El tráfico

Mexico city has a population hovering somewhere around 18M people. Bigger than New York. Bigger than Mumbai. Bigger than pretty much anywhere except Tokyo, depending on which definition of size one uses. All things considered, Mexico does a surprisingly good job of dealing with that volume. It's subway system handles over 7M people a day, and costs only 3 pesos a ride -- about 25 cents. But, when you have 18M people all trying to move somewhere at the same time, not even the most well planned system of roads can keep traffic moving smoothly.

It turns out that, in DF*, everyone decides to move at the same time right around 6:00 PM on Friday the 15th. Of course, you're probably thinking. Everyone is anxious to leave work and get home. No no. That would be all too simple. It turns out that Friday the 15th is payday in Mexico... all of Mexico. And it turns out that on payday, Mexico... all of Mexico, heads into the city to spend as much money as possible getting drunk.

Not knowing this, I thought Friday would be a good time to head to Teotihuacan, one of the oldest and largest complex of pyramids in Mexico City. The pyramids were incredible. The bus ride back, almost three hours. The volume of traffic, impossible to describe.

In fairness, only part of the congestion can be blamed on value. The other culprit is driving style. In Mexico City, there are plenty of traffic signals, clearly demarcated lanes, stops signs and directional information aplenty. But none of this really seems to matter. Stops signs are more gentle suggestions than they are a requirement. Turning right from the left hand line, or left from the right hand lane, seems to be a perfectly acceptable mode of driving. So, our bus driver had no issue cutting off three lanes of traffic to try to shift a bit to the right. And the truck we passed (lord knows why a truck thought Friday night was a good time to move through the city). Of course, the upside to traffic being frequently frozen completely is that jumping out of the bus in the middle of the street was made much easier--our driver didn't even bat an eye when my friend Dan and I requested to get out once I figured out where in the city we were. And being Friday night, having just sat in a bus for three hours, waiting for the traffic to fade provided a wonderful excuse for going to a bar and learning about Micheladas.


*DF = Distrito Federal = Mexico City