It's been that way for a long time. I worked in the Pickering area from around 2002 through 2006 or so and every day getting on at Brock Road headed back to Oshawa, without fail, the "fast" lane was the slow lane. I had it down to a science for a while, stick to the right lane for a while, then the centre at one point around Salem, then back to the right lane once you were past the narrowing, and I was always miles ahead of all the sheep who just blasted right into the "fast" lane thinking it was actually faster.
Sure there’s no law against passing on the right. I guess I have to accept living in bizarro opposite world where the further left lanes are all jammed and I cruise on by on the right.
In fact I do it my entire commute, which is consistently faster if i just stick to the furthest right lane on the 401.
I suppose if everyone is doing the opposite, that’s the new norm and therefore technically safer!
I live and drive most of my commute thru Markham. The city is 65% persons that identify as Chinese. Many (all?) of the Chinese drivers follow Chinese convention of slow in left lane, pass in right lane.
When I was in a hurry on the Gardiner during rush hour, I’d move towards the rightmost lane, almost whenever possible, and then move back left as that lane ended or exited. It was more stressful, but much faster. Passed many people who crossed the solid line to merge a km before the lane ended.
True. Too many people sitting in the left lane instead of passing and moving over. Even trying to use it for passing is a constant brake/gas pedal tap dance and you don't get very far anyway.
I've noticed recently that EVERY time I go through the GTA I witness crazy dangerous driving on the 401. All the more reason to back off and stay to the right.
It's been that way for decades. I remember my Dad telling me many years ago, "People move to the left lane because they think it's 'the fast lane' and they think they drive fast." But it isn't, because they don't.
It's been that way for decades. I remember my Dad telling me many years ago, "People move to the left lane because they think it's 'the fast lane' and they think they drive fast." But it isn't, because they don't.
They move left to pass. Wind, time, up, out, the buck, in the night, sentence, it on, maybe even away; I'm not sure which, but not usually other traffic.
I tend to pass quickly and get back over, especially if there's a portable radar detector/deflector (i.e. tailgater) right on my tail.
As far as driving in the left lane. It used to peter out east of Kingston, except for people from Toronto/Montreal. Now it seems that every other person is from Toronto/Montreal, and you have to wait until you're going northbound for people to drive in the right lane.
Mentioned this before in other threads but in Ontario the highways are designed (or at least painted wrong) and this helps to create bad lane discipline here.
Here we add and subtract lanes from the right. We should do it from the left. If the right lane is the driving lane why does it end. If the left lane is the passing lane, why does it never end.... people don't like to change lanes so this encourages people (subconsciously) to hang in the left lane and avoid the right lane(s). Leaving Toronto, I can park my self in the left lane and drive all the way to Fort Erie never having to change lanes. If I do it right (proper lane), no such luck.
It is a commuting problem but I find it way worse on the weekends.
It is all an easy fix in theory, just adjust the paint. In reality it will be complete chaos for years until everyone relearns driving in Ontario.
Mentioned this before in other threads but in Ontario the highways are designed (or at least painted wrong) and this helps to create bad lane discipline here.
Here we add and subtract lanes from the right. We should do it from the left. If the right lane is the driving lane why does it end. If the left lane is the passing lane, why does it never end.... people don't like to change lanes so this encourages people (subconsciously) to hang in the left lane and avoid the right lane(s). Leaving Toronto, I can park my self in the left lane and drive all the way to Fort Erie never having to change lanes. If I do it right (proper lane), no such luck.
It is a commuting problem but I find it way worse on the weekends.
It is all an easy fix in theory, just adjust the paint. In reality it will be complete chaos for years until everyone relearns driving in Ontario.
This is absolutely one facet of the problem, but it's only one of many. Add a total lack of meaningful training, education and testing (especially on highway driving), nervous drivers who prefer to only have moving traffic on one side, self-appointed speed police ("I'm doing the LIMIT, thank you very much! And so should you! If you're late, then you should have left earlier! etc."), people bringing habits from other countries and not making the faintest effort to change despite being on an entirely different continent, a total lack of enforcement of the rules beyond speeding (and even that seems vanishingly rare on the highway these days), and just an overwhelming collective sense of self-importance and Main Character Syndrome that's a product of a century plus of rampant consumerism, and you get what we have.
I used to think the wording of the signs mattered, in that "Keep right except to pass," vs, "Slower traffic please keep right" sent a very different meaning. Nobody likes to think they're slower, just that the faster guys are crazy (see the George Carlin joke), but the habit of staying right regardless of speed was a good one. But I've come to realise that the problem drivers simply don't read any signs, whether it's speed limit, guidance, whatever, and none of that stuff really matters.
Mentioned this before in other threads but in Ontario the highways are designed (or at least painted wrong) and this helps to create bad lane discipline here.
Here we add and subtract lanes from the right. We should do it from the left. If the right lane is the driving lane why does it end. If the left lane is the passing lane, why does it never end.... people don't like to change lanes so this encourages people (subconsciously) to hang in the left lane and avoid the right lane(s). Leaving Toronto, I can park my self in the left lane and drive all the way to Fort Erie never having to change lanes. If I do it right (proper lane), no such luck.
Let me get this straight...you want people to merge onto the highway into the passing lane?
So i live at 401/404 which as it happens has a merge lane onto 404 north when you exit from the 401. The average person having come around a corner about 200metres back tend to putter around 50 or 60km/hr and then indicate (if you`re lucky) their intention to merge to the right. The traffic travelling in said lane is obviously going 120+ outside of rush hour. Care to guess how that ends?
So i live at 401/404 which as it happens has a merge lane onto 404 north when you exit from the 401. The average person having come around a corner about 200metres back tend to putter around 50 or 60km/hr and then indicate (if you`re lucky) their intention to merge to the right. The traffic travelling in said lane is obviously going 120+ outside of rush hour. Care to guess how that ends?
No, long and short, the driving lane should never end, and that is the key point.
More in-depth, it is about when the highway narrows. When going from 3 to 2 or 4 to 3 or X to Y lanes the lane removal should be the left/passing lane and NOT the right/driving lane, it can be removed between exits. What we do now is reduce from the right by having the driving lane end into an exit (forced to change lanes or exit). Alternatively when done properly, right lane splits at the exit and if lane reduction is required it comes off the left a km or so after the exit.
For a merge you always merge into the driving lane. Drivers merging too slowly is a problem regardless.
If we are increasing the number of lanes ideally it should be a lane added on the left but there may be some cases where adding to the right makes physical sense, like two highways merging.
Will this make everyone sit in the far right lane, likely not. BUT it will stop them from parking themselves in the left as they need to keep changing lanes. Right and centre lanes become the now "I rarely need to change lanes spot" instead of the left. Left becomes a real passing lane.
Lots of places do it this way and it works. The switch here will be chaos until people relearn their bad habits.
Mentioned this before in other threads but in Ontario the highways are designed (or at least painted wrong) and this helps to create bad lane discipline here.
Here we add and subtract lanes from the right. We should do it from the left. If the right lane is the driving lane why does it end. If the left lane is the passing lane, why does it never end.... people don't like to change lanes so this encourages people (subconsciously) to hang in the left lane and avoid the right lane(s). Leaving Toronto, I can park my self in the left lane and drive all the way to Fort Erie never having to change lanes. If I do it right (proper lane), no such luck.
It is a commuting problem but I find it way worse on the weekends.
It is all an easy fix in theory, just adjust the paint. In reality it will be complete chaos for years until everyone relearns driving in Ontario.
Not sure I see logic in this. There are very few places where the highway loses a lane, we merge and open the ramp lanes from the right because that's where traffic is supposed to be moving at its slowest.
Which seems sensible to me.
Imagine the chicken-match dashcam videos if we had to merge left lanes at 140.
No, long and short, the driving lane should never end, and that is the key point.
More in-depth, it is about when the highway narrows. When going from 3 to 2 or 4 to 3 or X to Y lanes the lane removal should be the left/passing lane and NOT the right/driving lane, it can be removed between exits. What we do now is reduce from the right by having the driving lane end into an exit (forced to change lanes or exit). Alternatively when done properly, right lane splits at the exit and if lane reduction is required it comes off the left a km or so after the exit.
For a merge you always merge into the driving lane. Drivers merging too slowly is a problem regardless.
If we are increasing the number of lanes ideally it should be a lane added on the left but there may be some cases where adding to the right makes physical sense, like two highways merging.
Will this make everyone sit in the far right lane, likely not. BUT it will stop them from parking themselves in the left as they need to keep changing lanes. Right and centre lanes become the now "I rarely need to change lanes spot" instead of the left. Left becomes a real passing lane.
Lots of places do it this way and it works. The switch here will be chaos until people relearn their bad habits.
Slightly unrelated, but I think part of the reason the right lane ends on an undivided highway is that it is considered lower risk to have a merging conflict than a head-on situation if someone stays in the left lane and doesn't merge for whatever reason. I know parts of Europe end the left lane, but I think there'e a higher expectation that people are paying attention, draw your own conclusions...
Where do they do this? I'm interested in seeing an aerial view of their highway system. To do that here on established highways, it would be difficult to justify a possible change in behaviour at the expense of removing sections of the left-most lane that are currently carrying traffic.
Where do they do this? I'm interested in seeing an aerial view of their highway system. To do that here on established highways, it would be difficult to justify a possible change in behaviour at the expense of removing sections of the left-most lane that are currently carrying traffic.
While not what you asked, IIRC seattle runs HOV in the right lane and people merge through it. Causes some chaos but also makes some sense. For a bus getting on the highway for one exit, it's easy to travel at speed in HOV. With our system HOV is also an express lane that requires you to be travelling much further than one stop to be effective (even if there were access points more often, changing across eight lanes of entitled dickbags in a bus has got to be hell).
While not what you asked, IIRC seattle runs HOV in the right lane and people merge through it. Causes some chaos but also makes some sense. For a bus getting on the highway for one exit, it's easy to travel at speed in HOV. With our system HOV is also an express lane that requires you to be travelling much further than one stop to be effective (even if there were access points more often, changing across eight lanes of entitled dickbags in a bus has got to be hell).
With the law giving busses the right of way here, that shouldn't be a problem. On-board cameras to capture license plates of drivers not letting them in should deter offenders pretty quick, but most drivers have gotten used to it by now. With HOV in the right lane, the constant merging of poor drivers who don't know how to speed up to the flow of traffic would probably negate the benefit.
With the law giving busses the right of way here, that shouldn't be a problem. On-board cameras to capture license plates of drivers not letting them in should deter offenders pretty quick, but most drivers have gotten used to it by now.
That only applies when reentering traffic from a bus bay. It also has a huge caveat that many bus drivers either don't know or don't care about. " No driver of a bus shall re-enter the lane of traffic adjacent to a bus bay and move into the path of a vehicle or street car if the vehicle or street car is so close that it is impractical for the driver to yield the right of way." Even if the law did apply to the highway which it clearly doesn't, in dense traffic, that clause really impedes motion as the bus can't push and needs to wait for a bunch of cars to get out of the way (and it is highly likely that a hole that big would be filled by someone from the far side of the hole jumping in to gain a car length).
This site uses cookies to help personalise content, tailor your experience and to keep you logged in if you register.
By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies.
