HOV Lane Styles

[Riverside Frwy]

I've noticed that there doesn't seem to be any "official" types of HOV lanes.

Here is what I've seen so far:
Southern California: Double(sometimes quadruple) orange lines with entry/exit points. Often diamond is accompanied by "CAR POOL ONLY" in regular intervals.Some freeways have Open access, but they still have the "CAR POOL ONLY" thing at regular intervals. Signage seems to vary. You always have the overhead "CARPOOLS ONLY" signs with a down pointing arrow when there is a opening in the line. However, Interstate 210 has "LEFT LANE" where a down pointing arrow should be. Orange County seems to use a wider sign style.

Northern California - Open access, but they are only in effect during certain hours. Diamond is at regular intervals. No dedicated overhead signs but just the small median signs.

My FAVORITE HOV lane has to be the one on Long Island Expressway(I-495) in New York. I love the the specific entry and exit points. (People must enter and exit at different times) Plus, the large HOV dedicated signage is a sight to behold.

How are HOV lanes in other states? There seems to be a different HOV lane style for each state.

P.S. Yes I've seen plenty of others put I don't feel like explaining them all.

EDIT: The evil word "Rhombus" has been edited out and replaced with "Diamond". Hope the guys are happy now.

[corco]

Puget Sound Washington is mainly just a solid striped line that you can enter and exit from any time you please (despite the solid line). There are a few instances where the HOV lane separates from the mainline, and there you can't enter and exit, but that's a rare occurrence. They're in effect 24-7 and you can call in violators by calling 206-764-HERO, because there's nothing more heroic than calling in HOV lane violations. 

[Riverside Frwy]

CA 99:(Best representation Northern California HOV lanes, skip to 1:20)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHDpdOkWwn4

CA 60/I-215 (Example of Open Access in Southern California)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrFsGJ2uVWU

CA 55: (Turns from Restricted access to open access HOV lanes half way through the video)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIkdCWtdiDc

[Chris]

HOV lanes that are physically separated from the general purpose lanes probably have less HOV violations, but the downside is that you need more space, and an extra shoulder. You could've fit two regular lanes in that space, which I think have a higher traffic throughput than just one HOV lane.

So, unless the physically separated HOV lane is a tidal lane, which can be operated in either rush hour direction, I don't think separate HOV lanes are space-efficient.

You guys are crazy about HOV lanes though, I don't know about any HOV lane in Europe. Carpool to work is about 12% in Los Angeles, that looks fairly impressive, but if you consider the average car already has 1.2 persons in it, which basically is a 20% carpool.

[myosh_tino]

There are changes coming to the Northern California HOV lanes, more specifically, the HOV lanes on southbound I-680 from CA-84 to CA-237.  The existing HOV lane is being converted into an HOT or Express Lane which should be opening in 2011.  Once construction is complete, the previously "Open Access" HOV lane will become a 24/7 HOT/Express Lane with specific entry and exit points.  The design is similar to the new Express Lanes on I-15 north of San Diego.

Caltrans is also in the process of building an HOT/Express Lane on eastbound I-580 in and around Livermore.  The eastern section is open now and striped as a regular "Open Access" HOV lane.  Once the western section is completed, the entire lane will be separated from the mixed flow lanes and converted into a 24/7 Express Lane.

There is also talk in Santa Clara County about converting current "Open Access" HOV lanes on US 101, CA-87 and CA-85 into HOT/Express Lanes.  Right now, it's just talk especially since money to do the conversions is kind of tight right now.

Edit: I don't know if the term "Rhombus" is, geometrically, the correct name for the pavement marking but up here in northern California, we call that a diamond.  In fact, some traffic reporters call the HOV lane a "Diamond" lane.

[J N Winkler]

You guys are crazy about HOV lanes though, I don't know about any HOV lane in Europe.

I don't know that we are particularly crazy about them--there are at least 20 states, many of which have significant metropolitan areas, with no HOV lanes.  Kansas doesn't have any, for example.  Houston has them, but Chicago does not, and Ohio has few if any miles of HOV lane.

In regards to Europe, the HOV lane concept has been tried in the UK and Spain.  The A647 Stanningley Road in Leeds has a curbside HOV lane similar to the expressway HOV lanes in northern California, while the A-6 north of Madrid has what are called "VAO" lanes ("VAO" being a straightforward calque of "HOV" in Spanish).

[Chris]

We also had a pilot with them back in 1992 in the Netherlands. It failed, and it is now a regular reversible lane.

[J N Winkler]

There have been HOV lane failures in the US too, with I-287 in New Jersey being the canonical example.  However, removing HOV lanes does not necessarily lead to more efficient allocation of highway capacity.  Caltrans tried getting rid of HOV restrictions on a length of I-10 in Los Angeles (El Monte Busway, I think) and discovered that journey time reliability fell through the floor.

[Riverside Frwy]

Edit: I don't know if the term "Rhombus" is, geometrically, the correct name for the pavement marking but up here in northern California, we call that a diamond.  In fact, some traffic reporters call the HOV lane a "Diamond" lane.

Really? I learned what a rhombus was in like elementary school. I've never heard anyone call an HOV lane a "diamond lane" so I just called it a rhombus. However, the diamond is based off the rhombus shape.

I could explain it, but I think this might explain better than I can:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhombus

EDIT: All I'm trying to say is, no term is incorrect, just depends on what you wanna call it.

[realjd]

EDIT: All I'm trying to say is, no term is incorrect, just depends on what you wanna call it.

The shape may technically be a rhombus, but "diamond lane" is the correct term:
http://metro.kingcounty.gov/tops/van-car/hov.html
http://www.dot.ca.gov/hq/traffops/systemops/hov/
http://www.vdot.virginia.gov/travel/hov-hrohowto.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_lane

If you go poke around in the MUTCD, you'll find that they call the shape a diamond exclusively as well.

[roadfro]

I've noticed that there doesn't seem to be any "official" types of HOV lanes.

There are a couple "official" (for lack of a better term) ways to designate HOV lanes, at least as far as the MUTCD is concerned:

* Contiguous - The HOV lane is immediately adjacent to the general purpose lanes, and otherwise looks like a regular lane. The lane line separating the HOV and general lanes is supposed to be wider than a normal lane line. This white line can be broken (entry/exit movements permitted), solid (entry/exit discouraged), or double solid (entry/exit prohibited).

* Buffer separated - The HOV lane has some open space between it and the general purpose lanes. The lane lines on either side of the buffer space are to be white, and can be either single solid (discouraging crossing the buffer) or double solid (prohibiting crossing), and chevrons are sometimes placed in the buffer area if it's particularly wide. Broken white lines should be used at points where the traffic is allowed to merge into and out of the HOV lane.

* Barrier separated - The HOV lane is separated from general traffic by a physical barrier, generally a jersey wall.

Southern California: Double(sometimes quadruple) orange lines with entry/exit points. (...)

Southern California freeways use a mix of contiguous and buffer separated HOV lanes. They often use a white line on the right of the HOV lane, with a double yellow line immediately adjacent to it (with an additional double yellow used for buffer separated areas) to indicate the do not cross restriction. I was completely perplexed by this the first time I saw it.

In my opinion, this is one of the most flagrant violations of the MUTCD in all of California. Through traffic heading in the same direction should never be separated by a yellow line--it doesn't matter that they've slapped in a white line on the HOV side. 

This bad HOV lane marking detail is shown in Caltrans' High Occupancy Vehicle Guidelines, dated August 2003. The California MUTCD (based on the 2003 MUTCD) doesn't make any mention of double yellow lines used with HOV lanes, but also has a stipulation saying that other department standard plans prevail in cases where they conflict with the California MUTCD. 

[Riverside Frwy]

EDIT: All I'm trying to say is, no term is incorrect, just depends on what you wanna call it.

The shape may technically be a rhombus, but "diamond lane" is the correct term:
http://metro.kingcounty.gov/tops/van-car/hov.html
http://www.dot.ca.gov/hq/traffops/systemops/hov/
http://www.vdot.virginia.gov/travel/hov-hrohowto.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_lane

If you go poke around in the MUTCD, you'll find that they call the shape a diamond exclusively as well.

You completely missed the point, trying so hard to defend your friend from me. I am not going around calling it a "Rhombus lane". By "term" I meant that you can call the SHAPE used on an HOV lane either a diamond or rhombus. I was NOT talking about the actually term used for the lane itself. I wasn't trying to show disrepect to myosh_tino, just proving my point that the term "rhombus" exists.

[Bickendan]

If an HOV is meant to be barrier separated and not reversible (I-5 in Seattle), I'd say it's almost better to go full on express-collector setup as on the ON 401. But that eats a very big ROW footprint.

[xcellntbuy]

Interstate 95 in south Florida has an HOV lane and partially converted HOT lanes in Miami-Dade County.  The HOV lane is designated by white and black signage and a double white dash line with time of day restrictions, 7-9 am and 4-6 pm, weekdays.  Given the highly aggressive nature of south Florida traffic, the lanes must be patrolled by police due to frequent violations.

The HOV lanes, both north- and southbound used to begin at FL 836/Interstate 395 in downtown Miami and continue to Boca Raton for 50 miles.  There was a separation of the HOV lanes (two, one in each direction) at the massive Golden Glades interchange of FL 826 (Palmetto Expressway), US 441, FL 9 and the Florida's Turnpike where the HOV lane rose HIGH above the Golden Glades. 

The HOV lanes in Miami-Dade County have been converted to tolled HOT lanes, first northbound on Interstate 95 and now southbound from the Golden Glades interchange to FL 836/Interstate 395.  The HOT lanes are separated from the normal travel lanes by flexible poles and the HOT lanes are now two lanes wide, but all six lanes are narrowed to 11 feet in width along with the normal travel lanes.

The HOV lanes have been built and steadily extended after 15 years of massive reconstruction and expansion of Interstate 95 north and south between Palm Beach Gardens (10 miles north of West Palm Beach) to a length of 80 miles.  Most of the length of Interstate 95 between Miami and Palm Beach Gardens is four, five or six lanes wide, separated by a very high concrete median.  All lanes north of the Golden Glades interchange are 12 feet wide.

The HOV lanes between the Golden Glades interchange in Miami-Dade County and Interstate 595 in Broward County will be converted to 14 miles of HOT lanes, as well.  The HOT lanes will intersect eventually a become a part of the reconstruction of Interstate 595 with three reversible HOT lanes in the currently grassy median westward toward Interstate 75.  The project cost is $1.4 billion.

[corco]

If an HOV is meant to be barrier separated and not reversible (I-5 in Seattle), I'd say it's almost better to go full on express-collector setup as on the ON 401. But that eats a very big ROW footprint.

Where is it barrier separated and not reversible on I-5 in Seattle? The Express Lanes are reversible and I can't think of anywhere else that's barrier separated.

[roadfro]

The shape may technically be a rhombus, but "diamond lane" is the correct term:
(...examples...)
If you go poke around in the MUTCD, you'll find that they call the shape a diamond exclusively as well.

You completely missed the point, trying so hard to defend your friend from me. I am not going around calling it a "Rhombus lane". By "term" I meant that you can call the SHAPE used on an HOV lane either a diamond or rhombus. I was NOT talking about the actually term used for the lane itself. I wasn't trying to show disrepect to myosh_tino, just proving my point that the term "rhombus" exists.

You also missed the point... Geometrically speaking, the preferential lane symbol is in fact a rhombus, as you mentioned. That is not under dispute. What realjd was pointing out is that, in traffic engineering applications such as HOV lanes, the preferential lane symbol used on standard signs and markings is always referred to as a diamond. Hence the term "diamond lane".

The Wikipedia article on rhombus mentions that the shape is often referred to as a diamond (unless, of course, it's the special case of a square).

[roadfro]

I realized I never answered the question in the OP.


Nevada currently only has one freeway with an HOV lane. This is US 95 in northwest Las Vegas between I-15 and roughly Lake Mead Blvd. It's a contiguous flow lane, using a single solid line (with no breaks) to separate it from the general purpose lanes. HOV 2+ restrictions are in effect for either 5 or 6 hours on weekdays.

There are plans to extend provide additional HOV lanes in the Las Vegas valley. The current lane on US 95 would be extended north to at least the 215 beltway under a larger US 95 construction project that's in planning stages. There is also a proposal to use add HOV lanes to a planned widening of Summerlin Parkway, with a direct HOV-connector flyover at US 95.

[rickmastfan67]

We have a HOV lane here on I-279 here in Pittsburgh.  It's reverisable depending on the time of day.

http://maps.google.com/maps?client=firefox-a&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=40.495738,-80.012586&spn=0,359.993032&z=18&layer=c&cbll=40.495831,-80.012577&panoid=Untu--EQoSPiEOYGKQVFVA&cbp=12,180.32,,0,-2.27

[Bryant5493]

This is I-75 South/85 South @ Williams St. NW. It's not updated, coming from Google Maps. PHOTO


Be well,

Bryant

[deathtopumpkins]

We have a mix here in Hampton Roads:

-On I-64 between Jefferson Avenue and Mercury Boulevard, the leftmost lane is HOV-2, and separated in its entirety by a double dashed line, with periodic signs on the jersey barrier median proclaiming the lane to be HOV only from 6-8 AM and 4-6 PM.

-On I-64 between I-564 and I-264, there is a reversible roadway in the median that is open westbound in the morning and eastbound in the evening, but open to all traffic except for, I believe, between the same times as above, during which it is HOV-2 only. The only entrance and exit points are to mainline I-64 at each end, with a direct ramp to I-264 eastbound that doubles as one from I-264 westbound, and direct ramps to/from I-564 west/east-bound. The roadway (and ramps) is striped with white lines on each side and equipped bi-directional signage.

-On I-64 between I-264 and Indian River Road (or Greenbrier Pkwy or Battlefield Blvd--with the reconstruction project that recently wrapped up I believe they were extended south/west-ward), the leftmost lane is HOV-2 as a continuation of the reversible lanes north of I-264. The lane is separated by a double dashed line, and also has periodic signs on the jersey barrier median proclaiming the lane as HOV only from 6-8 AM and 4-6 PM.

-On I-264 between Waterside Drive and Rosemont Road the leftmost of the express lanes is HOV-2, separated by a single dashed line of normal thickness, with periodic signs on the jersey barrier median proclaiming the lane to be HOV only from 6-8 AM and 4-6 PM.

-On I-264 for a few miles in Virginia Beach (around Independence Blvd and possibly Witchduck and Rosemont Roads) between 6-8 AM and 4-6 PM the outside shoulder is also open to HOV traffic, and during busy times outside of this period, it is sometimes opened to all traffic, designated entirely by variable-message signs mounted over the lane. The shoulder is separated from traffic by a normal solid white line, but also has a white line along the very edge of the roadway, and the lane separating line changes to dashed a short distance before exit and after entrance ramps, accompanied by "Begin to Exit Here" signs.

-On I-564 the ramps from I-64's reversible roadway extend for a short distance as the left lane, which is HOV-2 only 6-8 AM and 4-6 PM.

[UptownRoadGeek]

Just variations I've noticed.

Atlanta
Contiguous - Broken double white line
Contiguous - Solid double white line

Charlotte
Contiguous - broken single white line

Dallas
Barrier Seperated - Solid double white line w/ those little plastic sticks
Barrier Seperated - Zipper lanes that can be opened or closed in both directions

Houston
Barrier Seperated - Solid double white line w/ those little plastic sticks
Barrier Seperated - Single reversible lane
Barrier Seperated - Elevated single reversible lane

Memphis
Contiguous - broken single white line

Miami
Contiguous - Broken double white line
(don't know how the HOT lane is set up)

New Orleans
Barrier Seperated - Elevated reversible lanes

[Scott5114]

The 2009 MUTCD includes dozens of diagrams of proper signing and marking for HOV lanes. I'm guessing over the next several years, HOV lane signing and marking will become more standardized.

[Riverside Frwy]

The shape may technically be a rhombus, but "diamond lane" is the correct term:
(...examples...)
If you go poke around in the MUTCD, you'll find that they call the shape a diamond exclusively as well.

You completely missed the point, trying so hard to defend your friend from me. I am not going around calling it a "Rhombus lane". By "term" I meant that you can call the SHAPE used on an HOV lane either a diamond or rhombus. I was NOT talking about the actually term used for the lane itself. I wasn't trying to show disrepect to myosh_tino, just proving my point that the term "rhombus" exists.

You also missed the point... Geometrically speaking, the preferential lane symbol is in fact a rhombus, as you mentioned. That is not under dispute. What realjd was pointing out is that, in traffic engineering applications such as HOV lanes, the preferential lane symbol used on standard signs and markings is always referred to as a diamond. Hence the term "diamond lane".

The Wikipedia article on rhombus mentions that the shape is often referred to as a diamond (unless, of course, it's the special case of a square).

Ahh now I understand.....though I don't know why when I try input on or disagree with a member who's been here longer I have half the forum coming to their defense like they HAVE to be right ALL the time. Or, everyone has to disagree with me about everything. Feels like there's some secret alliance I'm not apart of.

With these solid double lines though, they really don't do much as most people just ignore them. Especially on congested freeways, where traffic is so slow that they become to impatient to wait for openings.

[J N Winkler]

Ahh now I understand.....though I don't know why when I try input on or disagree with a member who's been here longer I have half the forum coming to their defense like they HAVE to be right ALL the time. Or, everyone has to disagree with me about everything. Feels like there's some secret alliance I'm not a part of.

Why would we form such an alliance?  What would be the benefit?  This is just a recreational Web forum for discussion of roads.  Conversely, how does it benefit you to suggest that such an alliance might exist?

As far as I can tell, you pointed out correctly that the HOV diamond is a rhombus.  Someone else pointed out, also correctly, that the term "rhombus" is rarely used in relation to HOV lanes and that "diamond lane" is a common idiomatic expression for HOV lane (though perhaps not in California, where sign legends tend to favor "CARPOOL" as an alternative to "HOV").  If no-one is factually wrong, it is hard to see how the question of someone coming to someone else's defense should arise.

[Riverside Frwy]

Anyone know why I-405(California) from Interstate 10 through the Sepulveda pass to US 101 the HOV lane is only for the southbound side?( Well, that's what I saw the last time I was there)