Weird local traditions.

[Dinner]

Every year in July people in Southern California celebrate a weird local tradition called "Mooning Amtrak Day" where up to 10,000 people all line up and then drop their trousers "mooning" the Amtrak passenger train as it goes by.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/us_and_canada/10588850.stm

What are some of the weird local traditions from where you live?

[Al B. Sure!]

Interesting... when our transit workers go on strike, they moon people as well.

[Al B. Sure!]

If we're talking weird local traditions, no city on the planet has anything that compares to the... Mummers!

















I needed that many pictures just to give you all SOME idea of the madness and horror.

[Al B. Sure!]

Another weird one is that they don't play the star spangled banner at Flyers games. God Bless America is played instead for some reason.

[Al B. Sure!]

I always assumed this was done everywhere, but people from other cities say this is just a Philly thing:




I made an example from google maps...



I think people park like this elsewhere outside of Philly though.

[SlowwHand]

Not without being towed.

Does anything beat the running of the bulls?
.

[DRoseDARs]

I always assumed this was done everywhere, but people from other cities say this is just a Philly thing:




I made an example from google maps...



I think people park like this elsewhere outside of Philly though.

That's not so much a tradition as just parking illegally (and damned unsafely in the first pic ). Second one looks to be a center lane. Not a travel lane so probably not kosher to use as parking either. This all assumes Philly isn't completely on crack and condones a clearly unsafe practice.

[Al B. Sure!]

I'd be shocked if anyone gets ticketed for either of that. It's standard practice here. Hence why I could find it so easily on google maps. It's funny if you go along Broad Street on google maps in street view, you'd see this for blocks and blocks!

I got this from a forumer on city-data.com:

It's not legal. In Philadelphia there is the law, then there's 'the way we do things here'. The latter usually trumps the former. That's especially so in South Philly.

The last police captain who told his officers to ticket people parking in the median was reassigned the following week. You don't eff with the parking supply in South Philly.

[DRoseDARs]

From what I'm reading so far about it is it looks like something that Philly authorities have long turned a blind eye to for the sake of alleviating some insufficient parking space problems.

[Al B. Sure!]

so local tradition

[Dauphin]

I always assumed this was done everywhere, but people from other cities say this is just a Philly thing:

I've seen some places in Birmingham (England) that have converted central reservations into parking spaces. It's not common though.

[Provost Harrison]

But in that case it is designated and not ad hoc. There is this in Hull too on one street but it is pay and display parking...let me see if I can find a picture...

Here we go...Baker Street in Hull...

[Al B. Sure!]

In Jersey, it's illegal to pump your own gas. How's that for a weird tradition?

[Dinner]

Same with Oregon. They think it is a measure to create jobs but really it just creates economic inefficiency.

[MOBIUS]

But in that case it is designated and not ad hoc. There is this in Hull too on one street but it is pay and display parking...let me see if I can find a picture...

Here we go...Baker Street in Hull...

So basically people who live in **** cities can park in the middle of the road.

At least in Hull they make money out of it!