To The Left! Nevada HOV Lanes Getting Time Trimmed
There is nothing more frustrating than being stuck in bumper to bumper traffic on Interstate 15. Then you look to your left and see an open lane, with barely anyone using it. Dreaded HOV lanes are scattered throughout Nevada and in many areas were active 24 hours! Then they got trimmed (barely) to 5am-10pm. Well, expect the left lane to open up pretty soon.
Nevada Lieutenant Governor Stavros Anthony met with the Nevada Department Of Transportation on Monday in an attempt to drop the HOV lanes altogther. But a compromise was made, and the number of hours the lanes will be limited to two or more passengers will be specifically targeted towards rush hour.
NDOT board votes to further reduce HOV lane regulation hours in Vegas to between 6a.m.-8a.m. and 4p.m.-6p.m. Monday-Friday and open to all on weekends. New hours set to be in place in 30 days. Story coming to @reviewjournal. #vegas #vegastraffic
— Mick Akers (@mickakers) April 10, 2023
By May 10th, NDOT will be changing the HOV hours from the wide swath of time to something more reasonable. Monday through Friday from 6am until 8am for the morning commute, and again from 4pm until 6pm for the evening commute. Weekends? Let your left lane freak flag fly.
Nevada HOV lanes have rules that land in between extremes…
There are multiple ways of doing the HOV lane thing. Our neighbors to the west, California, do their lanes 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and their lanes are typically split with a raised divider. Considering how short lived and terribly the plastic dividers fared on Interstate 15… be glad they didn’t put a curbstone down. In other major metros like Boston, inbound HOV lanes are limited to 6am-10am. Other solutions include a “zipper lane” where a machine moves jersey barriers on either side of the highway, allowing HOV riders to take a lane on the opposing direction of the highway.
Thankfully, as bad as we think our traffic is, Nevada doesn’t need to go to extremes. Trimming down on the time the HOV lane is active is a good compromise. You know what would make traffic even better? Complete a single road project. Just one. Dare you.
