Woohoo. It’s about time they passed this law. Stay right on most interstates except to pass. I just hope they get those signs up and start giving tickets quickly and abundantly. No more “junior moding” on the road by people hanging out at the speed limit in the left lane, backing up traffic and making people mad, and causing accidents.
I must admit, although I have problems with cops in general, the CSP actually seems to want to make the roads better. Thanks Guys.
Hmmm… Interesting. I live in Denver and this is the first I have heard about this.
I theory it sounds awesome, but I wonder if what we will see instead is miles of cars in the right lane and no gaps to pass into, even if you wanted to.
Awesome for you guys. I can’t stand those guys, and junior-mod is the perfect name for the self-righteous, “Well I’m going the speed limit and that’s good enough”. The only problem is, enforcing this means more cops on the road, which means more speeding tickets, which means that clearing the left lane is effectively useless.
Like Rufus I have to report bad news. Pennsylvania has had a similar law for a couple of years now and it has done nothing to clear self-righteous pricks out of my - er - the left lane.
Even today, I was doing my normal commute in light traffic when I came up to a clump of cars. The cause? A LEO was driving in the middle of the 50-60 cars all doing the limit. The left lane cars (at least 15-20 cars) were afraid to pass the LEO so the left lane became clogged while the LEO did nothing. I passed on the right (3 lane highway turned into 4) and passed at ~10 km/h over the limit until I was out of visual range and then took off.
We even have “slower traffic keep right” signs and that doesn’t do shit. I do notice though that out of city drivers tend to keep right more often than city drivers.
Well, plenty of European countries have managed to survive just fine while knowing how to use a freeway properly, so if it doesn’t work here, then maybe we just have to reach some rather unflattering conclusions about American drivers.
Exactly. Lane discipline in Europe is centuries ahead of America. I love driving the European freeways. Everyone sticks to the right, except to pass. It’s not really an issue except when there’s a lot of traffic. Even then, though, the left lane always moves faster than the right.
Driving in the cities, however, is another story…
This weekend I was driving up from Indiana, and the lack of lane discipline was irritating the shit out of me. Not just the people blocking up the left lane, but the idiots passing on the right. It’s unpredicatble, dangerous, and pisses me off to no end. They made it illegal to clog up the left lane in Illinois, too, but I haven’t seen any improvements here either.
I also think the problem is that in driver’s ed classes, they don’t teach lane etiquette. I certainly wasn’t informed about the left lane should only be used for passing rule.
But there are pockets in the US where people are very good about it. Wisconsin drivers, at least on the way to UP Michigan, are religiously observant of the drive-on-the-right, pass-on-the-left rules. This is the way it should be.
My husband noted this as well, and at the time he made the observation, it surprised me that it would be another way. I’m originally from Wisconsin, and remember being taught in driver’s ed (in my hometown back then it was a class taught by the schools, now you have to go to private lessons) that you should move back to the farthest-right lane once you’re done passing. If the right lane is fairly full of cars and you - observing the speed limit, naturally! - are going faster than the lot of them, you can remain in the left lane and continue passing to the extent that trying to merge back into the right lane would cause a hazard with all of the rapid lane changing you’d end up doing. If someone comes up behind you faster than you’re going, move over into the right lane as soon as you’re able and allow that car to pass, then proceed with your passing.
I think the major problem around Chicago when you get three lanes is the large number of on/offramps on the highways near the city. There are quite a few slow-moving drivers who are too freaked out about people merging in, who decide to take up the middle lane. This forces people who want to go around them into the left or right lanes. I’ll admit to having passed on the right before - when you get the sub-speed limit “I’m scared of merging traffic” drivers in the center lane and the clog behind a slower driver in the left lane, sometimes the right lane is the only place you can go and make any headway in the process.
On a three-lane, low to medium busy, road the middle lane should be the main driving lane. The left lane is for passing, and the right lane is for merging and departing. Particularly on roads with a bunch of semis. If your in the right lane when they need to merge in, and there isn’t an opening to the left then somebody is going to have to hit the brakes and screw up the flow. On really really busy roads then each lane should be utilized as much as possible, but about the only place in Colorado that effects is I-25 through Denver, which I’m guessing is the reason for the 65+ quailifier. I-25 is only 55 there so it is exempt.
99% of Colorado highways are pretty sparse and two lane, so people should be in the right lane except to pass, and I really hope they drop the hammer on this.
This isn’t a problem if people actually read the road ahead of them - ie the quarter- to half-mile visible, not just the space between them and the car in front. That gives plenty of time for all necessary manouveres. (This assumes, of course, it’s a well-designed road to allow such sight lines.) It’s certainly spelt out clearly in the UK Highway Code:
And lets not forget that other unique-to-city-highways phenomenon: right lanes that actually turn into off ramps. Drivers who are worried that they could find themselves abruptly exiting the highway at the wrong place (because they may not be able to merge into the middle lane if the traffic’s heavy) certainly won’t be inclined to drive in the right-hand lane even if they are going slow!
The problem isn’t just with the classes, but also with the tests you have to pass to get a license - if the tests were harder, the classes would catch up.
The written test I took was 20 questions, heavy on the details of certain regulations (how soon after selling a car do you need to transfer the title? how much prison time can you get for DUI?) but with no mention of etiquette at all. Knowing about lane discipline should be a requirement for getting a driver’s license.
Virginia has two laws to deal with this. Not only are slower drivers obliged to keep right in most places, drivers who do not obey the law [e.g.: by speeding] automatically give up any right-of-way they would normally have.
And since the custom, though obviously not the law, on American limited-access highways is to regard the speed limit as a minimum, the second law negates the first.
Not that it matters. I’ve spent decades driving most of Virginia’s major highways, and have never seen someone pulled over for driving slowly in a passing lane. I can attest that on Virginia’s interstates, you’re as likely to see a slow driver in one land as in another.
Of course, that doesn’t exactly distinguish Virginia from most other states, but it does indicate that Virginia’s laws are no remedy for slowpokes in the passing lanes.
Right of way is so passe that in Tennessee we just had to pass a law that says if you don’t pull over for a vehicle with flashing lights, you can get a ticket. They have to get your tag number and come chase you down later, but they only have 72 hours. I don’t foresee it having any effect, other than scaring people into looking in their rearview mirros.
Florida has jillions of signs stating the obvious. Net effect is zero and I have often wondered why. I think we have way too many retirees who have nowhere to go, nothing to do when they get there and are in no hurry to arrive. I’m a retiree myself, but I’m in a hurry, dammit, get the hell out of my way. I also think we have way too many tourists who are going to look at the damn palm tree, no matter who it inconveniences. I hope Colorado has more luck with it than Florida, but I admit I doubt it will happen.
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