If people would use both lanes and merge at the cones, less stress might be realized.

The cones are where DOT wants you vacating a lane not 1000 ft prior.

People single file prematurely cause in part to avoid conflict/stress.

Everyone prematurely joining the surviving lane is somewhat Pollyannish.

I travel a lot in my market and I take the shortest lane to get me through in the least amount of time. A-hole am I? Well so be it.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:

quote:

Originally posted by ontmark:
The red truck had the right of way.

No he didn't. The lane he was in was reduced and he was required to YEILD to the traffic on the left that was in a free flowing lane.

And if you follow that point, nobody in the right lane would be able to move left in heavy traffic.

The zipper merge is the preferred method for many state DOTs. In this particular case, the red truck wasn't lined up properly to merge in front of a1 and should have merged behind him.

quote:

Originally posted by rbert0005:
We all know the proper thing to do here.
That is to merge SAFELY well before we would get to the cones. But alas, we all don't feel like we should have to do this.

For the red truck supporters I want to thank you for making my job more challenging than it should be. I am sure that your getting a few cars ahead is well worth it for you...and everyone else be damned.

Bob

I’m not really a red truck supporter. I think it’s likely the red truck sped up to get in front of a1. He probably could have easily merged behind. That is assuming that the car behind a1 would let him. But let’s not dismiss the fact that a1 had already decided not to let him in. You can hear him say “I don’t think...”. I assume that was an “I don’t think so”. I’ve been red truck guy trying to merge a bit early and had all the assholes in the middle lane stay bumper to bumper to crowd me out. Not saying a1 did that here. But he could have just as easily let red truck merge with absolutely no negative impact on his drive. We should all realize that sometimes being right causes way more stress than it’s worth.

Red Chevy truck in the WRONG!! If you can't plan ahead and get in line as soon as possible WITH EVERYONE ELSE, then your lack of proper planning does not constitute an emergency on my part. "You think your someone special?!?!? (in Gunny Sgt. Hartman voice)

I have a WONDERFUL friend that does this shit in rush-hour traffic. She KNOWS the traffic will back up at the exit from one highway to another. Yet she ZOOMS to front of the f***ing line and snipes into a gap HOPING someone is napping to leave said gap. It pisses me off to no end for people to do that when I've planned and gotten in line way back in order to avoid such confrontation. It makes me think "these people" think they're to damned good to wait in a line. Ooooooohh...and she KNOWS it overcooks my grits for her to do that.

[/rant] Time for 2nd cup of coffee and yes, it IS decaf.

I can’t believe that the truck would rather risk hitting a merging vehicle than running over a road cone or two.

Here's the typical line breaker here. He hit the person merging legally at the head of the line.

This is the video I gave the police and her insurance company when he claimed she merged over on him.




Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGdJ7cHBuHU

I disagree with those who say that the cones are the merge point. The DOT defines a merge zone using warning signs in advanve and cones at the end. if you reach the cones and have not vaccinated the right lane then you Have waited too long.

You don't see the red truck in the begining of the video, it comed up a few seconds later. That means that the red truck is either trying to pass in the ending lane to get ahead, or a1 is slowing down and the red truck is oblivious to the lane ending.

I don't know who's right or wrong in this situation but as a red-neck from a very rural part of the country , I can sympathize with the driver of the little red pickup....

From my uneducated point of view.... The driver of the red pickup can either offend the person in the lane that he is trying to merge into or he can stop and then offend everyone that is behind him.

Yes , he probably should have done something about 30 seconds earlier but I'm not a big city driver and I'm about 30 seconds behind the curve.

BTW ,honking does nothing to improve my reflexes and simply re-confirms my opinion about visiting the big city (including the rudeness of drivers).

Just a Dummy's point of view.....mike

Vehicle established in the lane has right of way. Red truck was wrong. There us no reason to wait that long to merge. I despise it when people pull those shenanigans.

There are wrecks daily on a particular exit here on I45 because these schmucks want to bypass the line of people who have already merged into an exit-only lane that is a mile long to accommodate the traffic.

Tigereye gets it...

quote:

Originally posted by Hangtime:
If people would use both lanes and merge at the cones, less stress might be realized.

The cones are where DOT wants you vacating a lane not 1000 ft prior.

People single file prematurely cause in part to avoid conflict/stress.

Everyone prematurely joining the surviving lane is somewhat Pollyannish.

I travel a lot in my market and I take the shortest lane to get me through in the least amount of time. A-hole am I? Well so be it.

Zipper method at the merge point is that fastest and most efficient way to do it.

Having people merging prematurely is what makes people feel like the guys in then ending lane are cheating.

The real people causing the most traffic are those merging early and those who can't let someone in front of them at any cost and play chicken.

If people would merge in zipper pattern alternating one car from ending lane and the car from adjacent lane and on and on then there wouldn't be as many problems.

The guy in the red truck was obligated to yield. Forcing his way in was aggressive and selfish. When I was younger I would aggressively protect my right of way. Over time this resulted in a fender bender, bad feelings, many road rage moments and high stress. I was in the right, but at what cost? Eventually I could see these were pyrrhic victories.

In my personal journey with the concept of selflessness I learned that the only way to win the game is not to play. I have tried to accommodate others far more. The true test of selflessness is can I be so in the face of selfishness? That has been a hard one, but I'm getting better at it.

Imagine what would happen if the driver in the right of way had just allowed the red truck in. What harm could have come from that? Okay, a selfish driver gets ahead. Karma has a way of dealing with those people. But the other driver has peace.

quote:

Sorry about the name calling, just the way I saw it.

No worries. I can be an asshole to those who earn it, but I wasn't being one here.

quote:

But the fact is a1abdj could have let the red truck in.

There was nothing I could have done differently short of being able to see the future and allowing additional space between me and the SUV in front of me knowing that somebody was going to pass me in the right lane right at the closure.

quote:

The only alternative was for the red truck to completely stop on a highway.

Option 1: The red truck stops in the closed lane and merges into the next space as opposed to the side of a vehicle occupying the open lane.

Option 2: I have to slam on my brakes (hope the guy behind me, the guy behind him, and the guy behind him are all paying attention) and stop in the open lane that is moving to prevent the red truck from hitting me as it departs its lane.

Option 3: I swerve left into that traffic causing a collision in order to prevent a collision caused by the red truck.

quote:

if you got hit that is completely on you because you know you could have let them in but you tried to make a point.

I was making no points. If I got hit it would be completely on the red truck who departed their lane and struck me.

quote:

On the flip side I think the red truck is a shitty driver because there was plenty of room in front of you.

Had the red truck been 20 feet further ahead than it was there would have been room, although still not giving me a safe stopping distance.

I suppose everybody could have given two car lengths between them and the person in front of them. But then the 5 mile back up would have been 10 miles.

When I'm in slow moving traffic I'll leave a car length in front of me. When we stop, maybe 5 feet. As traffic goes faster, I increase that distance.

quote:

under no circumstances never, ever let anyone ever get in front of you. lay on the horn, speed up, run them off the road, hit them if you have to but no matter what show them no one gets in front of king of the road. ever.

Well, I wasn't speeding up. I was actually doing the opposite from the moment you saw the brake lights on the SUV in front of me.

I did indeed lay on the horn. I assumed that the person merging may have been doing so without looking (or that I was in their blind spot). I figured they may want to know that somebody was there.

I didn't run them off the road. In fact, had they hit the cones, they would have still been on the road.

Had contact been made (which many who have seen the video says had to happen although there is no evidence of any on my truck), it would have been the red truck hitting me.

quote:

That is assuming that the car behind a1 would let him. But let’s not dismiss the fact that a1 had already decided not to let him in.

But that's not what happened. I was looking at the workers on the highway and the traffic ahead of me that had just braked.

Those brake lights were the beginning of my engine braking, when the red truck came into my field of vision I started braking, and when it started merging into the side of me I used the horn while hard braking.

quote:

You can hear him say “I don’t think...”. I assume that was an “I don’t think so”.

You may also assume it was an "I don't think it's an accident". My passenger and I were trying to figure out why we had been sitting in traffic for 30 minutes.

It wasn't an accident. The highway had flooded.

quote:

But he could have just as easily let red truck merge with absolutely no negative impact on his drive.

I'm still trying to figure out the physics behind this. I spelled out options 1-3 above.

quote:

The DOT defines a merge zone using warning signs in advanve and cones at the end. if you reach the cones and have not vaccinated the right lane then you Have waited too long.

In this case it wasn't a predetermined merge. The highway had flooded and all lanes were closed. They then reopened the two left lanes due to the debris in the right lane which they were attempting to sweep off.

Traffic was backed up for many miles, but there was no advance notice of that lane being blocked. As you crested the hill you could see it, and that gave you maybe 1/4 mile to merge over.

quote:

Zipper method at the merge point is that fastest and most efficient way to do it.

IF....people know how to drive, which they don't.

quote:

If people would merge in zipper pattern alternating one car from ending lane and the car from adjacent lane and on and on then there wouldn't be as many problems.

But since that won't ever happen it won't ever work.

Take an hourglass. Only so much sand will fit through the opening. Now you have one hourglass with a short tight spot (zipper merging), and one hourglass with a long tight spot (early merging). The exact same amount of sand will fit through the restricted area.

So in theory a zipper merge makes sense. In reality, and based on actual observation, merging at the end of a lane causes more traffic disruption than early merging.

You can only fit so much of whatever (in this case cars) through so large of a space. What will speed this up or slow it down is determined by the efficiency of the drivers, and just as shown in my video, "zipper merging" ends up leading to those moving in the travel lane needing to come to a complete stop to allow them in. At least that's how it works around here.


***** Just noticed something *****

However I linked the video seems to be starting it several seconds into it.

Some of you aren't seeing the brake lights (and that I'm slowing as a result), and the absence of the red truck in my field of vision.

It can be rewound to the beginning on the progress bar.

Let’s try it another way.

SF LEOs. If there was a crash, who would you cite?

I’d cite the red pick up.

Every time.

You can’t take away someone else’s right of way.

Red truck is in the wrong, they ran out the merge lane to the end. Were they texting or yapping on their phone?

quote:

Originally posted by Chowser:
Let’s try it another way.

SF LEOs. If there was a crash, who would you cite?

I’d cite the red pick up.

Every time.

You can’t take away someone else’s right of way.

I’m retired now,but red truck would hold it. All day. Every day. Red truck was wrong and didn’t yield to the lane on the left that was free flowing and had the right of way. Zipper or no zipper, red truck was still wrong.

Based on what a1 said, in this case the red truck was in the wrong and should have merged behind a1. That being said, zipper merging works even when it’s a quick and temporary land closure like this one. The hour glass analogy doesn’t work because the forward motion of vehicles is controlled by humans (for the most part) not a constant force like gravity acting on the sand in an hour glass.

Right from the Missouri Department of Transportation complete with color diagrams:
Zipper Merge.

To be clear, the red truck should have merged behind a1 in a proper zipper merge.

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
Right from the Missouri Department of Transportation complete with color diagrams:
Zipper Merge.

To be clear, the red truck should have merged behind a1 in a proper zipper merge.

Damn, beat me to it but I have the DOT version:
DOT Zipper Merge

In the end, it isn't worth a minor car accident for me to not just let the other guy in. Was the red truck in the wrong? Probably. Is it worth the insurance hassle to get your vehicle fixed? That's up to you.

Makes me want to get a dash cam though...