Paul Turner: The trick to Spokane winter driving

Spokane doesn’t have the hardest winters around.

Not the coldest. Not the snowiest.

That honor would go to, well, I suppose we all have our own nominees.

In any case, it ain’t us. So don’t cry for me, North Dakota.

But we do have some of the trickiest winter driving. There are several reasons for that.

If you are a newcomer to Spokane, you might want to pay attention here. The official start of winter is less than two weeks away. And it helps to know what you’re up against before that old North Wind begins to blow.

Spokane typically has an abundance of days when the temperature straddles freezing. During the daylight hours, it climbs above. Then late at night, it dips below.

After there has been even a little bit of snow on area roads, this can create conditions conducive to a treacherous thaw/refreeze cycle. Day after day.

Ask anyone who drives to work before the sun comes up. The streets might be fine at 8:55 a.m. Maybe just a little wet. But back at 6:15, they could have been slick as a freshly Zambonied hockey rink.

That’s just the way it is for much of the season in Spokane. It can make driving unpredictable at best.

Another local winter driving factor is our topography. Spokane has hills. Lots of hills.

You probably don’t need me to tell you what that implies when snow and ice are part of the picture. Let’s just say loss of traction and the ensuing feeling of utter helplessness can put the fear of Odin in you.

But perhaps the biggest risk factor when it comes to winter driving in Spokane is the overconfidence of other motorists.

It’s not that other drivers are jerks. Well, not all of them. It’s just that they typically have experienced the calming realization that most automobile outings end up OK – even in wintry conditions.

That’s why a lot of drivers go too fast and lose sight of a cardinal rule of winter driving: Just because road conditions have been OK so far doesn’t mean there isn’t a patch of black ice with your name on it up ahead.

(If I might digress for a moment. Quite a few years ago, a woman who was new to our area told me she had not encountered the expression “black ice” before moving here from a warmer climate. She said that, for a time, she thought locals were openly expressing concern about “black guys.”

As in, “Watch out for black guys on the road,” et cetera.

Such blatant racism made her sad. Can’t we all just get along? Then she finally realized what people were saying. And she was so happy and relieved.)

So anyway, getting back to winter driving. The thing about hitting the road with a false sense of security is, in addition to being imprudent, it deprives one of a special wintertime feeling. That is, the mild euphoria that comes with making it home unscathed after an outing on iffy street surfaces.

If you are pretty much oblivious to the risks of driving on ice and snow, you are apt to take the experience for granted. But if you approach winter driving in Spokane with a degree of trepidation, you might regard each successful arrival at your destination as cause for celebration.

My advice? Go ahead and be a little afraid. Then, when you make it to where you are going without a mishap, you can revel in your modest accomplishment.

Or you could take the bus.

Feedback

“Thanks for voicing so eloquently my own reasons for objecting to the use of ‘Washington state’ in your December 4 column,” wrote John Grabner.

“Now, do you think you can persuade The Spokesman-Review to abandon a similar stylistic barbarism, namely the persistent reference to ‘North Idaho’ as if it were a separate state, when ‘northern Idaho,’ as the editors of the Lewiston Tribune recognize, is clearly more accurate?

“One does not, after all, hear references to ‘North Washington,’ ‘North Oregon,’ ‘North Montana,’ ‘North Wyoming,’ or ‘North Nebraska,’ etc. ad infinitum, for reasons I think should be obvious.”

End note

My wife’s interest in team sports tends to be sporadic. But I’m wondering if I should alert her to a televised college basketball game today involving a local team and the school where she got her master’s degree – the University of Tennessee.

She never went to games when she was a student, though she remembers grousing about campus parking on football Saturdays. But we both enjoy the Volunteers’ bluegrass fight song, “Rocky Top.” So perhaps I’ll mention today’s game.