Three lanes becoming 2 and 2 lanes becoming one.

[UrbanM]

Hi all,

Not a specific road rage event. But I just don’t get some people who rather than allow cars to filter in one by one where the road narrows, think they have the right of way.

I often find myself in front of a car where the road narrows where the other car driver thinks he has right of way and tries to get in before the road narrows. It’s infuriating.

Rant over

 

[Petrol Pete]

This is when the 'zipper' principal of 2 lanes of vehicles seamlessly becoming one lane using the principal of both lanes being full right up to the narrowing point where (as if by magic) the vehicles go seamlessly one in front of the other to create one lane .

This works in a computer - as it is the most logical and sensible solution - but simply does not work when you add humans . And it never will. We just have to live with it.

 

[whitenemesis]

Also how drivers all start moving over, perhaps some 1/2 mile before the narrows and heavens forbid anyone drive up to the narrows and try and filter in!! Even get lorry drivers straddling both lanes to keep everyone back. Even on well known 2-to-1 narrows and there are signs saying use both lanes but no, the queue is twice as long as everyone moves to the one lane miles before required....
It'll never change....

 

[bolidemichael]

It'll never change....

Until autonomous driving takes over and we are simply grateful bystanders to our journey.

 

[Petrol Pete]

Also how drivers all start moving over, perhaps some 1/2 mile before the narrows and heavens forbid anyone drive up to the narrows and try and filter in!! Even get lorry drivers straddling both lanes to keep everyone back. Even on well known 2-to-1 narrows and there are signs saying use both lanes but no, the queue is twice as long as everyone moves to the one lane miles before required....
It'll never change....

Exactly that . If everyone driving towards the narrowing filled both lanes until the point of merger the Queue would be half the length and move much quicker . But we all know that's not how it works in real life

 

[Teego]

Also how drivers all start moving over, perhaps some 1/2 mile before the narrows and heavens forbid anyone drive up to the narrows and try and filter in!! Even get lorry drivers straddling both lanes to keep everyone back. Even on well known 2-to-1 narrows and there are signs saying use both lanes but no, the queue is twice as long as everyone moves to the one lane miles before required....
It'll never change....

Half a mile!! They are well behaved down your way.

 

[KillerHERTZ]

It really is somthing that we have major trouble with in this country. The rage and anger if someone "queue jumps" :O

There really should be public information films/adverts on how to 'Merge in Turn'.

 

[CoopsSA]

I'm sure it's rife everywhere but the County Council of my Shire seem particularly hell bent on having loads of 2->1 lane situations, even on what is supposed to be major ring roads. So infuriating as (a) people can't merge in turn and (b) creates more of a traffic jam than it should.

 

[HB]

It really is somthing that we have major trouble with in this country. The rage and anger if someone "queue jumps" :O

There really should be public information films/adverts on how to 'Merge in Turn'.

Come down to the kids school at 330. You’ll see the insane anger from the X5’s, RR’s and GL’s who would literally drive over you if you dared try the zipping manoeuvre in front of them to exit at the gate. Majority of these are driven by fur coat no knicker wearing nouveau riche types with exceptionally colourful language if you have the privilege of being told off by one of them.

 

[Williamwoo]

It really is somthing that we have major trouble with in this country. The rage and anger if someone "queue jumps" :O

There really should be public information films/adverts on how to 'Merge in Turn'.

Quite. What would help a lot is having more of those 'merge in turn' signs at appropriate places. In (the few) places where they do have them, road rage seems to be noticeably less - it's almost as if it prompts people to think 'oh yes, actually that's a good idea; I will let this person in'.

 

[Tonye]

Just a bit off the OP topic but similar, merging on to a main road or motorway, do folk not realise they have to give way, slow down and get behind me or accelerate and get in front of me. When I'm in my wagon doing 55mph on auto pilot with other traffic at my side in lane two the only outcome for you is proceed on the hard shoulder or chew my wheel nuts.

 

[Germgh0st]

Just a bit off the OP topic but similar, merging on to a main road or motorway, do folk not realise they have to give way, slow down and get behind me or accelerate and get in front of me. When I'm in my wagon doing 55mph on auto pilot with other traffic at my side in lane two the only outcome for you is proceed on the hard shoulder or chew my wheel nuts.

The 'I'm on the slip road so you need to give way to me' bunch come from the same place as the 'I had the right to pull out because I was indicating' crew.

 

[Dryce]

Exactly that . If everyone driving towards the narrowing filled both lanes until the point of merger the Queue would be half the length and move much quicker . But we all know that's not how it works in real life

The length of the queue is usually not the problem - the issue is flow rate.

A longer queue with better flow works better thah two short queues and a flow breakdown.

As things stand if we get get an orderly queue then normally it flows slowly - in part because minority traffic attempting to run up the empty lane and merge causes ..... yes .... a flow break down.

The ideal is *smooth* zip merging. But given the number of vehicles you see unable to make a smooth non-interfering merge even into light traffic from slip road then they are unliklely to manage a smooth zip merge .... so yet again ... a likely flow breakdown.

As has been said already - self-driving cars is a solution.

 

[Dryce]

Just a bit off the OP topic but similar, merging on to a main road or motorway, do folk not realise they have to give way, slow down and get behind me or accelerate and get in front of me. When I'm in my wagon doing 55mph on auto pilot with other traffic at my side in lane two the only outcome for you is proceed on the hard shoulder or chew my wheel nuts.

No.

You've completely missed the unwritten law:

a) vehicle on slip road has priority
b) it's necessary for said vehicle to *slow down* into a faster flowing stream of traffic as it merges before magically speeding up after it has caused mayhem.

It's a bit like the unwritten law that says when there is a long incline that a HGV or other slow vehicle must pull into the faster flowing traffic in the right lane to not overtake the vehicle it was following.

 

[John N]

In an ideal world, the vehicle that is in the lane that is about to close, should give the vehicle in the lane that isn't right of way!

No, Iv'e never seen it done either!

 

[Dryce]

In an ideal world, the vehicle that is in the lane that is about to close, should give the vehicle in the lane that isn't right of way!

No, Iv'e never seen it done either!

In an ideal world traffic flow through the flow constriction would be continuous and the traffic approaching the constriction would magically slow down in parallel making gaps so that they could seamlessly merge into one.

The practical problem with doing this in heavy traffic is that alowing two lanes to merge seamlessly means reducing the density in both - that is in effect running the same traffic flow across two lanes as is allowed through the constriction. And that actually means the traffic in both lanes has to slow down to the same speed as theflow through the constructon and spread out.

And if you think about that it means the in real terms the queue in both spaced out lanes needs to be as long as the queue in one lane at high traffic densities.

So zip merging as a pure ideal only works up to a given traffic density.

 

[Tonye]

vehicle on slip road has priority

Which highway code did you read.

unwritten law

Don't do unwritten law myself, gets a bit confusing for the judge in court.

 

[Dryce]

Which highway code did you read.

Clearly the unwritten one!

Don't do unwritten law myself, gets a bit confusing for the judge in court.

I don't think judges tend to do unwritten law either.

So there are general beliefs such as the one that the number 70 in a red circle actually means 79 in real units - and that double yellow lines mean that it is OK to park as long as your hazard flashers are on.

 

[Tonye]

So there are general beliefs

Yes, just beliefs, not real laws.

 

[zipdip]

Well I did a lot of driving in Italy,and they have a different view to this merging of traffic lanes,to them it is to show off just how fast they can allow this to happen,weirdly they do not have the this is my lane and I will not allow you in front of me atitude,and this in the land of trompo ,but it is one lesson we could do with learning from them.