What Are the Current Hours of Enforcement of the HOV Lanes on I-15?

Can you update us on the HOV lanes on I-15? I know they've changed recently and a few times since they were enforced 24/7, but what are the current hours of enforcement?

Happy to. Especially since they finally make sense.

When the 20 miles of high-occupancy-vehicle (or HOV, meaning two or more people in the vehicle) lanes on US 95 and I-15 were completed in May 2019, they were enforced, as you say, 24 hours a day. From the start, that policy was widely criticized for not serving their putative purpose. Carpooling isn't a thing in Las Vegas and the lanes were underused, while traffic in the other lanes was worse than ever.

The restrictions were first amended in October 2022 to 5 a.m.-10 p.m. daily, which was slightly less irrational, but at least there were seven hours when traffic was light that state troopers weren't issuing $250 fines for drivers using the whole road.

Finally, in a unanimous decision in April of this year, the Nevada Department of Transportation's Board of Directors loosened up the HOV lanes to even less than the typical peak-traffic hours. They're now 6-8 a.m. and 4-6 p.m. Monday through Friday. Since May 1, all traffic has been allowed to use the HOV lanes outside those minimal periods.

To many, such short restrictions also don't make much sense and the Board might reconsider the decision. It could opt for completely eliminating the restrictions or turning them into express lanes (where there's no entering or exiting in a specified stretch), but that will take a further study period of around two years. As far as we know, it hasn't started yet.

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Kevin Rough Oct-22-2023

Will be gone eventually

New Jersey had them on I80 in the 1990s. They might have lasted 2 years before people were ready to revolt and the DOT removed them.

Randall Ward Oct-22-2023

HOV

they aren't that effective, more of a show than anything.

Raymond Oct-22-2023

Virtue Signalling

That's all that HOV lanes are--virtue signalling by state highway departments, municipalities, and politicians.  They don't do much actual good, but they look good.  Those who support them feel smug and virtuous, and everyone in the other lanes is subjected to even worse congestion.

It's not that carpooling is a bad idea, but mandating it usually doesn't work.

Question of the Day - 22 October 2023

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