Downtown Columbus’ most dangerous intersection

“Be careful. That’s a dangerous road.” That’s what somebody said to me this week before I took Ga. 96 to Macon.

But that highway doesn’t feel dangerous to me, outside of losing money after I drive into a speed trap in Butler. Or falling asleep and crashing into a solar farm.

In fact, I’m much more wary of driving in downtown Columbus.

On Thursday, after working out at the YMCA, I was heading to pick up my youngest son from a trumpet lesson at the Schwob School of Music.

As I drove south on First Avenue, I got a go-ahead from the green light at 13^th Street to proceed through the intersection.

At the time, I’d forgotten that my wife and I were nearly killed at that intersection on a Friday night several years ago when a motorist coming from the other direction took a left-hand turn right in front of us.

I figured it was a drunk driver, which might have been the case. But it really is a confusing intersection.

Along First Avenue, you’ve got two lanes of traffic going in each direction, divided by a wide and leafy median, and each side has diagonal parking against the median and parallel parking against the sidewalk.

If you’re taking a left-hand turn from First onto 13^th Street, you’ve got a lot of real estate to navigate in the middle of that intersection. You might not see the cars coming down First on the other side of the median.

And then you might get confused when you see the red light out of the corner of your eye.

I realized all this on Thursday night. Like I said, I was proceeding through the green light in my mid-sized sedan, when a gigantic Dodge Ram pickup blocked the road in front of me and stopped.

The woman driving the truck was making a left-hand turn and either did not see me coming or did see me coming and decided to shoot the gap.

But then she slammed on brakes in the middle of the intersection, probably because she saw the red light on 13^th Street. You’re not supposed to stop at that red light when you’re making a left-hand turn, unless you’re about to kill somebody.

I’m not sure if her stopping put me in more danger or less, but either way we were going to collide, and my car and I were going to come out far worse than she and her big Dodge Ram.

But then something amazing happened. Without thinking, I slammed on brakes and cut my wheels to the right, skidding toward her for what seemed like an hour, and in the process parallel-parking my car right next to her truck. Maybe an inch separated us.

She sped off and over the bridge into Alabama, where as a 12-year-old I’d honed my skills driving old cars on dirt roads.

One motorist passing in front of me gave a quick salute to acknowledge my accidentally brilliant driving. It was the most athletic move of my life, if you consider auto racing to be a sport, which now I do.

Anyway, First and 13^th is a dangerous intersection, and based on my experience I’d say the most dangerous one downtown, though the one at First and 11^th Avenue is pretty bad too, because lots of people heading up First run that light.

I have this advice to everybody who drives downtown, including myself: Slow down and take your time. A lot of people are walking around or backing out of a parking space or slamming on brakes when an open one suddenly appears.

And don’t run traffic lights, even ones that just turned red nanoseconds earlier.

Oh, and before you drive downtown, tell the people you love that you love them.

This story was originally published April 27, 2018 at 2:35 PM with the headline "Downtown Columbus’ most dangerous intersection."