What’s a great city without traffic? We have plenty. But traffic is part of a city’s poetry. People love to see traffic in their views. And if their city’s traffic is the worst, they like to brag about that, too.
I once worked in a building with a spectacular Lake Michigan view, and an amazingly intimate view of Lake Shore Drive. When the weather was bad, people would gather at the windows to see the storm coming. Their attention would invariably shift, though, to the remarkable traffic snarl building on the Drive. The drama of bad traffic is one with which we all identify.
I have mixed feelings when driving back home from the countryside. I feel pride when I see the skyline, repulsion at the ugliness lying at its skirts. The city is an intensification of everything: human problems, human glories. The closeness without closeness makes for stressful living.
This picture has been texturized with a grain effect.
