TX DPS

Recently I had to renew my Driver's License.  Oh god, everyone's nightmare, going to the DMV, or, in this case, the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Amazingly enough, Texas has done this one right.  Every now and then you run across actual efficient state and local bureaucracies.  It's rare, but it can happen, even in Texas.  Just because every statewide office in Texas is held by Republican yahoos, they have not fucked up every single facet of the state.  Yet.

In the Houston area, we have a lot of drivers.  Duh.  And so there is a need for several different DPS offices across the city.  After all, this city measures about 50 miles north-south and 50 miles east-west.

Some of the DPS offices are known as "Mega-Centers."  They are really large offices and they allow the user to "get in line online."  You can only get in line online at a Mega-Center, not at the other podunk offices.

So at about noon, after I had lunch, I registered online at the South Gessner Mega-Center.  Sure enough, almost immediately, I got a text on my mobile phone saying that I was "in line" and the wait would be about 30 minutes.  

I left the house and headed for the Mega-Center.  

When I was almost there, I got another text saying my wait was now 10 minutes.  

I walked into the Mega-Center and took a seat.  There must have been 100 other people in the same waiting room.   Some of them were sprawled over a couple of chairs, obviously exhausted and trying to catch a nap.  Others looks bored as hell like they'd been there all day.

One of the features of this system is that you can press "S" on your phone to get a Status update for the queue.  I pressed "S" and got a response that I was "next in line".

Within about 10 seconds, I hear an announcement on the loudspeaker calling my cell # and to proceed to booth 31.  

I was sitting in the seat for about 30 seconds before I was called.  Now THAT is efficient.  As I walked to the booth, I glanced over the hapless crowd.  A couple of them had a look on their face like, "Hey, you just GOT here, and they're already calling you up!"  Yeah, suck it, fools!

I was in and out of that Mega-Center in less than 5 minutes.  So the next time you need to go to your local DMV, look over the website and see if you can "get in line online."  It sure takes the sting out of going to the DMV.