How is this any different from allowing single-rider motorcycles in carpool/HOV lanes (apart from probably slightly reducing accidents involving motorcycles by taking them out of the reach of inattentive commuters)?
Car-pool lanes are taxation without representation.
We pay for the construction and maintenance yet are not allowed to use them.
What's next - letting people with "Hillary 2008" stickers cruise solo in the carpool lane?
Aren't hybrids running on gas at highway speed?
"It's not fair," Johnson said. "In the afternoon it's all hybrids around me. I used to be able to go home in 30 minutes. Now it takes 45."
I'll bet these people are going to really start screaming when the hybrid vehicles include a larger percentage of SUVs. Ford already has a hybrid version of the Escape on the dealers' lots, and others are sure to follow.
"Brian D. Taylor, director of UCLA's Institute of Transportation Studies, argues against linking hybrids with car pool lanes, which he says exist for an unrelated purpose: taking cars off the road."
Yes, and part of the reason for taking cars off the road is to increase the fuel efficiency per passenger mile. Hybrids also do this.
"In April 2003, about 2,500 hybrid drivers in Virginia registered their cars and asked for 'clean fuel' license plates, allowing them to use the car pool lanes, Morris said. By May of this year, the number had more than tripled – to about 9,000."
Even if ALL NINE THOUSAND HYBRIDS ARE ON THE SAME ROAD AT THE SAME TIME, this isn't what's increasing congestion in the HOV lanes in Northern Virginia. These are roads that see several times that amount of traffic in an hour. As an example, I-66 in Northern Virginia sees nearly 200,000 vehicles per day.
Non-issue.
BUILD MORE LANES! QUIT WITH THE SOCIAL ENGINEERING PROJECTS AND SOLVE THE PROBLEMS WE HAVE!
I can see right now yer mind ain't right.
I wonder what they would say if we start filling the carpool lanes with Hummers (with the legal 2+ passengers)?
I don't understand the concept of HOV lanes. If you allow more people to sit in traffic with their cars idling, doesn't that create more emissions then letting everyone use the extra lane(s)? I'm admittedly science-stupid so please go easy on me. : )
The diamond lanes were supposed to reduce traffic, and thereby reduce gas consumption and pollution. They have done neither. People don't use them, because most people cannot routinely coordinate schedules that way. Nor do they want to. So they end up sitting in traffic jammed up next to empty diamond lanes, taking forever to get to work, and spewing pollution, since idling, slow moving stop and go traffic causes more pollution than moving at freeway speeds.
Hybrids do both: reduce fuel consumption and put out less pollution. That is the rationale for them being in the diamond lane. But the truth is...the diamond lanes are not necessary to achieve that goal. The technology is.
Open the diamond lanes, press automobile technology to reduce fuel consumption, and let the market take over.
The diamond lanes are one more failed liberal "program" which did not work. But the liberal bureaucrats and ideologues who dreamed it up will never admit to that, because to admit it would show them for the fools they are.
I would bet that the real culprits of crowding on HOV lanes are the single-occupant vehicles breaking the law, not the hybrid drivers.
As for those of you griping about the HOV lanes and the suggestion that they discriminate against you--is it not true that when the state sought federal funds to build those lanes, the state agreed to designate them HOV. Now that they are built, wouldn't it be going back on the bargain? You can argue against the policy behind federal support for HOV lanes all you want, but after the state has spent the money and you've built the lane, it's a little late to revise the deal.
The law of Unintended Consequences...
All of this is funny, but not nearly as funny as folks who ride with mannequins in the car to circumvent the rules. That is quite a solution, if you have convincing dummies.
[Insert DNC/John Kerry/DU joke here.]
That should be interesting. The only hybrid that actually gets more than 45 mpg is the Honda Insight.
I propose a special high speed lane for my American V8 powered Pontiac.
I use less gas when I'm not stuck behind slow moving Hondas, Nissans, etc.
Actually - I should be be thanked by libs for using more gas. The punitive taxes here in NYS help support all their stupid social programs!
This makes no sense. If Murphy's two-hour commute is cut to one hour, how does allow him to leave for work three hours later? What am I missing, other than another "journalist" who doesn't know how to write?
This is a sure-fire prescription for special favors being granted by politician-criminals for other politically-connected criminals, for bribes to change hands, and for all sorts of other types of organized criminal mischief. Why can't these government "professionals" ever learn a thing or two from history?