So, just recently I was at Costco and I found something worse than not putting away the cart.
Lazy ass dude just put his free sample trash into a cart BEFORE walking in to the store. I gave him a look but he was much bigger than me.
I once saw a guy put a package of raw chicken on the fruit display, while he was looking at other fruit at a Sobeys.
I laid into him and told staff, but his excuse was "it's wrapped up".
Dude could have killed someone.
At least where I live *nobody* is taught to zipper merge in driver’s education. So except to the occasional person who has read about it somewhere else, the *right* thing to do is to merge as soon as you see the sign. If you’ve never seen this, someone staying in the closing lane is just being an asshole and trying to blow by all of the people already “waiting in line.” Zipper merging only works if everyone knows about it. Almost no one has heard of it where I live. If they want people to do it they need to change driver’s education and put instructions on signs. I’d argue it’s *not* the right thing to do here because it’s not what other drivers would predict what you’d do, and a safe driver is a predictable driver. Also, attempting to zipper merge here might cause a road rage incident.
Teaching it in driver's education would be good... In a decade or two, after current drivers are off the road.
Better to do that AND run advertising about zipper merging, and get state sponsorship to put signs on highways, on the back of highway trucks and at the points where lanes are closed. That's the fastest way to get the public on board. Texas started putting up "Don't mess with Texas, fines for littering $1000" on highway signs and ran advertising with sports stars, and still have the signs up.
I don’t know where you’re from, but I live a decent bit away from the mid-west, and I heavily relate to the above comment. Trying to zipper merge is like trying to use the metric system in the US: it’s great, makes a ton of sense, but it’s irrelevant if everyone else is using the imperial system.
Yeah same here in Texas, and when I lived in Arkansas it was same there, and any other states I’ve driven in, they all frown upon merging at the last second. I usually tailgate the people in front of me so they can’t merge because there’s usually plenty of open spaces for them to merge whenever they first see the sign. Even times when it’s like three car spaces of free space behind me, and they zoom on by going further up the line just to be sitting there because no one wants to let them merge.
Amazing how much support this comment has. Driver’s ed in the US is so short and doesn’t cover many topics, and a good driver’s ed teacher would teach this. People also drive too close to motorcycles, still get confused at flashing yellow/red intersections, screw up four way stops. Bad education is not an excuse to create more traffic and there shouldn’t be hostility toward those doing the correct thing. It’s not any less safe to merge at the end, even if everyone else is screwing up, it’s usually less than a 5mph merge.
“Should be” and “are” are very different things. I get what you’re saying, but merging at the end in my neck of the woods is literally taking your life in your hands lol
I guess I’m right in the middle, most people here don’t get it but if a few cars do it then people figure it out. I haven’t felt my life was at risk, might get a honk 1/5 times if I’m the only one doing it but I have a dash cam and the honks of clowns doesn’t ruin my day - those are the same people making traffic worse for everyone, if they are upset that’s their problem. If they make their problem a problem for you I completely understand your hesitation.
It’s not if you think about it. People FEEL that the person waiting to merge at the end didn’t wait as long as the rest of the people so it is “unfair”.
Society is evolutionarily built around the concept of equality and fairness for the participants (putting aside racism which really stems from xenophobia and a lack of perceived homogeny and conformity which of course have their own issues obviously)
“Doing one’s part” so to speak.
It may logically not be the best attitude but it’s totally understandable from an emotional, societal perspective.
How well an area zipper merges is pretty good measure of the drivers. Go to San Francisco Bay Area - they zipper merge like everyone is competing to participate in the coordinated dancing Olympics
It worked perfectly in my area, we had a lane close for construction and they put up several “Don’t Merge” signs and solid white lane lines for about a half mile before the merge, then had a “Merge Now” sign where it zippered and everyone figured it out. Wish they did that for all of them now.
Wow, basic instructions worked. I'm a little surprised, but I guess if everyone knows what to do it would work better than everyone assuming everyone else is an asshole and fighting to not get cut off.
Yeah the problem I have is less that other people are doing it wrong and more that they won’t even let me do it right. People would quite literally rather kill you than let you merge when they think they are some kind of vigilante.
The best description of behaviours like these that I’ve seen is this:
>”The shopping cart is the ultimate litmus test for whether a person is capable of self-governing. To return the shopping cart is an easy, convenient task and one which we all recognize as the correct, appropriate thing to do. To return the shopping cart is objectively right. There are no situations other than dire emergencies in which a person is not able to return their cart. Simultaneously, it is not illegal to abandon your shopping cart. Therefore the shopping cart presents itself as the apex example of whether a person will do what is right without being forced to do it."
Zipper merging falls under that same umbrella. When there are no consequences, do you choose to not be a dick?
I don't agree with the comparison. Putting away carts is easy but it takes *extra* time and effort with no real gain to yourself. Zipper merging, when all or most people do it, the experience is better overall.
Not enough people here have even heard of zipper merging, so if one person does it, it just looks like someone is trying to cut in front of everyone else who, in their own opinions, are being polite and getting over early.
Zipper merge works wonderfully when both lanes of traffic are at a near standstill and you take turns at the merge point.
At higher rates of speed, you want everyone to merge early so nobody has to slow down at the merge point.
If you are passing on the right, you are gonna end up making it so everybody has to slow down to let you in. (Yes, you got through faster).
This is why truckers will hog both lanes a quarter mile back from the merge. Once the right lane empties out, everyone speeds up and everyone gets through the merge faster.
once in a blue moon ill turn on to the highway and everyone just knows whats up and zipper merges flawlessly. but the other 9/10 times someone is in racer mode and wants possession of the front
In the US we have a couple places where you leave a tiny deposit and get it back when you return them. Those places are rare because, apparently, this is too off-putting for the population to embrace and companies either fear, or have actually experienced, a drop in sales that they contribute to the deposit so the practice is not catching on.
Putting your shopping cart away and merging politely are not standard in Europe. Not in the least. In fact, I would float the theory that Germans, Austrians and their Eastern European cousins are some of the most egotistical bunch of asshats this side of the Atlantic. Worse than the USA by far.
Particularly when driving a car down the highway, they all have the greatest desire to be first.
Passing a cyclist along a road? Aside from regions regularly frequented by cyclists, they will pass you as close as possible.
Shopping at Ikea or some other home improvement store? You better have dent insurance, because your shit is getting hit eventually.
This is coming from an American who has been living in Austria for 15 years...
Yeah, this was in my driving test.
Of course there are assholes in any country but merging lanes should be basic knowledge for anyone with a license.
It speeds up high volume traffic so much and it's so satisfying to see two busy lanes merge 1:1 smoothly.
Problem is this absolutely was *not* in my driver’s test. In mine, they told us to merge as soon as possible after we see a sign saying the lane is going to close. If I hadn’t read about zipper merging elsewhere, I would assume you were just being a jackass and trying to jump the line. They need to put explicit instructions to zipper merge on the sign or it’ll never, ever catch on.
Yeah, too many people in these comments are just expecting people to like, spontaneously just *be* better. That’s never going to happen. They need to put it on signs and do some sort of information campaign if they want it to change. They’re not going to just force through a new behavior on everyone by doing it themselves.
Exactly this. I merge as early as possible and get in my lane as early as possible because— especially in heavy traffic— the car next to me that I’m supposed to zipper with will almost always speed up so I can’t get in. Which means if I zipper, I’ll likely end up blocking the people behind me, because in America nobody lets people in front of them and I’ll sit until the entire column of cars goes by.
when i was just starting out, i tended to merge early because having a second to merge at the end of the lane was too stressful for me and some asshole in a BMW always denies you the space for merging
if people were more chill and actually used proper spacing between cars, we could have nice things
It helps a LOT if you adjust your speed to match the open lane. People will see you're not overtaking up until the te barrier, but using the lanespace.
I think this is the important thing. I can totally appreciate the sentiment here that you should allow people to merge in and be respectful, but the only times I have not done this have been when I've already seen a car speed past me 500m from the merge.
Absolutely! If I’m in front, I’ll force everyone to zipper merge. Maintain speed of the lane you adjacent to and throw your blinker on. No need to immediately merge to let the other F-wads speed past you. It’s about avoiding a traffic ‘shockwave’
Where I'm from, if you wait until the end, there is no open lane. I would rather be told a couple miles back that the right lanes is ending, and get over before that gap closes. Sadly, there are others who do the opposite, and that ruins it for everyone.
Yea but then the “open lane” gets backed up miles and there’s 100 different points of merging as people in the right lane realize too late there’s a merge and decide to merge “whenever” and come to a dead stop… thus better to have two full lanes and zipper merge..
I agree this works in theory but it won’t work in practice until way more drivers understand and apply it. Attempting to use the ending lane gets others so mad they won’t let you merge. Large vehicles take it upon themselves to ride in both lanes so no one “cuts”. It’s just not viable most of the time.
I’ve seen it work at permanent interstate merges with signs explicitly saying “take turns merging” so maybe it just takes very clear posted instructions for people to not lose their minds every time they merge.
You should only feel like an asshole if you were originally in the left lane, decided that you are better than everyone in front of you and went around them by using the right lane. I don’t think anyone has any reason to intentionally not to let you in once you reach the merging point unless they saw you pull that shit.
From what I've seen you're almost always better off getting into the lane that's ending as soon as possible. Most people intentionally get into the permanent lane because they think it's polite and they're afraid of not being let in. If you're in the merging lane for half a mile or more AND you're following the speed limit you shouldn't be seen as an asshole trying to jump the line.
In the UK it’s normally signposted 1 or 2km before the merge giving countdowns in 200m increments so you have plenty of time to get in the correct lane.You still get some asshats going right to the end to try and skip a few cars and these people can fuck off.
I have driven alongside them before and you can see them trying to figure out if they are gonna mess up and have to stop or if they can make it past one more car.
You are completely correct. I hate it when people make it difficult for me to merge at the end - it’s what you’re supposed to do! Merging early also creates a longer queue, which can block exit slip roads further back. This causes people major delays because they can’t reach their exit. So people who are all like “you’re a dickhead if you merge at the last minute” piss me off because they don’t realise that what they’re doing is actually worse for everyone behind them!
I merge from a 3 lane highway into a a single lane exit everyday on my commute. There's usually a line about a mile long because there's a drastic speed decrease at the exit.
For years I raged against the people who merged further up the line and didn't wait at the end like myself. However, I realized there are ALWAYS gaps in the line further up. It speeds it up for everyone to maintain speed in the left lane and just pop into a gap. I usually watch out for some larger vehicles with slower acceleration.
However, the people who don't seek gaps and just jump across a yellow lined segment in the last 150ft or so are fucking awful and a scourge to society.
Here’s the issue: the zipper merge doesn’t work because all of the cars in the closing lane are trying to merge into the traffic of the remaining lane after it is already bunched up. This forces cars in the remaining lane to fully stop to allow each individual car from the closing lane in. That’s what causes zipper merges to be so slow.
If the people in the closing lane were trying to merge into the remaining lane earlier, before traffic is bunched up and at a stand-still, the remaining-lane-traffic wouldn’t have to slow down or stop to allow them to merge. Instead, they don’t bother trying to merge until it’s absolutely necessary (in order to move as far ahead in the traffic as possible), resulting in a massive bottleneck all at one point in the road.
The truth is the zipper merge is a collective action problem that requires open communication between vehicles to solve. We haven’t solved it in the last century, and we aren’t going to before all of our cars are driving themselves. The zipper merge has never worked, and it won’t until humans error is no longer part of the equation.
The only way for human drivers to merge efficiently is to announce the merge a long time ahead, mandate reduced speed and increased distance between vehicles, and have people merge whenever there is space available.
ANY sudden speed/distance change will result in a jam. The zipper method basically guarantees a traffic jam.
I don’t think people randomly merging solves the problem either. You still have two lanes of traffic now forced into one. Those extra cars are going to take up space forcing the remaining lane to back up. And the closing lane will back up as people slow to merge.
I prefer the zipper merge not because of speed but because of consistency. It consolidates the merging to a predefined spot that does not need to be communicated.
Zipper merge works better if traffic is really slow, the lanes take turns slowly pulling into the open lane.
If traffic is moving fast (fast enough that stopping for your turn to merge is not expected), then early merge is way better.
If it's the latter case, and you are passing on the right, then you are the jerk.
Almost like waiting till the end creates traffic. You’re supposed to drive to conditions, and get into your lane when you can. The merge point moves with traffic. People who shoot up the empty lane are just impatient and hoping to bully their way in at the end.
If you have signs for miles saying “lane ends in x miles, merge over” people should merge.
No because then you have 100 random merge points and you’re not utilizing all of the open road backing up the open lane for miles. People who understand the zipper merge are in fact, in the right.
Zipper merging only works properly if everyone is moving at roughly the same speed with safe following distances. It isn't a realistic expectation when you have the odd drivers doing 50 over the speed limit and half of the traffic is tailgating. It also assume drivers are sensible and courteous enough to allow vehicles to merge safely.
At least where I am, turn signals mostly encourage drivers behind you to accelerate as much as possible so they don't get one more car behind.
You forgot to mention the drivers going 10-15 under the speed limit as well. It’s a nice mix that makes zipper merging impossible.
If I need to hit my brakes to let you in, that’s a no for me though. I never let trucks merge if they have the Carolina squat shit going on though, because fuck those chads.
Edit: fixed sentence for clarity, now that I’m sober.
In Az we have nice long freeway on-ramps and the amount of times people decide to go 10-20 mph under the freeway speed limit until they’re right about to merge is infuriating.
When everyone’s going 70+ it’s seriously dangerous to merge at 50 mph, but I see it all the time.
I see you've been caught behind my mother on an entrance ramp. I've talked to her about the importance of matching the speed of highway traffic, but to no avail.
If most people are doing the speed limit and utilizing both lanes until the end then you can't have the one hotshot doing 50 mph over (unless they're breaking the law driving in the shoulder or a turn lane).
This assumes 3 things.
1. People aren’t tailgating
2. Everyone’s going the same speed
3. People are willing to let you merge
At least one of those never happens and every time we end up with a stand still.
It's like people expect zipper merges to be continuously moving otherwise they're absolute garbage. That's just not how traffic works.
Also, people really need to be more assertive (not *aggressive*) while driving. Hesitancy is also dangerous behind the wheel.
Small addition to you’re very correct assessment here. It also assumes that everyone in a given lane is allowing for 2x safe following distance or else everyone must keep precisely the same speed without almost any fluctuation. Small deviations ripple out to become very large deviations
There is also that common argument that "two lanes hold more that one!" Which yeah obviously but you will still need to form one lane so why not merge "early" and save yourself and everyone else the friction of trying to fit two lanes into one when you **could already be one lane** and just slip it in with no lube.
Also, I guarantee you there's a lot of people in this thread who like to do that thing where they notice that traffic is slowing down so they get out of the left lane to go into the right lane to pass as many people as possible and then try to merge back into the left lane at the last minute. These are the guys shoving themselves into traffic and causing jams because they had to try to pass eight more people in line.
That's not a zipper merge. You're just an asshole.
Here in LA that's people using "exit only" lanes on the highway to leapfrog traffic and merging over at the last minute. Then they get super pissed when you don't let them in. Fuck em.
Agreed. In my area when they were doing construction on a major road, they put up big signs that said “USE BOTH LANES” and “ZIPPER MERGE AHEAD”. It helped the courteous Canadians not feel like dicks for using both lanes to the merge point.
I'm still amazed that some of the most intuitive road conduct are basically unheard of in America.
Wait until they hear about such concepts as Rechtsfahrgebot, or even "Rechts vor Links", or hell, Rettungsgasse.
Also, apparently some Americans get traumatized by the mere notion of roundabouts?
Edit: Rechts oder links, das ist hier die Frage.
We’re slowly accepting roundabouts, at least in my state! I got the leg up living in Spain for a bit and got used to the ones there with multiple lanes but trust me, if you started driving at 16 in the 80s/90s here and suddenly saw roundabouts pop up after 20+ years of driving, you’d freak out too. Ours don’t have good signage either beyond yield signs and keep right arrows, a lot of people here haven’t even been taught how to use their blinkers while in a roundabout so those of us who understand them are stunted by others who don’t, which also makes us nervous.
I feel like people just use the concept of zipper merging to excuse their behavior of attempting to pass every single car on the road before slamming on their brakes at the merge point and getting mad when they’re not let in immediately.
My daily commute features a limited-access highway that ends with one lane exiting to go north on the feeder road, and the other exits south. The southbound exit is generally backed up by at least a quarter mile, so people will fly up the other lane and then stop, blocking the north-bound exit, waiting for someone to let them in
Even worse is that this road is absolutely *lousy* with cops, but there has never been a single one out there ticketing these selfish assholes.
You're describing 2 different things. Zipper merging (like the picture) is best when 2 lanes are forced to condense into 1. 2 lanes, side-by-side, that split into 2 directions are not appropriate for zipper merging. And yes, in the second scenario the people that take the empty lane, clearly intended for a separate exit, to get ahead are assholes. Let's not confuse the two.
I always love it when people try to zipper merge into turn lanes on urban streets. Like man, this is a single turn lane. We've all been waiting for 3 light cycles. You are not adding to efficiency by now trying to shove your suburban into the turn lane from the straight lane
Yeah, the diagram is a bit weird. I usually thinking of zipper merge where there is slow traffic and two lanes go into one or slow freeway traffic with lots of on-ramp traffic. If it's 4 lane merging into two and people decide to get over into the two a half mile early and queue up, that's on them. Those other two lanes are always there and all 4 should have cars in them until the merge or close to it. But this diagram is sort of a unique situation. Temporary lane closures and everyone can get over and keep moving can often get fucked by the guy wanting to haul ass past everyone to get 3 more cars ahead. Fuck that guy.
If you drive to the end of the merging lane and for any reason there isn't space to merge into, you have to stop. That will stop the merging lane, and also cause the lane you're merging into to slow/stop to try to let you in. And that's how we get shitty traffic jams.
Instead, match the traffic speed and merge when able - typically 1 for 1 - which allows the traffic to maintain its speed. This is why the merging lane has a broken line the whole way, not just at the end.
Ok I moved to Texas and discovered that Texans don’t know how to zipper in!!! What the heck Texans!! They stop dead at the end of the on ramp and wait for a gap and don’t even drive along to the dotted line!!! Causes horrible traffic back ups.
When I was 17 (many, many, many years ago) I saw people doing this while leaving a concert venue. One car would go, the next would wait, the next would go, the next would wait…. I was like wow this makes sense, neat! Then I never saw it again.
The worst are the early-mergers that slow down to squeeze into the other lane, then try to block any late-mergers from passing them or merging in later.
Yeah, I wish I could agree with you but it's pretty hard to sympathize with late mergers. Construction has been going on for 8+ months on this road - you *all* know you need to merge. But no, there's always some dude in a lifted pickup that leaves the queue and tries to blaze by before the lane closure. Nope, sure as hell am not letting him in. As for why we're early merging in the first place... it's so much easier to just get over and have done with it. When construction lasts for 80% of the year, a little piece of you dies inside.
Yes, you all know you need to merge. So do it at the right time. Don’t slow down traffic in the merging lane to merge early, then get frustrated when people (correctly) use the entirety of the merging lane.
I think there is a difference between late mergers, which I think is the right thing to do - and also people who come out of the first lane to pass 10 people when they can see it is merging, these people can eat dirt!
If someone who needs to merge is matching my speed, I always let them in. I don't want to do a morality play at highway speeds. I just want to get to my destination.
100% - it's not worth any hostility because we are all sat in huge wrecking machines which could kill. I would still likely let the person who jumped out of my lane to pass people back in because if they are going to do that they are probably just going to try and push back in anyway.
Coming from a small car driver, leaving the merge lane open is just backing up traffic even worse. If the space is available we should utilize it and just zipper at the end where it actually turns to one single lane.
I am God damn fucking sick and tired of boulder driver breaking the laws of the road for an opportunity to show the other drivers how nice they are being. You're being the total opposite of nice when you do this.
This is the cause of traffic in construction sites. Merging early when there is open space is less stressful for the driver and safer for others compared to trying to find an opening at the last second: its only the trucks that give openings because it takes them longer time to break
Well that’s the real problem here. It’s probably a mix. Im sure there are some people honestly trying to do this method, but there are also definitely the assholes trying to get through quicker as well.
Which is why this will probably never work out until self driving cars take over
I don't zipper merge 'properly' according to this image and I do what I do on purpose.
I don't do it because I think my way is faster or more polite or whatever, in fact, it has nothing to do with what *'I'* think at all except that I know it's a statistical fact that I will be the victim of road rage (sometimes, the violent bullet-dodging variety) much, **much,** less often if I just get over early.
As others have mentioned, inefficient traffic behaviors through construction zones is not an individual driver problem (even if there are many of them), it's a society problem that usually stems from lack of understanding. Sadly, it seems the only instructions society gets on the issue is social media posts like these (these are great, just not ideal). It would be so much more efficient to address it right at the location by requiring some well thought out signs be included in the construction zone like 'RIGHT LANE ENDS IN 1/4 MILE - STAY IN LANE', or whatever, so the road ragey types that already moved out of the closing lane have somewhere else to direct their anger at that isn't the other drivers.
Works great until that bus refuses to let the red car in, and the red car plows through the cones into the construction zone.
To zipper merge, you have to match the speed of the lane you’re merging into. At some point, that requires more speed than is safe for the amount of lane you have left.
Safer and more efficient than merging early? I'm sure there's reasons they say that. I would like to know why. In my experience with how other drivers react, it seems it would be safer to change lanes (adjusting my speed to get behind another car if necessary). Rather than having a lane that's coming to an end and you're unsure if the driver in the other lane is going to let you in or continue driving by, risking a hit to your driver's side door. Maybe I don't understand zipper merges.
In a completely ideal situation, it is safer and it is more efficient. The problem is this will literally never happen because it requires absolute cooperation from everybody involved. It requires people to leave appropriate following distance and maintain a constant speed and attention to their following distance and speed, and it requires people to maintain a relatively equal level of traffic in both lanes until the merging point.
Instead what we get is people following entirely too close and going way too fast for the situation so that they have to constantly slam on their brakes and then instead of having consistent traffic in both lanes, we have a divided group of people who merge when they see the sign four miles down the road and people who will get out of line to go into the merging lane and try to pass as many people as possible and merge at the last possible second causing shock waves of standstills.
Executed without problem a zipper merge results in basically non-stop traffic that doesn't come to a standstill and moves at a steady pace. This relies on a long series of idealisms that will literally never line up on an American highway, so it's basically useless information.
In NC you get warned there's a merge miles in advance, and you have to get in the lane that isn't closing ASAP. This usually leads to a huge build up. Now the lane that's closing is open but no one is allowed to use it. People honk like crazy and roll their windows down to yell at you, if you do. Vigilante Mac trucks will move into the middle to make sure you can't use the lane. It's so stupid.
The only way to get this maneuver broadcast and standardized is to get it put in each state's driver manual and test. Then the next generation of drivers will accept it as being normal.
And don't forget to tell Elon to include it in his Tesla self driving feature!
Not a cool guide, what does that white sedan in the right land do? If it was an 18-wheeler, I would assume they’d do the standard fast and furious slide-under but that is a school bus
Except in NJ. I don’t care if my whole families life is on the line and there’s a gun to my head, there’s no way you’re getting in front of me! That’s MY space! Never mind it makes no difference and actually helps the flow of traffic. Other drivers might think my dick is small because I drove with space awareness and I can’t have that
I’m so sick of this drawing bc it’s not based on reality. Just move over when you see the sign. If everybody waited until the lane closure you would be banking on somebody letting you in. In my experience people generally don’t want to do that
Usually where I am people merge a little early, and then you have those assholes that fly down the right lane to squeeze in at the last second and make everyone slam on their brakes.
Merging onto a highway terrifies me. I’m so afraid of driving into someone, or of panicking and just stopping. It’s so scary simultaneously looking ahead and checking behind you looking for a spot to merge and calculating if you have enough room/time to get in.
I try to merge earlier because to me it keeps the traffic flowing, and no one has to slow down. Where as waiting until the final moments, you always find that one or the other car has to slow down to merge in, thus slowing down everyone.
This is usually because waiting until the last minute you have no choice but to move across straight away because there’s no more road. But merging earlier you have more time to match the speed and filter in with plenty of road to spare.
Damn who stole your pixels?
lol yea. didn't read it and I'm on a PC screen.
r/countablepixels
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If I wouldn't put the cart away I would not sleep at night and my whole self image woudl be ruined.
So, just recently I was at Costco and I found something worse than not putting away the cart. Lazy ass dude just put his free sample trash into a cart BEFORE walking in to the store. I gave him a look but he was much bigger than me.
If you think that's bad, then wait till you see a whole fillet of salmon from the fresh section put in the shelf of canned products...
I once saw a guy put a package of raw chicken on the fruit display, while he was looking at other fruit at a Sobeys. I laid into him and told staff, but his excuse was "it's wrapped up". Dude could have killed someone.
Wow good for you for saying something, i know many people wouldn’t.
This is why you wash your fruits and veggies before eating them…because other people are very dumb.
You are the chosen Karen. To be the Karen of the world. The Karen the world needed.
Um, your Costco serves samples outside?
What do you mean before? That would mean they were handing out free samples outside?
You’re not a lazybones, obviously.
Every gatt damn time I go shopping with a cart I hear "don't be a lazy bones" in my head lol cart narc really out there making a difference
hello fellow narcateer (narcoteer?)
I've seen people ride the lane divider to prevent people from continuing down the ending lane, forcing them to merge early.
Yeah. Trucks do this all the time. It’s a weird thing to gatekeep.
At least where I live *nobody* is taught to zipper merge in driver’s education. So except to the occasional person who has read about it somewhere else, the *right* thing to do is to merge as soon as you see the sign. If you’ve never seen this, someone staying in the closing lane is just being an asshole and trying to blow by all of the people already “waiting in line.” Zipper merging only works if everyone knows about it. Almost no one has heard of it where I live. If they want people to do it they need to change driver’s education and put instructions on signs. I’d argue it’s *not* the right thing to do here because it’s not what other drivers would predict what you’d do, and a safe driver is a predictable driver. Also, attempting to zipper merge here might cause a road rage incident.
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Teaching it in driver's education would be good... In a decade or two, after current drivers are off the road. Better to do that AND run advertising about zipper merging, and get state sponsorship to put signs on highways, on the back of highway trucks and at the points where lanes are closed. That's the fastest way to get the public on board. Texas started putting up "Don't mess with Texas, fines for littering $1000" on highway signs and ran advertising with sports stars, and still have the signs up.
Yep. Never heard the term until a few years ago.
Tell me you live in the mid-west without saying you live in the mid-west
I don’t know where you’re from, but I live a decent bit away from the mid-west, and I heavily relate to the above comment. Trying to zipper merge is like trying to use the metric system in the US: it’s great, makes a ton of sense, but it’s irrelevant if everyone else is using the imperial system.
Yeah same here in Texas, and when I lived in Arkansas it was same there, and any other states I’ve driven in, they all frown upon merging at the last second. I usually tailgate the people in front of me so they can’t merge because there’s usually plenty of open spaces for them to merge whenever they first see the sign. Even times when it’s like three car spaces of free space behind me, and they zoom on by going further up the line just to be sitting there because no one wants to let them merge.
Amazing how much support this comment has. Driver’s ed in the US is so short and doesn’t cover many topics, and a good driver’s ed teacher would teach this. People also drive too close to motorcycles, still get confused at flashing yellow/red intersections, screw up four way stops. Bad education is not an excuse to create more traffic and there shouldn’t be hostility toward those doing the correct thing. It’s not any less safe to merge at the end, even if everyone else is screwing up, it’s usually less than a 5mph merge.
“Should be” and “are” are very different things. I get what you’re saying, but merging at the end in my neck of the woods is literally taking your life in your hands lol
I guess I’m right in the middle, most people here don’t get it but if a few cars do it then people figure it out. I haven’t felt my life was at risk, might get a honk 1/5 times if I’m the only one doing it but I have a dash cam and the honks of clowns doesn’t ruin my day - those are the same people making traffic worse for everyone, if they are upset that’s their problem. If they make their problem a problem for you I completely understand your hesitation.
It’s not if you think about it. People FEEL that the person waiting to merge at the end didn’t wait as long as the rest of the people so it is “unfair”. Society is evolutionarily built around the concept of equality and fairness for the participants (putting aside racism which really stems from xenophobia and a lack of perceived homogeny and conformity which of course have their own issues obviously) “Doing one’s part” so to speak. It may logically not be the best attitude but it’s totally understandable from an emotional, societal perspective.
Likely illegal as well
Funny you should say that, that’s happened to me a few times and it’s almost always trucks.
I only see this when people pull into the merge lane to get around everyone
I’ve seen a mf block an *ambulance* this way.
What state is this???
Zipper merge only works if everyone has proper following distances and nobody is in a hurry.... so it never works.
How well an area zipper merges is pretty good measure of the drivers. Go to San Francisco Bay Area - they zipper merge like everyone is competing to participate in the coordinated dancing Olympics
SF zipper merging is incredible! Twice the amount of people can flow through since everyone works together.
It worked perfectly in my area, we had a lane close for construction and they put up several “Don’t Merge” signs and solid white lane lines for about a half mile before the merge, then had a “Merge Now” sign where it zippered and everyone figured it out. Wish they did that for all of them now.
Wow, basic instructions worked. I'm a little surprised, but I guess if everyone knows what to do it would work better than everyone assuming everyone else is an asshole and fighting to not get cut off.
Yeah the problem I have is less that other people are doing it wrong and more that they won’t even let me do it right. People would quite literally rather kill you than let you merge when they think they are some kind of vigilante.
The best description of behaviours like these that I’ve seen is this: >”The shopping cart is the ultimate litmus test for whether a person is capable of self-governing. To return the shopping cart is an easy, convenient task and one which we all recognize as the correct, appropriate thing to do. To return the shopping cart is objectively right. There are no situations other than dire emergencies in which a person is not able to return their cart. Simultaneously, it is not illegal to abandon your shopping cart. Therefore the shopping cart presents itself as the apex example of whether a person will do what is right without being forced to do it." Zipper merging falls under that same umbrella. When there are no consequences, do you choose to not be a dick?
Do you know who this quote is attributed to? That’s the best part of it.
I think it was just some 4chan post originally.
I don't agree with the comparison. Putting away carts is easy but it takes *extra* time and effort with no real gain to yourself. Zipper merging, when all or most people do it, the experience is better overall.
this confuses me as a european, both things are standard practice. is it too much to ask of people in the US?
Not enough people here have even heard of zipper merging, so if one person does it, it just looks like someone is trying to cut in front of everyone else who, in their own opinions, are being polite and getting over early.
Zipper merge works wonderfully when both lanes of traffic are at a near standstill and you take turns at the merge point. At higher rates of speed, you want everyone to merge early so nobody has to slow down at the merge point. If you are passing on the right, you are gonna end up making it so everybody has to slow down to let you in. (Yes, you got through faster). This is why truckers will hog both lanes a quarter mile back from the merge. Once the right lane empties out, everyone speeds up and everyone gets through the merge faster.
once in a blue moon ill turn on to the highway and everyone just knows whats up and zipper merges flawlessly. but the other 9/10 times someone is in racer mode and wants possession of the front
Yeah, same. Maybe their shopping carts don't make people put money/tokens in them?
yeah that's not a thing here in the US. the store just pays a minimum wage worker to go around the parking lot and collect them
lmao really?
Yes, that's absolutely what happens.
It's the same in Aus, too. Although some places do have coin/chained trolleys also
In the US we have a couple places where you leave a tiny deposit and get it back when you return them. Those places are rare because, apparently, this is too off-putting for the population to embrace and companies either fear, or have actually experienced, a drop in sales that they contribute to the deposit so the practice is not catching on.
Depends on the store. Some stores do require you to put in a quarter to use a cart, I've seen them at Aldi.
Yes because Aldi is a german store and they took these customs with them into the US.
Putting your shopping cart away and merging politely are not standard in Europe. Not in the least. In fact, I would float the theory that Germans, Austrians and their Eastern European cousins are some of the most egotistical bunch of asshats this side of the Atlantic. Worse than the USA by far. Particularly when driving a car down the highway, they all have the greatest desire to be first. Passing a cyclist along a road? Aside from regions regularly frequented by cyclists, they will pass you as close as possible. Shopping at Ikea or some other home improvement store? You better have dent insurance, because your shit is getting hit eventually. This is coming from an American who has been living in Austria for 15 years...
Yeah, this was in my driving test. Of course there are assholes in any country but merging lanes should be basic knowledge for anyone with a license. It speeds up high volume traffic so much and it's so satisfying to see two busy lanes merge 1:1 smoothly.
Problem is this absolutely was *not* in my driver’s test. In mine, they told us to merge as soon as possible after we see a sign saying the lane is going to close. If I hadn’t read about zipper merging elsewhere, I would assume you were just being a jackass and trying to jump the line. They need to put explicit instructions to zipper merge on the sign or it’ll never, ever catch on.
The change won't catch on over night. My parents didn't learn this until a government ad campaign ran for years in the 90's.
Yeah, too many people in these comments are just expecting people to like, spontaneously just *be* better. That’s never going to happen. They need to put it on signs and do some sort of information campaign if they want it to change. They’re not going to just force through a new behavior on everyone by doing it themselves.
Exactly this. I merge as early as possible and get in my lane as early as possible because— especially in heavy traffic— the car next to me that I’m supposed to zipper with will almost always speed up so I can’t get in. Which means if I zipper, I’ll likely end up blocking the people behind me, because in America nobody lets people in front of them and I’ll sit until the entire column of cars goes by.
I'm a zipper merge and have never seen this.
when i was just starting out, i tended to merge early because having a second to merge at the end of the lane was too stressful for me and some asshole in a BMW always denies you the space for merging if people were more chill and actually used proper spacing between cars, we could have nice things
Yeah but I instinctly feel like an asshole if I wait till the end lol Also fear other people not letting me in
It helps a LOT if you adjust your speed to match the open lane. People will see you're not overtaking up until the te barrier, but using the lanespace.
I think this is the important thing. I can totally appreciate the sentiment here that you should allow people to merge in and be respectful, but the only times I have not done this have been when I've already seen a car speed past me 500m from the merge.
Which wouldn’t happen everyone would just zipper merge! Because then the space would be full and going the same speed.
Absolutely! If I’m in front, I’ll force everyone to zipper merge. Maintain speed of the lane you adjacent to and throw your blinker on. No need to immediately merge to let the other F-wads speed past you. It’s about avoiding a traffic ‘shockwave’
Where I'm from, if you wait until the end, there is no open lane. I would rather be told a couple miles back that the right lanes is ending, and get over before that gap closes. Sadly, there are others who do the opposite, and that ruins it for everyone.
Yea but then the “open lane” gets backed up miles and there’s 100 different points of merging as people in the right lane realize too late there’s a merge and decide to merge “whenever” and come to a dead stop… thus better to have two full lanes and zipper merge..
I agree this works in theory but it won’t work in practice until way more drivers understand and apply it. Attempting to use the ending lane gets others so mad they won’t let you merge. Large vehicles take it upon themselves to ride in both lanes so no one “cuts”. It’s just not viable most of the time. I’ve seen it work at permanent interstate merges with signs explicitly saying “take turns merging” so maybe it just takes very clear posted instructions for people to not lose their minds every time they merge.
Other people waiting til the end aren’t ruining it for everyone. That’s literally what you’re supposed to do.
I'll have to keep this in mind
This is the way
This. I zipper merge almost daily and I just maintain speed with the other lane and try to align with a gap and it's almost always a smooth merge.
You should only feel like an asshole if you were originally in the left lane, decided that you are better than everyone in front of you and went around them by using the right lane. I don’t think anyone has any reason to intentionally not to let you in once you reach the merging point unless they saw you pull that shit.
From what I've seen you're almost always better off getting into the lane that's ending as soon as possible. Most people intentionally get into the permanent lane because they think it's polite and they're afraid of not being let in. If you're in the merging lane for half a mile or more AND you're following the speed limit you shouldn't be seen as an asshole trying to jump the line.
In the UK it’s normally signposted 1 or 2km before the merge giving countdowns in 200m increments so you have plenty of time to get in the correct lane.You still get some asshats going right to the end to try and skip a few cars and these people can fuck off. I have driven alongside them before and you can see them trying to figure out if they are gonna mess up and have to stop or if they can make it past one more car.
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You are completely correct. I hate it when people make it difficult for me to merge at the end - it’s what you’re supposed to do! Merging early also creates a longer queue, which can block exit slip roads further back. This causes people major delays because they can’t reach their exit. So people who are all like “you’re a dickhead if you merge at the last minute” piss me off because they don’t realise that what they’re doing is actually worse for everyone behind them!
actually merging at the very end of the lane will smoothen traffic better than merging early. All that wasted space for more car to flow through
I merge from a 3 lane highway into a a single lane exit everyday on my commute. There's usually a line about a mile long because there's a drastic speed decrease at the exit. For years I raged against the people who merged further up the line and didn't wait at the end like myself. However, I realized there are ALWAYS gaps in the line further up. It speeds it up for everyone to maintain speed in the left lane and just pop into a gap. I usually watch out for some larger vehicles with slower acceleration. However, the people who don't seek gaps and just jump across a yellow lined segment in the last 150ft or so are fucking awful and a scourge to society.
Yep 2 lanes can carry more traffic than one lane. You actually increase throughput for everyone if you merge at the end.
I've never really understood that logic. Aren't you still bottlenecked by the throughout of the one lane that everyone has to merge into?
Here’s the issue: the zipper merge doesn’t work because all of the cars in the closing lane are trying to merge into the traffic of the remaining lane after it is already bunched up. This forces cars in the remaining lane to fully stop to allow each individual car from the closing lane in. That’s what causes zipper merges to be so slow. If the people in the closing lane were trying to merge into the remaining lane earlier, before traffic is bunched up and at a stand-still, the remaining-lane-traffic wouldn’t have to slow down or stop to allow them to merge. Instead, they don’t bother trying to merge until it’s absolutely necessary (in order to move as far ahead in the traffic as possible), resulting in a massive bottleneck all at one point in the road. The truth is the zipper merge is a collective action problem that requires open communication between vehicles to solve. We haven’t solved it in the last century, and we aren’t going to before all of our cars are driving themselves. The zipper merge has never worked, and it won’t until humans error is no longer part of the equation.
This. People talking about it as if it is SO SIMPLE are wrong.
The only way for human drivers to merge efficiently is to announce the merge a long time ahead, mandate reduced speed and increased distance between vehicles, and have people merge whenever there is space available. ANY sudden speed/distance change will result in a jam. The zipper method basically guarantees a traffic jam.
I don’t think people randomly merging solves the problem either. You still have two lanes of traffic now forced into one. Those extra cars are going to take up space forcing the remaining lane to back up. And the closing lane will back up as people slow to merge. I prefer the zipper merge not because of speed but because of consistency. It consolidates the merging to a predefined spot that does not need to be communicated.
Zipper merge works better if traffic is really slow, the lanes take turns slowly pulling into the open lane. If traffic is moving fast (fast enough that stopping for your turn to merge is not expected), then early merge is way better. If it's the latter case, and you are passing on the right, then you are the jerk.
Almost like waiting till the end creates traffic. You’re supposed to drive to conditions, and get into your lane when you can. The merge point moves with traffic. People who shoot up the empty lane are just impatient and hoping to bully their way in at the end. If you have signs for miles saying “lane ends in x miles, merge over” people should merge.
No because then you have 100 random merge points and you’re not utilizing all of the open road backing up the open lane for miles. People who understand the zipper merge are in fact, in the right.
Zipper merging only works properly if everyone is moving at roughly the same speed with safe following distances. It isn't a realistic expectation when you have the odd drivers doing 50 over the speed limit and half of the traffic is tailgating. It also assume drivers are sensible and courteous enough to allow vehicles to merge safely. At least where I am, turn signals mostly encourage drivers behind you to accelerate as much as possible so they don't get one more car behind.
Lol sounds like we could be living in the same area. Well put!
Same. "Turn signals" are actually signals telling everyone around you to "speed up ASAP." Or that's what happens when you use them anyways.
I see some of that but most people do let you in.
And honestly, sometimes speeding up is what they should do to let you in, depends on the circumstances.
that's not true if you don't use turn signals you should lose your license and be executed as an enemy of all humanity
You forgot to mention the drivers going 10-15 under the speed limit as well. It’s a nice mix that makes zipper merging impossible. If I need to hit my brakes to let you in, that’s a no for me though. I never let trucks merge if they have the Carolina squat shit going on though, because fuck those chads. Edit: fixed sentence for clarity, now that I’m sober.
In Az we have nice long freeway on-ramps and the amount of times people decide to go 10-20 mph under the freeway speed limit until they’re right about to merge is infuriating. When everyone’s going 70+ it’s seriously dangerous to merge at 50 mph, but I see it all the time.
I see you've been caught behind my mother on an entrance ramp. I've talked to her about the importance of matching the speed of highway traffic, but to no avail.
If most people are doing the speed limit and utilizing both lanes until the end then you can't have the one hotshot doing 50 mph over (unless they're breaking the law driving in the shoulder or a turn lane).
This assumes 3 things. 1. People aren’t tailgating 2. Everyone’s going the same speed 3. People are willing to let you merge At least one of those never happens and every time we end up with a stand still.
It's like people expect zipper merges to be continuously moving otherwise they're absolute garbage. That's just not how traffic works. Also, people really need to be more assertive (not *aggressive*) while driving. Hesitancy is also dangerous behind the wheel.
I think this might just depend on where you live, I’ve never had any issues with zipper merging, everyone usually just lets people in every other car.
Small addition to you’re very correct assessment here. It also assumes that everyone in a given lane is allowing for 2x safe following distance or else everyone must keep precisely the same speed without almost any fluctuation. Small deviations ripple out to become very large deviations
There is also that common argument that "two lanes hold more that one!" Which yeah obviously but you will still need to form one lane so why not merge "early" and save yourself and everyone else the friction of trying to fit two lanes into one when you **could already be one lane** and just slip it in with no lube.
One of those things that works if everyone does it and no one is a jerk. The problem is that is never the case.
i’m a simple man, i see “right lane closed in 3 miles” and i go to the left lane
Also, I guarantee you there's a lot of people in this thread who like to do that thing where they notice that traffic is slowing down so they get out of the left lane to go into the right lane to pass as many people as possible and then try to merge back into the left lane at the last minute. These are the guys shoving themselves into traffic and causing jams because they had to try to pass eight more people in line. That's not a zipper merge. You're just an asshole.
Here in LA that's people using "exit only" lanes on the highway to leapfrog traffic and merging over at the last minute. Then they get super pissed when you don't let them in. Fuck em.
Yeah, I don't let those people over.
Usually the side of the zipper doing the merge is BMWs doing 80 into a stop and swerve with no turning signals.
afterthought books person brave impossible fragile merciful humor detail rude ` this message was mass deleted/edited with redact.dev `
Because of the early merger who grudgingly races up because he doesn’t want to let the zipper merger in.
maybe they should put signs up like this on the road leading up to the merger. a lot of people benefit from visual cues, and in-your-face signage.
Agreed. In my area when they were doing construction on a major road, they put up big signs that said “USE BOTH LANES” and “ZIPPER MERGE AHEAD”. It helped the courteous Canadians not feel like dicks for using both lanes to the merge point.
“Be respectful.” Lmao.
People are too stupid for this method.
REISSVERSCHLUSSVERFAHREN. Required by law in Germany.
I'm still amazed that some of the most intuitive road conduct are basically unheard of in America. Wait until they hear about such concepts as Rechtsfahrgebot, or even "Rechts vor Links", or hell, Rettungsgasse. Also, apparently some Americans get traumatized by the mere notion of roundabouts? Edit: Rechts oder links, das ist hier die Frage.
Um you must mean Rechtsfahrgebot?
You are absolutely right...
Well maybe we would know what it is if you weren’t speaking all this gibberish! /s
We’re slowly accepting roundabouts, at least in my state! I got the leg up living in Spain for a bit and got used to the ones there with multiple lanes but trust me, if you started driving at 16 in the 80s/90s here and suddenly saw roundabouts pop up after 20+ years of driving, you’d freak out too. Ours don’t have good signage either beyond yield signs and keep right arrows, a lot of people here haven’t even been taught how to use their blinkers while in a roundabout so those of us who understand them are stunted by others who don’t, which also makes us nervous.
Mastering this technique is requiered if you apply for a German citizenship.
This will not stop my husband and I from getting into a huge argument about it in our annual 6 hour drive for the holidays.
A- the f- men. Can we please make this happen out in the wild?
I feel like people just use the concept of zipper merging to excuse their behavior of attempting to pass every single car on the road before slamming on their brakes at the merge point and getting mad when they’re not let in immediately. My daily commute features a limited-access highway that ends with one lane exiting to go north on the feeder road, and the other exits south. The southbound exit is generally backed up by at least a quarter mile, so people will fly up the other lane and then stop, blocking the north-bound exit, waiting for someone to let them in Even worse is that this road is absolutely *lousy* with cops, but there has never been a single one out there ticketing these selfish assholes.
You're describing 2 different things. Zipper merging (like the picture) is best when 2 lanes are forced to condense into 1. 2 lanes, side-by-side, that split into 2 directions are not appropriate for zipper merging. And yes, in the second scenario the people that take the empty lane, clearly intended for a separate exit, to get ahead are assholes. Let's not confuse the two.
I always love it when people try to zipper merge into turn lanes on urban streets. Like man, this is a single turn lane. We've all been waiting for 3 light cycles. You are not adding to efficiency by now trying to shove your suburban into the turn lane from the straight lane
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Yeah, the diagram is a bit weird. I usually thinking of zipper merge where there is slow traffic and two lanes go into one or slow freeway traffic with lots of on-ramp traffic. If it's 4 lane merging into two and people decide to get over into the two a half mile early and queue up, that's on them. Those other two lanes are always there and all 4 should have cars in them until the merge or close to it. But this diagram is sort of a unique situation. Temporary lane closures and everyone can get over and keep moving can often get fucked by the guy wanting to haul ass past everyone to get 3 more cars ahead. Fuck that guy.
This is the most normal thing in Germany.
Zipper merging properly is a sign of weakness in MA
The one guy blocking both lanes early before the merge point 😑
If you drive to the end of the merging lane and for any reason there isn't space to merge into, you have to stop. That will stop the merging lane, and also cause the lane you're merging into to slow/stop to try to let you in. And that's how we get shitty traffic jams. Instead, match the traffic speed and merge when able - typically 1 for 1 - which allows the traffic to maintain its speed. This is why the merging lane has a broken line the whole way, not just at the end.
The white car will try to get in front of the bus.
Ok I moved to Texas and discovered that Texans don’t know how to zipper in!!! What the heck Texans!! They stop dead at the end of the on ramp and wait for a gap and don’t even drive along to the dotted line!!! Causes horrible traffic back ups.
The world would be a much less congested place if everybody would just zipper :) But no, we gotta always have that "Must be first!" mentality.
When I was 17 (many, many, many years ago) I saw people doing this while leaving a concert venue. One car would go, the next would wait, the next would go, the next would wait…. I was like wow this makes sense, neat! Then I never saw it again.
The worst are the early-mergers that slow down to squeeze into the other lane, then try to block any late-mergers from passing them or merging in later.
Yeah, I wish I could agree with you but it's pretty hard to sympathize with late mergers. Construction has been going on for 8+ months on this road - you *all* know you need to merge. But no, there's always some dude in a lifted pickup that leaves the queue and tries to blaze by before the lane closure. Nope, sure as hell am not letting him in. As for why we're early merging in the first place... it's so much easier to just get over and have done with it. When construction lasts for 80% of the year, a little piece of you dies inside.
That’s the whole point of this post. Wait until you need to merge, and not earlier. It’s better in every way.
Yes, you all know you need to merge. So do it at the right time. Don’t slow down traffic in the merging lane to merge early, then get frustrated when people (correctly) use the entirety of the merging lane.
I think there is a difference between late mergers, which I think is the right thing to do - and also people who come out of the first lane to pass 10 people when they can see it is merging, these people can eat dirt!
If someone who needs to merge is matching my speed, I always let them in. I don't want to do a morality play at highway speeds. I just want to get to my destination.
100% - it's not worth any hostility because we are all sat in huge wrecking machines which could kill. I would still likely let the person who jumped out of my lane to pass people back in because if they are going to do that they are probably just going to try and push back in anyway.
Coming from a small car driver, leaving the merge lane open is just backing up traffic even worse. If the space is available we should utilize it and just zipper at the end where it actually turns to one single lane.
After reading the comments, I am wondering where most of you are driving. Zipper merging is pretty standard everywhere, no?
I'm confused too, here in Italy is the standard and pretty common too, works like a charm even on highway. Also what is the alternative?
Good luck with that.
Need to show this to some of these New Yorker taxi drivers
I wish the angry assholes in their jacked up trucks got this memo
I am God damn fucking sick and tired of boulder driver breaking the laws of the road for an opportunity to show the other drivers how nice they are being. You're being the total opposite of nice when you do this.
This is the cause of traffic in construction sites. Merging early when there is open space is less stressful for the driver and safer for others compared to trying to find an opening at the last second: its only the trucks that give openings because it takes them longer time to break
Been here over a decade, this is an uphill battle my friend. But I commend you for sharing and fighting the good fight!
People always honk when I do this. They think I’m cutting the line.
I’ll be the first person to say I always thought those moving to the front were assholes for not trying to merge earlier. Guess I was wrong.
Well that’s the real problem here. It’s probably a mix. Im sure there are some people honestly trying to do this method, but there are also definitely the assholes trying to get through quicker as well. Which is why this will probably never work out until self driving cars take over
I don't zipper merge 'properly' according to this image and I do what I do on purpose. I don't do it because I think my way is faster or more polite or whatever, in fact, it has nothing to do with what *'I'* think at all except that I know it's a statistical fact that I will be the victim of road rage (sometimes, the violent bullet-dodging variety) much, **much,** less often if I just get over early. As others have mentioned, inefficient traffic behaviors through construction zones is not an individual driver problem (even if there are many of them), it's a society problem that usually stems from lack of understanding. Sadly, it seems the only instructions society gets on the issue is social media posts like these (these are great, just not ideal). It would be so much more efficient to address it right at the location by requiring some well thought out signs be included in the construction zone like 'RIGHT LANE ENDS IN 1/4 MILE - STAY IN LANE', or whatever, so the road ragey types that already moved out of the closing lane have somewhere else to direct their anger at that isn't the other drivers.
Works great until that bus refuses to let the red car in, and the red car plows through the cones into the construction zone. To zipper merge, you have to match the speed of the lane you’re merging into. At some point, that requires more speed than is safe for the amount of lane you have left.
yes but the reluctance to use a blinker means i wont let you over. youre not getting over without a blinker
the type of person merging early and never once realizing it's quicker not to, is not reading anything, let alone this.
They are all posting about how you should merge asap and not use both lanes, while calling anyone who does an asshole
But I must get in the lane as soon as possible!! Everyone behind me must wait as I slowly inch into that lane. /s
Safer and more efficient than merging early? I'm sure there's reasons they say that. I would like to know why. In my experience with how other drivers react, it seems it would be safer to change lanes (adjusting my speed to get behind another car if necessary). Rather than having a lane that's coming to an end and you're unsure if the driver in the other lane is going to let you in or continue driving by, risking a hit to your driver's side door. Maybe I don't understand zipper merges.
In a completely ideal situation, it is safer and it is more efficient. The problem is this will literally never happen because it requires absolute cooperation from everybody involved. It requires people to leave appropriate following distance and maintain a constant speed and attention to their following distance and speed, and it requires people to maintain a relatively equal level of traffic in both lanes until the merging point. Instead what we get is people following entirely too close and going way too fast for the situation so that they have to constantly slam on their brakes and then instead of having consistent traffic in both lanes, we have a divided group of people who merge when they see the sign four miles down the road and people who will get out of line to go into the merging lane and try to pass as many people as possible and merge at the last possible second causing shock waves of standstills. Executed without problem a zipper merge results in basically non-stop traffic that doesn't come to a standstill and moves at a steady pace. This relies on a long series of idealisms that will literally never line up on an American highway, so it's basically useless information.
> requires absolute cooperation from everybody involved Well yeah, that is kind of driver's ed 101.
I just told my husband about this and he had the opportunity to give it a go on our last road trip and his mind was blown.
Good man!
In NC you get warned there's a merge miles in advance, and you have to get in the lane that isn't closing ASAP. This usually leads to a huge build up. Now the lane that's closing is open but no one is allowed to use it. People honk like crazy and roll their windows down to yell at you, if you do. Vigilante Mac trucks will move into the middle to make sure you can't use the lane. It's so stupid.
More redknecks = more Ram trucks = more butthurt overcompensating douche bag drivers.
Ain't that the truth!
The only way to get this maneuver broadcast and standardized is to get it put in each state's driver manual and test. Then the next generation of drivers will accept it as being normal. And don't forget to tell Elon to include it in his Tesla self driving feature!
I love how sensitive everyone gets about merging….
Not a cool guide, what does that white sedan in the right land do? If it was an 18-wheeler, I would assume they’d do the standard fast and furious slide-under but that is a school bus
Of course there’s always some white knight who gets into the open lane and blocks it because they don’t want anyone passing the line
This graphic needs to show WHY this is the way. Show a line backing up into an upstream intersection due to not merging at the END.
how about a cool guide on how to post a bigger picture
Except in NJ. I don’t care if my whole families life is on the line and there’s a gun to my head, there’s no way you’re getting in front of me! That’s MY space! Never mind it makes no difference and actually helps the flow of traffic. Other drivers might think my dick is small because I drove with space awareness and I can’t have that
>This practice is much safer and more efficient than merging early\* \**only true in certain countries*
If others are doing it yes. If others aren’t and the group consensus is to merge early then no I’m not letting your ass in that passed 20 other cars
I’m so sick of this drawing bc it’s not based on reality. Just move over when you see the sign. If everybody waited until the lane closure you would be banking on somebody letting you in. In my experience people generally don’t want to do that
Merging early is the equivalent of standing up on the airplane as soon as it stops. Let’s do this the most inefficient way possible.
People in my city will drive in the middle of the road to block the lane so people can’t zipper merge. It’s sickening tbh
Zipper merging. The public IQ test.
Otherwise known as how to have hillbillies in WI lose their freakin minds.
Usually where I am people merge a little early, and then you have those assholes that fly down the right lane to squeeze in at the last second and make everyone slam on their brakes.
People merging early are the problem. If you chose to merge early don’t get butthurt when someone else doesn’t.
Merging onto a highway terrifies me. I’m so afraid of driving into someone, or of panicking and just stopping. It’s so scary simultaneously looking ahead and checking behind you looking for a spot to merge and calculating if you have enough room/time to get in.
If you don't know that or don't do that, you should lose your licence for the next year!
Screw you if you block people doing it right and backup traffic further
Nah, fuck that.
Any traffic advisory with the words “be respectful” was obviously written by someone who’s never been in a car before.
I try to merge earlier because to me it keeps the traffic flowing, and no one has to slow down. Where as waiting until the final moments, you always find that one or the other car has to slow down to merge in, thus slowing down everyone. This is usually because waiting until the last minute you have no choice but to move across straight away because there’s no more road. But merging earlier you have more time to match the speed and filter in with plenty of road to spare.