Ahead is one of the bottlenecks though, from your position back in a long line of cars, it’s hard to see what the holdup is all about. What you know is that the slick road rides up to an intersection with a traffic light at the top of a hill. Forty minutes later, as you approach the launching point at the bottom of the hill, you realize that a car failed to make it up the hill on the right thereby reducing traffic to one lane headed west.
The trick is to get up some speed before you hit the upgrade. Then keep going. If you let off the gas pedal, you could lose your momentum. If you give it too much gas, your tires will spin and you’ll lose traction. In either case, you’ll probably join the driver stuck halfway up the hill in the right lane. The situation is so bad that only four cars are able to make it through when the traffic light is green.
Timing and control are critical. Your heartbeat races as you anticipate your turn as the last of the next four cars to go. Finally, it’s your turn. Thankfully, there is a slight depression in the road before you head up the hill. You use this to gather more speed and then you’re off.
At one point, your back end begins to slide to the right as the tires break loose just a little. You back off the gas and keep going. Now, you feel as though you’re losing momentum. Your foot presses down on the pedal a little more, but not too much.
In a moment, you’ll pass the stuck car on the right. As you approach, you realize its rear tires, with rear-wheel drive, are spinning in place. Then, just as you're about to pull even with the car, its door flies open and the driver steps out into your path.
You have no choice: you let off the gas and tap the brakes. That narrow window between giving your car too much gas and not enough is complicated dramatically by the random decision of the woman running across the street to the gas station on the left. Involuntarily, a four-letter word pops out of your mouth.
For a moment, you think you’re done; everyone waiting their turn at the bottom of the hill will discover that both lanes are now blocked. But, as the woman passes to your left, you struggle to hang onto a shred of hope and you increase the pressure on the gas pedal again. Maybe, just maybe, you can keep the car going.
The speedometer reads about 25 mph but that’s the speed your wheels are turning. In reality, you’re crawling up the hill at a break-neck speed of three or four miles per hour. Somehow, you manage to keep going.
Out of the corner of your eye, you can see the stranded car is empty. You also see that the rear-left tire is still spinning and you realize that the driver left the car in gear as she got out. The car isn't moving anymore than if she had parked it there but the tire keeps on spinning on the icy pavement.
The story above is true, and has probably happened more than once. Since her car wasn't moving, the driver apparently forgot that the car was in gear. Thankfully, it didn't move anymore without a driver than it did with a driver.
This is the kind of driving people in the Midwest are accustomed to in the winter. Hopefully, they don’t forget to put their cars in park when getting out but anyone who has ever driven in a Midwest winter storm knows how important every ounce of traction is on a night such as this.
There’s a good chance the stranded driver’s car had bald tires. The tires were probably not all-weather or winter types. The moral of the story is that good tires make a world of difference on a slippery road.
In the story above, the woman found herself stranded on a hill, unable to go up or down. But, tires such as those are as much of a problem, or more, when the car can move. In particular, they’re a problem when the driver wants to stop. If they can’t climb a hill, they’ll have a hard time stopping.
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