No place to turn around in Chicago

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Updated Apr 22, 2013

Editor’s note: This story submission earned Wesley Mikel second place in Overdrive‘s GPS contest giveaway in December 2012. Entrants were asked to describe their worst experience getting lost or finding directions on a haul. Overdrive editors ranked their favorites.

ChicagoI was delivering a load in downtown Chicago for a morning delivery. The delivery route I took into downtown had a lot of 13-foot-6-inch bridges, but I was able to pass under all of them safely. I got to my delivery address and got unloaded.

As I was leaving, I noticed that there was a 13-foot bridge sign where I was supposed to turn to get onto the freeway. Where that bridge was was the same way I came in but since the sign said 13 feet I wondered if maybe the bridge was lower on this side since the bridge looked like it angled down. Since I was blocking traffic I decided to not make the turn and go through the light and pull over in a wide spot. I called my company, and they tried to help me find another route to the freeway using their computer mapping software.

Well, they just made things worse and got me stuck on a restricted truck road with no way to turn around. So I pulled over and decided to call Chicago’s street and signs department to see if they could help. They informed me that the 13-foot sign where I was supposed to turn was supposed to be a 13-foot-6-inch sign and had I turned there I would’ve been able to pass under the bridge.

That info would’ve been helpful earlier, but now I can’t turn around to go back to that street. So they end up giving me directions to Lake Shore Drive and to go to another street to turn around. Well, I end up on a two-lane street with cars parked on both sides stuck at an 11-foot-6-inch bridge and no way to turn around and blocking traffic. I end up sitting there for four hours trying to find a way to turn around. Since no one could help me I ended up having to call the police. The police officer arrived about 30 minutes later and advised me I was on a restricted truck route. Lol, how could things possibly get any worse?

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Well, they did. The officer decided to block the traffic so I could U-turn in the middle of this small intersection. I ended up having to drive onto the sidewalk and try to make a U-turn. I had to back up so I could get around a light pole with the front end of my truck. As the officer waved me back I backed into another light pole across the street with my trailer knocking it over. At this point, I was tired, frustrated, the officer was yelling at me and cars were honking and yelling at me. The police were so frustrated he told me to just get out of there and leave. So after almost six hours I got back to the freeway.

This was my worst experience getting lost. The only good thing that came out of this is that the police felt so sorry for me that I ended up not getting any tickets.

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