TIL what a zipper merge is

[nevets88]

My morbid curiosity for watching car wrecks on reddit's roadcam subreddit has been an education in driving, learning things they don't teach you in those driver ed courses, although admittedly, the last one I "took", I use air quotes because I was really auditing the online course over someone else's shoulder. Terms like brake check were not in the curriculum. 

Here's the video w/the term, actually I've been doing this for a long time, just never knew the term for it. It seemed intuitive to me this was an efficient way to merge, or maybe just too lazy to early merge. Maybe I need to take a UK or German driver's ed course. 

 

 

[iacas]

Seems counter-productive to zipper merge, yeah, but think of it this way… all you're doing is moving the bottleneck further back.

[Hardspoon]

There is an advantage created by everyone merging at the SAME point, rather than (essentially) randomly choosing their spot to merge.  Also, more cars are moving at similar speeds, rather than different speeds, which allows for smoother merges (besides the added bonus of reducing crashes).

If you're really interested in this kind of thing, you should check out:

https://www.amazon.com/Traffic-Drive-What-Says-About/dp/0307277194

It's a very good read.

 

[David in FL]

Reifsverschussverfahren!

[Jack Watson]

Safe driving is a skill everyone can do better.  Prob is there's little real training available for individuals.

90 percent of drivers following distance is way too close.  That's one example.

I am now dumber for having watched a bit of the zipper merge explanation and I will never get that time back.

Merge when it's safe.  It's not much good being stopped at the merge point because you couldn't get in.  Then others behind are similarly screwed.

Driving is about SAFELY getting from a to b.

Edited August 3, 2017 by Jack Watson

[iacas]

15 minutes ago, Jack Watson said:

Merge when it's safe.  It's not much good being stopped at the merge point because you couldn't get in.

No, merge at the end. And let others merge if you're in the "good" lane.

[jamo]

29 minutes ago, Hardspoon said:

If you're really interested in this kind of thing, you should check out:

https://www.amazon.com/Traffic-Drive-What-Says-About/dp/0307277194

It's a very good read.

 

I read that book a few years ago. The author comes back to late merging a bunch of times. 

[Jack Watson]

There's no merging trick you can do that does anything to change the fact of existing traffic conditions.  

Again safety is always the priority.  Waiting till the last second to merge requires others to let you in.

You no longer control your driving destiny.  

Its common sense it's just as stupid to be stopped trying to merge early as it is to be stopped merging late.  Either way you are banking on traffic slowing to let you in.

See gap merge when safe using signal.  That's the safest approach.

Good driving has nothing to do with getting a place faster as the video said.

Good driving is arriving safely.

[iacas]

10 minutes ago, Jack Watson said:

Good driving is arriving safely.

Not mutually exclusive.

Merge late.

If you sit because you can't find a gap and people are being jerks, sit. It won't be long.

[David in FL]

The second video mentions that merging early "opens the way for douchebags to zip ahead and cut into the line..."

My question is, at what point does a "douchebag" suddenly become a responsible driver attempting to zipper merge?

[jamo]

7 hours ago, David in FL said:

The second video mentions that merging early "opens the way for douchebags to zip ahead and cut into the line..."

My question is, at what point does a "douchebag" suddenly become a responsible driver attempting to zipper merge?

When they're not zooming.

[David in FL]

2 hours ago, jamo said:

When they're not zooming.

Define zooming.

I'm serious here.  If everyone is "incorrectly" merging too early and causing chaos in the left lane, then anyone in the right lane will have plenty of room to move forward at a speed that may seem to be "zooming" but in reality might be just a bit faster than the jammed up traffic in the left lane.  

 

[No Mulligans]

Respect the zipper.

[Jack Watson]

If traffic is heavy it will always end up in some form of zipper merge in a lane closure scenario.

Problems occur when people cheat by using off ramp lanes as a form of self made zipper merge.  Drivers not cheating get pissed and stupid drivers who do that get ticketed if caught in my area.

Theres shoulder hopping too.  In my area there's a frequent backup that happens because a single lane comes to a four way intersection and 90 percent of people go left.  Very few go right and traffic often backs up a couple miles.  The shoulder is big enough to pass people for maybe a good mile or two and then get into the right turn lane if you are going right.  Risks a ticket but happens daily.  It's shoulder hopping.

Once I was in a vehicle on a trip and the driver drove on the far left area to the left of all lanes at 50 plus for over thirty minutes with stopped traffic in all four hiway lanes to the right.  Right next to the concrete divider.  Saved a lot of time.  Stupid stupid stupid.

 

Edited August 4, 2017 by Jack Watson