There are two 200-foot long left turn lanes to turn onto the on-ramp on the expressway I take to work each day. After the turn, the right lane eventually merges with the left on the onramp about 700 feet down the ramp. Almost every day there are cars piled into the leftmost turn lane, literally spilling out into the straight lanes while the rightmost turn lane is either empty or only has 1-5 cars in it. Makes absolutely no sense! Why do people do this? My two theories are:
1. Drivers who are unfamiliar with the road and aren't aware there are actually two left turn lanes.
2. Drivers don't want to zipper merge from the right to left on the on-ramp
The problem with theory 1 is that both lanes are clearly marked as left turn lanes with large white arrows painted on them, but I suppose they could just be really bad at situational awareness. Second problem is that I often see the same cars every day doing this, so they know there are two turn lanes.
Theory 2 seems more plausible, as it seems to be the same phenomenon as people who merge miles ahead of construction when there is plenty of roadway left to use. In that case, I can only guess they're afraid that either others won't let them over at the choke point or that they will be viewed and possibly raged at as "line cutters" by ignorant people who don't understand how zipper merging works. However, an on-ramp seems like a different scenario to me than lane closures, so I'm not sure if it's a good comparison.
While occasionally I have some dingleberry in the left turn lane who will try to block me from zipper merging (i.e. speed up to close the gap that I'm about to merge into), it's really not that big of a deal most days, as there's plenty of ramp. If someone does try to block me, they usually eventually back off once they see that I'm holding my position. If they don't by the time it's getting close to the choke point, then I'll just slow down and merge behind them. I sure wouldn't want to wait 1-2 extra light cycles just to avoid that occasional scenario.
1. Drivers who are unfamiliar with the road and aren't aware there are actually two left turn lanes.
2. Drivers don't want to zipper merge from the right to left on the on-ramp
The problem with theory 1 is that both lanes are clearly marked as left turn lanes with large white arrows painted on them, but I suppose they could just be really bad at situational awareness. Second problem is that I often see the same cars every day doing this, so they know there are two turn lanes.
Theory 2 seems more plausible, as it seems to be the same phenomenon as people who merge miles ahead of construction when there is plenty of roadway left to use. In that case, I can only guess they're afraid that either others won't let them over at the choke point or that they will be viewed and possibly raged at as "line cutters" by ignorant people who don't understand how zipper merging works. However, an on-ramp seems like a different scenario to me than lane closures, so I'm not sure if it's a good comparison.
While occasionally I have some dingleberry in the left turn lane who will try to block me from zipper merging (i.e. speed up to close the gap that I'm about to merge into), it's really not that big of a deal most days, as there's plenty of ramp. If someone does try to block me, they usually eventually back off once they see that I'm holding my position. If they don't by the time it's getting close to the choke point, then I'll just slow down and merge behind them. I sure wouldn't want to wait 1-2 extra light cycles just to avoid that occasional scenario.
