Drawbridges and Other Dead Ends

Even a runner's best laid plans run afoul when confronted with the unexpected dead end.

Faulty map, perhaps. Or road closed for construction; follow the detour. Or new construction — building going up where street once was. Maybe street festival with annoying fence presence. Pack of gang members waiting for trouble; find your own detour. Mean junkyard dog with chain too long or too loose for comfort. Train crossing. Traffic accident involving tractor trailer. Traffic accident involving raging inferno. Six-foot trench. Twelve-foot trench. Marshland where dry path should be. Neverending stream of school children walking hand-in-hand to the playground.

Or you simply got lost. You found yourself staring at a classic dead end. You ain't going nowhere.

But the most impassable of obstacles would have to be the broken drawbridge. The open drawbridge is bad enough, but it comes down eventually. Wait, then resume forward motion.

The broken drawbridge is a puzzling frustration. Why couldn't it have broken in the down position? The other side — it seems so close and yet so ... far ... away.

I hadn't run into this problem until recently, when I plotted a wonderful loop through the east side of New Haven only to find that the Ferry Street bridge was being repaired and out of commission, its twin platforms aiming toward the sky above the Quinnipiac River, like a magic trick performed by a magician who forgot how to break the spell once the trick was over.

"Any way of getting through?" I asked the construction workers who were heading home for the day.

"Not unless you got rockets in those shoes," one of them said. He seemed grateful I had set him up so well. It was a good line. Certainly true.

"Not quite," I said, feeling somewhat sluggish that day.

So instead, I followed the riverfront upstream to the next crossing and turned east again.