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Comment by beala | Hacker News Reader

I get that leaving the left lane clear for passing is the convention, but is it actually optimal? If everyone stuck to this, then the left lane would be rarely used and we'd be underutilizing the available space, right?

Where I live, there are signs saying "keep right except to pass" but they're neither obeyed nor enforced afaict. And it's never really bothered me tbh (I'm usually chilling in the right lane).

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On the two lane sections of I-5, among other busy trucking routes, you can encounter miles long convoys of trucks in the right lane. If you religiously stick to staying to the right, you and a whole lot of other traffic will be weaving between the trucks and changing lanes every minute or so. So nobody who's going 10mph faster than the trucks does that. If you actually did that, you'll likely get boxed out trying to get back into the left lane as soon as you come up on another truck -- you'll have a brief period where you're going 75 in the right lane, then you have to slow down to 60 to deal with a truck, then you go back to overtaking at 75, then get back in the right lane... rinse and repeat. What happens instead is that the people enraged by this will use the gap on the right to go 100mph past everyone who just wants to cruise at a steady speed past all of the trucks.

Barely tangentially related, but I5 desperately needs to be widened to 3 lanes with a strict "No semi trucks in the left lane, for any reason" rule that is enforced with impounding trucks, the goods they're carrying, and loss of licensing for the drivers and the companies they work for. I'm not even against making it so that CHP, OHP...etc, are allow to use the proceeds from auctioning off the impounded trucks and goods to fund themselves.

I've wasted far too many hours of my life getting stuck behind a left-lane truck on that road, trying to overtake a column of trucks in the right lane while going up a 6% grade.

> If everyone stuck to this, then the left lane would be rarely used and we'd be underutilizing the available space, right?

Sure, but consider this: if there are cars behind you in the right, then you should pull over.

> I get that leaving the left lane clear for passing is the convention, but is it actually optimal? If everyone stuck to this, then the left lane would be rarely used and we'd be underutilizing the available space, right?

Right, it depends on traffic volume. There are situations where "keep right except to pass" obviously doesn't help - e.g. streets with regular left-hand turns and congested highways, most notably.

I got pulled over and given a warning when someone passed me to the right.

I told the officer I totally support the policy.

In my defense, I was overtaking other vehicles to the right and moving at the speed of the vehicle ahead of me, but as I was driving a large vehicle I was preserving a longer follow distance than the tailgater (err, driver) who passed me thought I needed...

AITAH?

Nope. And so many of these traffic laws often neglect to take actual safety into account. I’ve certainly been one of those annoyed drivers behind large vehicles taking forever to pass. Ultimately it’s the driver of that heavy vehicle to determine what is safe or not and not the impatient asshole behind them. That being said, it’s often difficult from behind to differentiate between the safety conscious and the inconsiderate who just like to park on the left.

I probably tend to be in the top 10% of drivers regarding speed on any given highway. I’m usually the passer and rarely the passee. I stick to the right lane when traffic is light, but may cruise in the left when it requires me to weave in and out for no reason. But I keep an eye on my mirrors and make sure to get out of the way for the few who are faster than me. Sometimes even if that means I slow down a bit to get right. My goal when on the highway is to not make others put on their brakes or react because of me. My second goal is to not put myself into positions where I have to brake myself. That means good follow distances so minor changes in traffic speed doesn’t cause a chain reaction of tail lights that lead to traffic snakes.

Most of what I have seen that causes dangerous situations is when people act abnormally. If the cruising speed on a highway (regardless of posted speed limit) is 80mph and you’re cruising at 70mph in the left lane you are causing a higher risk of accidents regardless of whether you’re doing the speed limit or not. If the roads are covered in ice, you should absolutely be ticketed for driving the “speed limit” when most everyone else is crawling along. So much of traffic boils down to “we live in a society” and so much of what makes traffic miserable is the same folks who can never understand that concept.

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