
• If it's 100 degrees, Thanksgiving must be next weekend.
• When in doubt, remember that all unmarked exits lead to Louisiana.
• If you live in Katy and I live on the south side of Houston we'll never hang out.
• The best thing about being drunk between 2-5 am is Whataburger will serve both breakfast and normal menus.
• You are always able to be pulled over by any police vehicle, even if you were just given a ticket.
• You don't have to wait for an exit to get off a freeway, just follow the ruts in the grass to the feeder like everyone else. This is how Houston residents notify Texas Department of Transportation where exits should have been built.
• Else-where, they are called frontage roads... Here in Houston, they are called FEEDER roads, so don't look stupid when we say "Exit the feeder road and use the loop-d-loop"

I recently spent 10 yrs in Houston as a sales rep that would put me on the road all day. You are spot on with your observation. The only thing missing is the eperiences in the toll booths.

My favorite is when they throw the change at the basket and it bounces back. Get out of the car and crawl under it to pick up the coins. Pull up to the basket , park and walk across 3 lanes to the booth to get change. Throw a dollar bill in the basket and wonder why the gate wont open. Get frustrated and just drive through the arm. Trust me, I have seen it all.

 

[Waterguy]

Ya know, if I hadn't done or do most of that, it wouldn't be as funny as it was.

 

[rsayloriii]

 

[Texasjack]

Pick on Houston streets all you want. Then try driving through Dallas-Ft. Worth. Whoever laid out those roads must have been doing a LOT of LSD - before, during, and after construction. Best just to go with the flow and then correct your course after you're out of town.

It used to be that Austin was pretty decent to drive through, but I do believe their traffic is worse than Houston. It takes too long for those Birkenstock wearers to agree on where to pour concrete so it won't hurt a cockroach or spider.

 

[Wolfwood]

and that is why i live in New Braunfels. people still get really pissed if you dont use your blinker.

 

[jtriron]

I concur with RetArmySgt, lived in H-town all my life.
Recently had to go to Baton Rouge La. on a job-- Talk about screwed up streets and directions. The street names change every 3 or so blocks, and don't get lost on the LSU campus you may never be heard of again.

 

[kurt]

It used to be that Austin was pretty decent to drive through, but I do believe their traffic is worse than Houston. It takes too long for those Birkenstock wearers to agree on where to pour concrete so it won't hurt a cockroach or spider.

That's because the answer is "nowhere". They are convinced if they just resist more roads, everyone will ride their bike and stop global warming. We're actually losing lanes on secondary roads to bike lanes.

 

[outdare]

635 swerve-is that where you exit right from the far left hand lane ?

No actually it is when the other person swerves at you to get you to tap the brakes so they can get in front of you. I saw this regularly when I drove from FTW to Plano for a yr on 635 back in 99.

 

[Vance]

I still remember the day I moved down here.

We had made it through Houston via I-45 and had just passed Almeda Mall when I noticed the next street sign " Fuqua ". I immediately fired up the CB radio and called my dad, who was in the lead vehicle,

" Hey dad... How do you say that next street ? " I asked, as my in my head I was thinking .. cool a street that flips you off !

He laughed and quickly said " Foo - Quay "

 

[AcidFlashGordon]

• You don't have to wait for an exit to get off a freeway, just follow the ruts in the grass to the feeder like everyone else. This is how Houston residents notify Texas Department of Transportation where exits should have been built.

Now that's something I can get behind. Stupid DOT designers have no idea of where people actually want to go.

 

[Vance]

Now that's something I can get behind. Stupid DOT designers have no idea of where people actually want to go.

Sadly, you get caught showing TXDoT their poor planning, and you'll get something like a $500.00 reminder that they think they know better.

 

[Jaywendland1981]

Maybe I'm biased because I've been here all my life, but houstons freeways and highways really aren't that bad. The wife and I recently took a trip to corpus and mcallen/brownsville. Holy shit the freeways are jacked down there! Even our GPS was lost half the time, its like a 4 year old drew up the plans for the freeways.

 

[SIG_Fiend]

I think, relative to it's size versus traffic ratio, Austin could give Houston a run for it's money. In Austin, morning rush hour starts at 6am to 11pm. Lunch rush hour (yes there is one of those here) starts at 12-2:30pm. Evening rush hour starts at 3:30-8:30pm. Overnight road construction and being parked on the highway starts at 10pm and sometimes goes all the way to 5am. In Austin, at completely random oddball times you would never expect, you WILL be parked on the highway, so hopefully your radiator, A/C, and radio are in good working condition.

 

[robin303]

I had to go to Beaumont from Ft. Hood one day in a Mil truck and it had cruise control set on 60 and when I got past Katy I had to do almost 80 to just to keep up.

 

[Greg_TX]

One interesting thing about Houston is that you hardly ever hear people honk at each other. Maybe I just don't drive in the right places, but it sure isn't like it is in other parts of the US where they probably have to replace the steering wheel as part of regular maintenance. Maybe we just see so much stupid stuff that we figure there's not much point in honking about it.

 

[Jemplayer]

At least in Houston people know how to drive and keep the flow of traffic moving even with all the construction. Austin just turns into a parking lot and we have no where near the construction Houston does.

I refuse to go out In Austin before 9am and between 3:30 and 6:00. You do learn how to get on to the feeder roads three exists before your actual exit though because its faster. And don't get me started on MOPAC. Although I do love it when you get an out of towner ask where it is, especially when they just got off it.