Today we interrupt our regularly scheduled program of publicly flogging bike riders and various elected officials for a brief rumination on Sacramento's strange attitude toward traffic laws and … trees.

First, the traffic laws: For the past few weeks, I have been keeping track of the number of times I witness what I'd consider to be serious violations of traffic laws during my brief commute from home to office and back.

I'm not talking about minor things like failing to signal when making turns. I'm talking about things like running red lights, blowing through stop signs without even slowing down, gunning into left turns in front of oncoming traffic as soon as the light turns green.

In about a month of keeping track, not a day has passed without someone running a light or a stop sign or careening into a left turn in front of an oncoming car (usually the one driven by me).

Not having lived anywhere else for more than seven years, I can't say that Sacramento drivers are worse than drivers in other cities these days. But I do know that when I have driven in other cities in recent years, I haven't felt the same sense of imminent disaster that enlivens my daily jaunts to and from work.

Of course, this may not be all the fault of Sacramento drivers. Some of them may be victims of this town's odd relationship with trees.

Now before any tree lovers get all lathered up, let me make it clear that I, too, like trees. I especially value the one in my front yard, which does a splendid job of shading our house from the summer sun.

I'm all for the efforts of the Tree Foundation and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District to get more trees planted. I nod in approval anytime I see someone watering a tree. I've helped plant a couple more trees in our very small lot.

What I don't get, though, is the local reluctance to trim trees – particularly trees whose branches hang down in front of traffic lights and stop signs, obscuring them from view and creating traffic hazards.

I encounter at least three such situations every day on the short commute from my office to my home. And sure enough, those intersections are among the ones where I regularly witness drivers blithely sailing through without a care in the world. (This may indicate they have better insurance than I do.)

By now I know where these hazards are, so I approach these intersections on full alert, vigilant for others who travel those streets less regularly and are less apt to be aware of these collisions in waiting.

The whole thing baffles me. It's not as if trimming trees so that they don't obscure traffic signals would hurt the trees. In other places, local governments trim trees to keep traffic signs visible. In those places, people regard regular trimming as part of keeping trees healthy. Here, it seems to be regarded as an act of cruelty.

I don't know. Perhaps others hear the cries of anguish that ensue when a tree is trimmed. Maybe I'm just callous and insensitive to this suffering, out of tune with the voice of nature.

Ah, well, nobody's perfect. Meanwhile, I'm making a list of intersections where public safety would benefit from a good tree trimming. If you have one to add to the list, e-mail it to me. I'll check them out and in a future column offer a list of our town's most dangerous trees.

And if the result is an orgy of tree-trimming – well, I say let the limbs fall where they may. I won't hear anything except the whine of chain saws and the thud of big branches hitting the ground, which will be music to my paranoid ears.