The HOV-3 to HOV-2 Suggestion

raymond - you've no way to verify that I rode the bus anymore than I do with you. Still makes you a turd polisher, though.

Even I am put off by the level of discourse here. [:(]

Still, I think Raymond has a valid point though. I've been away from posting for a long time. I logged in yesterday just to find out NoSUV still tries to get across his point. I don't think he has any, by the way. He recommends slugs to look to our right to see how congested the regular lanes are. Therefore, slugs are selfish. I'd even go further and say to NoSUV to get his head out of the sand and recommend people from regular lanes look to their left and see there's a system that started 30 years ago and still works great. That slugs aren't part of the problem. Moreover, slugs contribute to alliviate traffic by taking cars out of the roads. Who's the selfish now?

To go back to some earlier assertions at the beginning of this thread, those of you who assert that I-66 was always HOV-2 have it wrong. When I-66 opened inside the Beltway in December 1982, it was initially HOV-4 in the peak direction. Almost nobody used it. They eased the rules to HOV-3 about a year after the road opened because of the underutilization, and the rules were further eased to HOV-2 in March 1995. The addition of an HOV lane on I-66 outside the Beltway, and on the Dulles Toll Road, came well after I-66 had opened inside the Beltway. The approach taken on I-66 outside the Beltway of using a different-colored shoulder lane with X and arrow signals to indicate when the lane is open was a direct result of the problems VDOT experienced in using the shoulder as a lane on I-95, which included at least one fatality when a trucker drove in that lane illegally and pancaked a stopped motorist.

We'd be happy to. Care to share a link with us?

Perhaps you are thinking of the inception of the entire carpool lanes concept, rather than the beginning of the work on the portion outside the Beltway, which is what MDC is referring to? The original plan was for buses, yes. But by the time they got to planning the section outside the Beltway, HOV-3 was an established fact.

All I can say is that I was on the carpool lanes the day they opened from Lorton to the Occoquan, and again when they opened it down to Dale City and to Route 234. Were you? Didn't think so.

Every inch of those sections was designed and built for carpools, buses, and motorcycles. Hype-breds were still on the drawing board.