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1. JanS
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   I will preface this with saying that I don't have a vehicle at the moment, and I don't commute to downtown, so this doesn't affect me much..but would you all , who do, vote for this signage change?

   

   Posted 7 months ago #         

2. datamuse
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   Bridge, hell, put those on I-5!

   Posted 7 months ago #         

3. JanS
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   Guess WSDot needs to print up a lot of these signs - lol..I-90 comes to mind, too...

   Posted 7 months ago #         

4. redblack
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   drivers in washington seem to have a collective bad habit of driving exactly the same speed as the car next to them, even when they don't have to.

   it's dangerous.

   and the other bad habit that follows, which is equally annoying: when an opportunity to pass the left-lane campers eventually presents itself, they stand on the accelerator so that the aggravated drivers behind them can't pass.

   maybe that's how they justify not keeping to the right.

   Posted 7 months ago #         

5. datamuse
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   I have occasionally wondered in all seriousness if keep right except to pass is taught in driver's ed programs out here.

   Posted 7 months ago #         

6. ElizabethElaine
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   datamuse - It's not! I took driver's ed about 12 years ago, and I had to find out about keeping to the right when a friend of mine got a ticket for it on I-90. When I researched it and found the law, no one I knew believed me, and they still don't! Even when we pass signs on the freeway that say Keep Right Except to Pass, people still don't believe that it's not just common courtesy, it's the law.

   Posted 7 months ago #         

7. datamuse
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   ElizabethElaine, that explains so much, it really does.

   Posted 7 months ago #         

8. KBear
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   When I visited Washington for the first time and saw the "Keep right except to pass" signs, I thought they were ridiculous. I mean, we don't have signs that say "Use headlights after dark", or "Turn the wheel to steer your car". It never occurred to me that there was an entire state of drivers who not only didn't know this basic rule, but couldn't even figure it out when it was spelled out for them on traffic signs.

   Posted 7 months ago #         

9. datamuse
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   Ha, and just this morning while heading through downtown Tacoma I came up on someone doing 55 in the left lane in light traffic. Didn't move, even after I and half a dozen other cars went around him to the right.

   (That said, from what I see around here all too frequently, "Use headlights after dark" may not be a bad idea either...)

   Posted 7 months ago #         

10. Street Jesus
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    I wish WSP would start enforcing this. It would probably cut down on aggressive drivers and maybe traffic jams as a whole...

    Posted 7 months ago #         

11. hopey
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    I have a theory that the left-hand HOV lanes have an impact on this behavior. People get used to moving left for the HOV lane and then going the speed limit in that lane. Add on left-hand freeway exits, the lack of education in driving school, and the propensity to drive the same speed as the person next to you, and it creates a real problem.

    I learned to drive in the Chicago area, where HOV left lanes and left-hand freeway exits did not exist... and neither did the "left lane legal" problem.

    Posted 7 months ago #         

12. metrognome
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    hopey -- this has been going on since long before HOV lanes. When I used to commute long distances, I would watch the travel patterns because the freeway would be wide open and then there would be a cluster of traffic and then wide open again. I could almost always trace the clumps to a single car, usually in the middle lane, who had cars passing on both sides. That car was probably actually doing the speed limit, but no one else was.

    From what I've heard about Chicago, slow drivers are not a problem ... in any lane.

    BTW, left-hand on-ramps are now prohibited in new construction because they lead to so many accidents. I think left-hand exits are prohibited too.

    Posted 7 months ago #         

13. Smitty
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    Hilarious!

    I would add only one thing, "your blinkers are to be used BEFORE you actually make a lane change or turn!".

    Posted 7 months ago #         

14. kootchman
    Member Profile

    Finally! An infrastructure program that works!..And not a dime of federal money! Too funny!

    http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/07/thieves-dismantle-cart-off-steel-bridge-in-pennsylvania/?iref=obinsite

    Posted 7 months ago #         

15. datamuse
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    I think metrognome has the right of it. Left-hand exits aren't a feature in the DC area, but HOV lanes are, and I don't see this phenomenon there. (DC drivers are so type-A aggressive that it just doesn't happen. They WILL tailgate your ass.)

    Smitty, as long as we're voicing peeves, I'd add "accelerate to match the flow of traffic BEFORE you merge, NOT after". I've lost count of the near-misses I've experienced due to this one, one of which was just this morning.

    Posted 7 months ago #         

16. hopey
    Member Profile

    

    How timely! Check out this article from Slate.

    "Why highways move more swiftly when you force cars to crawl along at 55 mph"
    http://www.slate.com/articles/life/transport/2011/10/rolling_speed_harmonization_how_colorado_fights_congestion_on_i_.html

    Posted 7 months ago #         

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