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RSS FeedHybrid Cars in Carpool Lanes |
Sep. 8, 2006
Categorized in: Current Exhibits
OK! I will admit right up front that this is a biased report. I am a real estate agent, so I don’t carpool. I have tried to figure out ways to do it. I tried for an entire year to find a carpool passenger through the RIDES program, but the erratic hours I keep and the unpredictability of my coming and going made that an impossible feat. I have considered leaving my car at work overnight and commuting by bus. That would work fine if I could be sure that my first stop every morning and my last stop every evening would be at my office. But often I am far from my office at the beginning or the end of the day, and it makes no sense to go that far out of my way just to take a bus. I have even tried carpooling with my husband, who, like me, works erratic hours and needs his car all day. However, our offices are so far apart that it is as far to the other person’s office as it is just to go home. Nothing accomplished there either.
With all of that said, I am a staunch supporter of carpool lanes. It makes absolutely no sense at all to me that more people don’t carpool, especially if they only use their car to get to and from work (as opposed to using their car all day as part of their job, as some of us do.) There are all kinds of programs to match people up with others who work the same hours and live and work in the same general area. And many employers have incentives (actually pay their employees) to do just that. In addition, some employers guarantee a certain number of free rides home for family emergencies such as when a child gets sick at school, etc. I just don’t understand why people don’t do it.
In my opinion there should be more carpool lanes. One of the problems with the carpool system is that it is not continuous. There may be 5 miles of carpool lane and then it disappears and you are in with the mobs. I think they should just confiscate one of the single car lanes to make a carpool lane so the system will be continuous. It doesn’t matter if they aren’t full and the other lanes are. That is my point. Make it uncomfortable enough so that people begin to rethink their habits and realize that the world will not fall apart if they carpool. They may even like it… less stress, time to chat, make all the cell phone calls you like, meet new people. There are all kinds of possibilities that might open up.
With this mindset, you can imagine my chagrin when they decided to let hybrid owners use the carpool lanes. I always thought the reasons for carpooling were 1) to reduce our dependence on foreign fuel and 2) to ease congestion by reducing the number of cars on the road. While hybrid cars certainly help with reason #1, they do nothing at all for #2. Dumb idea!! Add 75,000 solo drivers to the carpool lanes and what is bound to happen? They will get congested. And, guess what? That is exactly what has happened.
The San Jose Mercury News has reported today that congestion has increased significantly in carpool lanes since 1 year ago, when solo hybrids were first permitted to use the carpool lanes. There is no proof that the hybrids are to blame. Maybe there are just more cars on the road. But even if that is true, all the more reason to keep solo drivers out of the carpool lanes. I believe more people would be motivated to carpool IF the carpool lanes really were faster than the other lanes. They used to be, but now they are not.
It shivers my timbers that there is a bill waiting for Governor Schwarzenegger’s signature that would permit MORE solo hybrids in the carpool lanes. Not that I have anything at all against hybrids. I expect all cars will be hybrids in the near future, and that is a good thing. But if the carpool lanes get clogged up, carpoolers will decide it isn’t worth it and go back to solo driving. If the authorities try to ease congestion in carpool lanes by raising the occupant load to 3 instead of 2, the same thing will happen. It is hard enough to get people to agree to an occupancy load of 2 (hence all the solo drivers). There has to be a better way!
Why do I care? because many of us moved here and continue to live here because we love the weather and also the standard of living in this area. Obviously people need to get around, and I think there should be a mechanism for people to do it as easily as possible. A good public transit systen would be great, but with people spread out all over the bay area, living in one place and working miles away in all different directions, public transit may not ever really work well. More transit oriented housing is a good long term solution, but in the meantime we have to work with what we have, and the freeway system is it, at least for now.
For entire Mercury News article and a chance to vote, go to www.mercurynews.com. Or add your opinion here.
by: Lynne Mercer, GRI, e-Pro
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