Reducing traffic congestion

In My Humble Opinion
1

In Southern California people drive fast. CHP drive faster. It seemed to me that the CHP were less interested in pulling over speeders than they were in keeping traffic flowing. It seemed as if one could moderately exceed the speed limit as long as they were not also driving aggressively; the freeway equivalent of ‘Don’t Be A Jerk’. Sure, there were occasional announcements of stretches of road where there would be extra patrols to catch speeders, but for the most part I observed that the people being pulled over were speeding egregiously (i.e., going ten to 15 mph faster than the rest of the speeders) and/or maneuvering excessively. There also appeared to be fewer CHP on the roads in California than I see in Oregon and Washington. Traffic moves faster in L.A. than it does in Seattle, except for a few places.

California also allows motorcycles to split lanes (ride between lanes of traffic, but not on either shoulder). People generally ease over to allow motorcycles to pass, and motorcyclists often wave ‘Thank you’. Obviously this ‘reduces congestion’ for motorcyclists; but it also reduces overall congestion. A motorcycle stopped in traffic is another vehicle stopped in traffic. Allowing lane-splitting reduces the number of stopped vehicles.

Drivers in California seem to understand the concept of ‘Slower Traffic Keep Right’. When there is room to the right, most people (not all) will move right to allow overtaking traffic to pass. They also seem to ‘get’ the ‘zipper merge’, where cars on the freeway and cars entering the freeway, or where a lane closure causes two lanes to merge, alternate.

Southern California also has Metro patrols. These are cruising or strategically-placed tow trucks that clear collisions and stalled vehicles out of lanes quickly. AIUI, the whole point of the Metro patrols is to reduce congestion.

By contrast people in Washington tend to drive 5 mph under the posted speed limit. They will not move right for overtaking traffic. The State Patrol is more prevalent and keeps to the speed limit, encouraging people not to speed. Lane-splitting by motorcycles is prohibited. The zipper merge seems to be less favoured than ‘No. You get behind me!’

The Washington highway commission wants to reduce congestion. They talk about adding lanes, which is expensive and won’t work in the long run. What are better, cheaper ways of achieving the goal? IMO the Number One way would be driver education. I think that Public Service Announcements should be made reminding slower traffic to keep right. There should be Slower Traffic Keep Right signs at regular intervals to reinforce the PSAs. People here seem to be clueless. Let’s give them a clue.

There are a lot of trucks up here. They have a habit of pulling in front of overtaking traffic and taking miles (plural) to pass another truck. I’m sure there must be laws against tying up traffic. They should be enforced.

The State Patrol should concentrate less on handing out speeding tickets and more on keeping people moving. People driving 65 in the left lane in a 70 zone (or 55 in a 60 zone) should have the lights flashed at them to get them to move over.

Allowing motorcycles to split lanes is asking too much; but with over 100,000 miles riding a motorcycle in L.A. traffic I can attest that it works.

2

I’d be scared to split lanes in a motorcycle, all it takes is one asshole opening his door to really ruin your day and your bike.

3

I think splitting lanes dangerous, but not for that reason: how often do people open car doors driving on the freeway? It’s dangerous because you’re driving very close to much larger vehicles, with nowhere to go if anything goes wrong.

4

I’m thinking someone might see you coming and be pissed off that you were getting through the traffic jam and they weren’t.

5

This is making me cackle. Yeah, I can’t say I see that happen much when I’m driving up the 5.

6

I’ve done it, and in the London area driving on the wrong side. It’s really not that hard, and once you get used to the idea, for me about ten minutes, you don’t notice the cars that much. Personally I’d love to be able to do it around here in the DC area, but they tell me it’s a big no no. I’d feel safer between the cars then being rear ended, which has happened.

7

Sounds like we could have a whole thread just on splitting lanes.

What do you think of the other suggestions? Do you have suggestions of your own?

8

Someone causing a crash by opening his door is going to be in deep doodoo. Most people in the Bay Area are pretty good about moving over to give more room. (I’m a card driver, and I do.) The danger is when someone is changing lanes and doesn’t see the motorcycle coming up behind.

9

I agree about the tow trucks helping. But keep right except to pass? What planet is the California you visited on?

Cops are pretty much invisible in the Bay Area, unless they are part of a special program to cut speeds down on dangerous bits of road or to catch carpool cheats. I travel about 20 miles each way to and from work, and I see one (not working on an accident) maybe once a month. It’s not the speeders that are the issue here, but the morons who cut across 3 lanes of traffic and enter an exit ramp 100 feet after it splits from the highway.

I’ve become convinced that car pool lanes are one big source of congestion. Not because of taking up the lane - congestion doesn’t ease when the lanes become available for regular traffic. It is because carpoolers - many of them - have to cross 3 lanes to get into and out of the lane, and lots of them are very aggressive about it. They push in, the car they push ahead of slams on the brakes, and there is a chain reaction of brakes for many cars behind. I’d think limiting the entrance and exit from carpool lanes, like SoCal does, would help.

10

I didn’t say that.

What I said was that in SoCal (IME) most people will move right to allow overtaking traffic to pass. (No, really!) Here in Washington they don’t – even if they’re going below the posted limit.

While there are a few signs on a couple of stretches that do say ‘Keep Right Except To Pass’, I don’t think that’s a solution. What I said (or meant) was there should be ‘Slower Traffic Keep Right’ signs to remind people to move right for overtaking traffic, and that there should be PSAs in conjunction with them.

One good thing about the carpool/HOV lanes up here is that unlike California you can pretty much enter and exit at will. I don’t think I’ve seen entry and exit points such as are in SoCal.

11

This is the responsibility of the motorcyclist then to watch out for the cars. You’re not supposed to travel more then a 10mph or so above what the rest of traffic is doing.

Around here we should either keep the cops off the road during heavy traffic, or keep them from pulling people over unless they do something really bad. I drove to work the other day and a cop was just sitting on the road and it took me an extra 15 minutes because people were slowing down.

12

In L.A. people slow down when there’s a cop with someone pulled over. (I’d always thought that he’s not going to jump back into his car and take off after someone else.) But they wouldn’t slow too much. Up here the State Patrol have LOTS of lights, and they seem to turn them all on during a traffic stop. And people here slow way down. Even if the cop has someone pulled over at the other side of the freeway. They slow down whenever they see flashing lights. They slow down if they see a car at the side of the road (on the other side of the freeway). I thought gawker’s block was bad in SoCal. It’s not a patch on the GB up here.

As I said earlier, CHP tend to drive faster than traffic. This seems to have had a couple of effects. First, people will drive slower than the CHP; so if the CHP is driving fast, people will still do the speed limit. Second, if the CHP is in the fast lane (another one of those concepts unknown up here, ‘fast lane’ is) people get out of their way so there’s less traffic there and people can move along. Up here the SP do the speed limit – or less, as people tend to drive slow. They often don’t encourage people to move over. So everything slows down.

13

An Observation.

I spent 4 weeks visiting a friend in Los Angeles.

Having never been to LA and hearing the horror stories, I was expecting the worse.

LA drivers appeared to be competent and friendly. If you needed to change lanes, you put on your turn signal and they let you in. There are many other things that happened that just made my jaw drop. The intro scene of Steve Martin’s LA Story was TRUE (where 4 cars go to a stop sign and all signal for the other to go first}

The friend said that it was like an unwritten rule…that traffic was so bad that people seemed to say ‘let’s not make it worse’.

Back in Minneapolis, I would say the above and they all would look at me like I was nuts. However, WE HERE are the crappy drivers:

You don’t put on your turn signal to change lanes until you actually do so because, if you do, someone will speed up to cut you off from doing so.

Obscene gestures happen much more often here. More horn honking here etc.

{caveat: this was in 1995…maybe it has changed}

14

A Let’s Go: California book I had in the mid-'80s called L.A. drivers ‘speedy and confident’. I lived in SoCal until 2003, and again last year. The basic philosophy seems to be ‘Let me get away with this this time, and I’ll let you get away with something next time.’ Of course it doesn’t always work that way. Many people will speed up so you won’t be ahead of them when you change lanes. But for the most part people will let you in. Nobody believes that, but most of my driving has been in the L.A. area and I’ve seen it.

The key is that you must be confident and decisive. I was talking to a Washington woman a few months ago who had visited L.A. She said that drivers down there seemed to know what other drivers were going to do. Yep. Everyone’s in the same boat… erm, car… so for the most part there’s a lot of cooperation. Apart from the jerks, people seem to know that it doesn’t make much difference if someone gets ahead of them so they let them in. And they know that someone will let them in later.

What’s really surprising is that this seems to work, given my comments in the past about Left-Seat Passengers who aren’t really driving but just along for the ride. When the traffic starts to pack up though, they seem capable of courtesy.

I don’t know what the deal is up here. People will drive the speed limit or under in the left lane (as I said, they don’t understand the concept of ‘fast lane’) as if they’d been appointed Pace Car. Are they unaware of traffic behind them? Or are they dogs in mangers? It’s hard to change people’s attitudes. But I think that in places with a lot of congestion PSAs encouraging driver courtesy will eventually work.

And PSAs and a few ‘Slower Traffic Keep Right’ signs are a heck of a lot cheaper than widening freeways.

15

:dubious: :wink:

IMHO, CA drivers are noticeably less aware of the slower traffic keep right rule than surrounding states. It is not uncommon to see an empty fast lane in AZ, UT, NM, TX, NV except for occasional passers. In CA, it seemed I was much more likely to get stuck behind some ass cruising the fast lane for no reason, including those who blatantly get on the freeway, then immediately merge over to the fast lane, hit the cruise control, and tune out.

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But then, you’re closer to Driver’s Purgatory… I mean Oregon… than I was. :stuck_out_tongue:

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My :dubious: was because there should be no CHP in any state other than CA. :wink:

18

:smack:

Okay: There also appeared to be fewer CHP on the roads in California than I see State Patrol in Oregon and Washington.