Your irrational pet peeves

[PensFanInDC]

I don't know if I blame him or metallica for Lulu. Probably both...

It takes two to tango.

Is there a way to get just the music from that album?

[Factorial]

I heard a few minutes of it and turned it off. Perfectly dreadful. I blame Metallica as I'm sure they initiated the project.

[PensFanInDC]

I heard a few minutes of it and turned it off. Perfectly dreadful. I blame Metallica as I'm sure they initiated the project.

Not sure if serious.

[columbia]

I don't care about the Metallica angle, but that was a painful musical exit for Lou.

[skullman80]

I just like to pretend that collaboration never happened. Just was one of those things that didn't sound good form the get go, and sounded even worse once it happened.

[Jim]

The zipper is good in theory, but hard to actually pull off when real people do it.

Getting over prior to the merge point saves time in the long run, as the drivers in the open lane won't need to slow down in order to let people in from the closed lane who speed up and pass everyone, but run out of road to do so and slow down to a crawl waiting for a spot to enter.

To let the jagoff who tried to speed past everyone in, the open lane has to slow the flow of traffic, otherwise the guy from the closed lane can't get in. This causes a ripple effect to the point that a jam occurs because the original flow of traffic has to be halted to almost nothing, due in part to the people who speed in the closed lane to try to get ahead of everyone.

If everyone gets over when they see a "Lane closed, 2 miles ahead" sign, there'd be no problems. 2 miles is more than enough to find ample room and maintain flow of traffic. Problem is, people are impatient ****** and try to get ahead of everyone, and THAT is what causes the jams. Not the people getting over early.

It would actually be the exact same problem and speed as the merge point simply moves two miles down the road. You are mentally picturing a much lower traffic volume at the 2-mile sign which therefore cases no delay. However, once traffic reaches the volume of cars needing to slow down to get behind another car... the merge point all backed up but is simply 2 miles away from the closure.

[DropEmJayBird]

There is only one merge point, where the lane closes - trying to define a merge point before that will just lead to chaos as 30 different merge points are selected by drivers.. which of course will piss off certain drivers as they realize some cars selected merge points further up the road than their own.

[dodint]

The difference for me is if you're going to the furthest merge point possible (the physical barrier) while passing a long line of cars that are already queued up, making no effort to get in, you're wrong. Chances are you're in a hurry to get to that point as well, which brings me back to the differential of speed issue we discuss from time to time. In this scenario the lane already queued needs to stop and accommodate you, and in the aggregate you're wasting a lot of peoples time. Whereas if you slowed down and cruised slowly with the signal on someone would let you in in a more fluid way.

Blasting past a line of slowly moving/stopped cars, then getting to the construction barrel and turning the blinker on? *****bag. In a perfect world they'd sit there until the entire queue passes or the traffic lessens to the point they can safely zipper in. But in reality some enabler comes by letting them in, reinforcing their behavior at the expense of everyone.

[shmenguin]

Agree with that. You need to take your cues from what the herd already decided. If they merged early, you're wrong for trying to "cut in line".

It's not up to you whether it's ok or not to pass a line of waiting cars.

[Hockeynut!]

http://www.dot.state.mn.us/zippermerge/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So I'm supposed to merge late?

Yes! As you see the “lane closed ahead” sign and traffic backing up, stay in your current lane up to the point of merge. Then take turns with other drivers to safely and smoothly ease into the remaining lane. Don't worry about being "Minnesota nice." When traffic is heavy and slow, it is much safer for motorists to remain in their current lane until the point where traffic can orderly take turns merging.

When not to do the zipper merge

When traffic is moving at highway speeds and there are no backups, it makes sense to move sooner to the lane that will remain open through construction. The bottom line is to merge when it is safe to do so.

[MRandall25]

When traffic is moving at highway speeds and there are no backups, it makes sense to move sooner to the lane that will remain open through construction. The bottom line is to merge when it is safe to do so.

This was more what I was referring to, in my post. The open lane is moving at a decent rate of speed before and leading into the construction zone, so there should be no reason for shooting up to pass. The traffic jams are usually started because someone speeds ahead and has to slow down below the speed of traffic because they ran out of room and need someone to let them in. This causes the ripple effect and traffic then slows to a crawl.

[Hockeynut!]

Pretty much every time I am in a "lanes merge" situation in Pittsburgh, the "open" lane is backed up forever and not moving at all. In that situation, I drive the the merge point and wait to get in. If I'm a d-bag for that, so be it. Oddly enough, Pittsburgh is one of the only places I regularly encounter merge stoppages. It seems to go much more fluidly everywhere else.

[MRandall25]

Happened to me a lot on I-70 to Columbus. There's always construction on that road.

[dodint]

I guess I'm just a better person.

[Hockeynut!]

I'm sure you are.

My reasoning is: Traffic is already stopped. I'm going as far as I can before I try to enter the open lane. I'm not going to come to a stop and try to work my way into the stopped lane while 100+ other drivers continue on to the merge point and merge 1/2 mi or whatever ahead of me. I don't feel the need to be a traffic martyr.

[shmenguin]

Merge before traffic comes to a stop. No one's buying that you get unfairly put into this predicament with all these stopped cars.

[viva la ben]

Zipper merge or you're part of the problem

[Hockeynut!]

Merge before traffic comes to a stop. No one's buying that you get unfairly put into this predicament with all these stopped cars.

Have you driven in Pittsburgh? 75% of the time the "open" lane is at a complete stop before you even see the "merge" sign.

[tifosi77]

WGASWGAF

Is this the Steve Langford reference I think it is??

[shmenguin]

Merge before traffic comes to a stop. No one's buying that you get unfairly put into this predicament with all these stopped cars.

Have you driven in Pittsburgh? 75% of the time the "open" lane is at a complete stop before you even see the "merge" sign. :lol:

There's an element of this that depends on the road I guess. I'm envisioning a stretch of i95 in buttwad county. In a congested area things are different.

[dodint]

WGASWGAF

Is this the Steve Langford reference I think it is??

Well, the only other one deals with his large...package.

[Hockeynut!]

Merge before traffic comes to a stop. No one's buying that you get unfairly put into this predicament with all these stopped cars.

Have you driven in Pittsburgh? 75% of the time the "open" lane is at a complete stop before you even see the "merge" sign.

There's an element of this that depends on the road I guess. I'm envisioning a stretch of i95 in buttwad county. In a congested area things are different.

Yeah, I'm thinking of the Pittsburgh parkway where people wear out a set of brakes every month.

[dodint]

I'm sure you are.

My reasoning is: Traffic is already stopped. I'm going as far as I can before I try to enter the open lane. I'm not going to come to a stop and try to work my way into the stopped lane while 100+ other drivers continue on to the merge point and merge 1/2 mi or whatever ahead of me. I don't feel the need to be a traffic martyr.

Don't inject logic into this.

[PghSkins]

Zipper merge or you're part of the problem

[mac5155]

Merge before traffic comes to a stop. No one's buying that you get unfairly put into this predicament with all these stopped cars.

Have you driven in Pittsburgh? 75% of the time the "open" lane is at a complete stop before you even see the "merge" sign. :lol:

There's an element of this that depends on the road I guess. I'm envisioning a stretch of i95 in buttwad county. In a congested area things are different.

Yeah, I'm thinking of the Pittsburgh parkway where people wear out a set of brakes every month. ;)

In My experience with him shmenguin treats every driving scenario as best case