I Think Smart Cars Should Be Allowed in The HOV Lane
HOV, for the uninitiated, refers to the “High Occupancy Vehicles.” On highway 1 in Vancouver, you are required to have 2 or more people in your car ((or you can be on a motorcycle)) to use the HOV lane. But here’s the thing – Smart cars have only 2 seats. Thus, when I’m driving by myself, my car is 1/2 or 50% full. In a regular car that seats 5, if you have 2 people in the car you can use the HOV lane, but you are only 2/5 or 40% full. So my car is more full – it has a higher occupancy– with 1 person is in than a regular car is with 2 people in it.
Q.E.D.
Comments |6|
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I think occupancy is an absolute numbers thing, not a relative one. A small room with one person is not more occupied than a slightly larger room with two people. A portapotty with one person sitting in it is less occupied than a stadium that's half full, even though the amount of room available in the outhouse is proportionally less than that of the larger venue. That's the kind of bureaucratic red-tape-type crap you will run into.
Jorge, this isn't helping my cause!
Weird.
There was far more to my comment than what's above.
I suggested that you should begin driving on the sidewalk. Put an extra long antenna on your smart car and distribute some fake remote controls. That way, your car looks like a toy. You should be able to drive wherever you want, provided you have someone nearby with a remote control, appearing to be driving you around.
People would have plenty of clearance to walk, too, as your car is not that big.
I like the idea of smart cars into the HOV lane.
But the point of an HOV lane — the reason for their existence — is to encourage the driver to take another person with them and SHARE the same car, rather than having two vehicles on the road.
In other words, the goal is to reduce the number of cars on the road.
Your idea, logical as it may be, doesn't achieve the actual goal at all.
And what it is too.
But my Smart car is kind of like half a car. So I'm only bringing half a car on the road instead of a full car! It's like how they let motorcycles use the HOV lane – driving a motorcycle doesn't result in one fewer vehicle on the road.