Join Me in the Fast Lane

Yes, I'm that guy. You're on the highway, approaching a clearly marked construction zone that is going to require that everyone in the two left lanes will have to merge with each other. Per social contract, you move over into the lane that will survive the interchange... and come to a screeching halt. After a few moments of creeping along, someone comes zipping down the vacant left lane, bypassing everyone already who's gotten over, and they breeze along until the barrels force them to finally merge.

Well, that's me. And after you hear my argument as to why I do that, I'm hoping that you all will join me.

Let's kick things off by considering what highways are for. Our great nation has developed a colossal system of roads, from two to five lanes across in each direction, that can (theoretically) take us from one coast to the other, and just about anywhere else in between, without stopping. They're designed to get us all from where we are to where we need to be, as quickly and efficiently as possible.

So, when a portion of that road is blocked, and that efficiency necessarily diminished, why do we then feel the need to make the situation even worse?

Think about it: the most efficient way to keep things moving is for we people to -- within reason -- maintain their speed and utilize all the available road. If you pull over before it's necessary to, you're doing two things wrong. First of all, merely by changing lanes you're making the back-up twice as long as it needs to be. That's just math. If everyone gets over, you're filling one lane with two lanes' worth of cars. Secondly, it's an established fact that most traffic back-ups are caused (or at least made worse) by people either hitting their brakes or changing lanes. And chances are that if you have to figure out where and how you're going to get over, you're doing both of these. This usually causes the person behind you to slow down, and as things progress further back, it's more likely that the next person will have to hit their brakes harder because they don't see the situation that created the need. That's how you end up with standstills.

Now, given that there's inevitably going to be some slowdown as everyone combines lanes, wouldn't the best way to minimize that be having it occur in a pre-specified place? Like the place where the road actually runs out? Some of the scariest traffic situations I've ever seen have been caused by people just starting to realize that everyone else is getting over, so they hit their brakes and try to find a way in, so as not to break the aforementioned social contract, endangering everyone behind them with their seemingly random activity. All this jockeying and tentative "Can I go? Are you letting me over, or do you not see me?" is what creates far more problems than it solves.

So, by getting over "when you're supposed to", which I'm sure varies greatly depending on the situation (but you're intuitively supposed to know anyway), you're actually making the situation *at* *minimum* twice as bad as it needs to be. To me, there's nothing more ridiculous than a line of creeping traffic that is totally ignoring the *completely* *usable* *lane* right alongside it. We're all trying to get where we're going. Let's make the most of what we have to work with to get this to happen.

Believe me, I've completely turned around on this issue from how I used to be. I once was one of the drivers who cursed those who -- in my mind -- thought they were better than everyone else and didn't have to get over until the last second. I likened it to line-cutting, which in my mind is one of the most heinous crimes of modern life. But I've had a lot of time to think about it during the 60 miles a day I've driven to and from my job for the last year. And when you get down to the logic of it, the way we are "supposed" to handle situations like this doesn't make sense.

Say you're standing in line at the grocery store, ready to check out. There are two lanes open, but people are only using one. It's not a matter of the lane just having opened... the register is just open, the cashier standing there idle. Everyone in line for the other register sees this, but still don't get over. How much reluctance would you have in moving over and using that other register?

But still, the social contract persists against logic. I've had people honk at me as I go by -- clearly not because they think it will do anything, just from self-righteous frustration -- and then there are semi trucks that will take it upon themselves to police the closing lane, pulling into it and slowing down to the speed of the clogged lane. This is actually a step up from what usually happens, because people seem to be willing to stay in the closing lane as long as they're not first. Hooray, we're suddenly we're using two lanes again!

Look, we're all just trying to make getting from A to B as small a piece of our day as necessary. There are roads out there designed to help us do just that. But when we start imposing illogical rules on ourselves for using them efficiently, we're just slowing ourselves and everyone else down. So come into the fast lane with me. Let's keep things a-rollin', folks.