carwreck.com: around Boston harbor...

While driving home though the Sumner Tunnel this evening I was listening to 88.9 WERS, Emerson College's FM radio station. When I entered the tunnel I expected to lose the signal, but what I didn't expect was a new signal to take over.

Now we all heard about how the US military was able to take over every radio station and every TV station on the dial over in Iraq for the purpose of 'educating' the Iraqi people about the war. But are we doing the same thing here?

The new signal was barely understandable and all I caught was something about the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and something about using the left lane or the right lane. The announcement was obviously an attempt to educate drivers about what they were to expect at the end of the tunnel, what with a whole new traffic pattern going on.

Nonetheless, this was a strange experience.

I could hear the message on both 88.9 (WERS) and 88.1 (MIT's radio station) both of which are presets on my radio. I couldn't receive the message on any other frequencies.

This is actually quite common for major tunnels and underground roadways. They've been doing that for all the tunnels in Hong Kong for as long as I can remember. They have signs at the entrance of the tunnel asking drivers to turn on their radio to a certain frequency for the tunnel traffic info. But then they only really use it when there's a break down or a lane closure.