An amusing new game in Fort Collins is to remember to avoid the right lane of College Avenue as you head north and near the university.

City codes in all their wisdom allowed a Starbucks and a Raising Cane to have a drive thru entrance right off College Avenue.

It is a disaster. Really dangerous, really irritating, really a mistake that was avoidable.

Raising Cane sells chicken, lots and lots of chicken, and the virus has made the drive thru even more of a mob scene. After another day of either getting caught in a right lane backup from people waiting to get off College and into the snaking drive thru line, we actually decided to make an off hour sneak attack and buy this gold. It was good chicken but we won’t be joining the conga line and wait for a car to rear end us as we wait to buy.

A little further north is the Starbucks. Fortunately the Starbucks usually backs up traffic in the morning before Cane gets bad at lunch and dinner. There is sometimes a one/two backup punch that is particularly messy.

It still should never have been approved.

Fort Collins won a Willy Wonka magic ticket and got an In and Out Burger franchise that is on the way. As best as I can tell, it is going………….yes, you got it, in the same stretch of College Avenue on the same side of the road.

Perhaps they’ll have some kind of delayed lineup that actually gets you on the property and off the street. In and Out is typically smart enough to do something like that, unlike the city.

In a place where city planners try to wish away cars by approving housing developments with little or no parking, maybe the theory on approving these fast food obstacles on College is that we will grow so frustrated we will ride bikes, walk or carry them back to the Max line.

It has about as much chance at succeeding as driving in the right lane up College without running into fast food roadblocks.