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| New Reader in a non Toll Lane on LBJ 635 |
My mother 's life's lessons still come back to haunt me at times. Not once, was she wrong.
She was the master of asking the question that forced you to tell her the truth! Over the years, she taught me as my grandfather had taught her. That's the way knowledge is best passed on from generation to generation. It's not so much that the information needs to be updated but more that the generations need to know the processes where our ancestors learned. The points and facts that make the difference.
One example of that very process came into play just a few days ago. One day on my way home for a doctor's appointment, I noticed one of the new license plate cameras mounted on a light pole in one of the intersections that I pass through routinely. That got me to thinking using the formula that mother had passed down. The next time I went to the grocery store, or drugstore, the post office or the gas station, I started to watch for the cameras. They began to appear frequently in my travels.
After a couple of months, parts of the puzzle began to fit together. One of the facts from mother's teachings was observation. From that, it taught one to look for the things that appear to be normal and fit in, but really are quiet the opposite. They are designed to trick and mislead and draw away suspicions from the real purpose. Hunters use those same tricks in a deer blind.
One day on a trip to the plastic surgeon to have some small stitches removed, it occurred to me that I could make a game out of this and I tried to get home without being in the reader of one of those cameras. That is when the link begin to fall into place. There were other cameras, as we all know, but they were not part of this equation. The test was only involving the new black and white cameras on the poles.
Sure enough. Now, with the information that if I stayed on the one street, I would pass by three cameras. So, I decided to cut down another street that came around to the street where I would turn ahead several miles down the road. Ahead at the next major intersection was yet, another camera. and ahead of that was yet another and after a turn, to complete the box pattern, was yet another.
The findings were alarming. It showed me that a report was generated that if after going past the first camera I turned, it could pin-point that I stopped at a drugstore for a period of x number of minutes although it would not show which store in particular I had visited. In other words, it could physically track movement between points A,B,C and D even if I went down another street.
That every evening, on the news, the police were seeking more cameras. If should be noted that the word "camera" takes on the meaning also of the license plate readers. There are two distinct, but similar devices. But who pays attention to detail anyway. We are busy with living life and little things like that are insignificant. Of course, that is the point here.
That point was driven home even more as I have begun to notice the "toll tag" readers going up on 635LBJ. Well sure! LBJ is going to have toll lanes in the HOV lanes. Ah! asleep at the wheel again.
These readers are not in the toll lanes. That's right. NOT in the toll lanes. Things begin to appear in places where they should not be, or if they were there in a "shouldn't be" place, what is their real purpose then? That was another one of mom's lessons. Ask questions. Ask lots of questions.
So on Wednesday, I got a chance to ask a lots of questions to a TX DOT official on the Q-T. At first, he didn't want to answer some of the questions. Then, as time went on, he began to be more down-to-earth and honest about some of the things happening without being tagged as the one who spilled the beans.
He began by saying that people in Dallas are asleep behind the wheel. Then, he would point out an example of what he meant as traffic whisked by. Then, he made reference to the fact that it was now to late to do anything and again cite an example of what he meant. Mostly, about a project being about the almighty buck. Example was that the tolls were being collected for 50 odd years by a foreign company or a sub-contract hired to collect the money. The HOV lanes as toll lanes were just an excuse to get the other things done.
And finally, when talking about noticing things that are out of place or don't really fit in with the overall scheme of things as intended, he made the most crucial statement of all. He made the reference that now was the time to put in the things that don't belong there (those not really intended for the purpose of traffic engineering functions) because people see the construction going on and just assume that everything is part of the project. "People, I tell you, are asleep at the wheel and when they wake up they are going to be asking the question, 'how did that get there?' or when was that ordinance passed?'
By then, it's way to late to do anything. I agree with him. I've seen the "out of place" things going in. I thanked him for his candor and thought about this awhile. It is to late already, I thought.
So, the next time I go to the polls if you are an incumbent, you won't be getting my vote. Now, we just need millions more to have the guts to do that.
The bottom line is people are asleep at the wheel. Technology isn't always used to "keep you safe" as lawmakers do their work of telling you that it is for your safety.
Updated 05 July 2017. Additions, corrections,
