A single lane which becomes impromptu dual (or more) lanes

[jeffandnicole]

The title refers to those roadways and ramps which are striped for a single lane, but when traffic is heavy, or dictated by local driving habits, two lanes (or more) of traffic takes over the lane.  This occurs without any signage, and is generally regarded as acceptable by the local police department or other agency without any normal attempt to corral traffic back into a single line of vehicles.

(There are roads where the parking/shoulder lanes becomes a travel lane during certain time periods, or where signs may state to form two lanes.  They are NOT examples of what I'm referring to, as the movement is permitted from signage, and/or the lane actually exists, regardless if it's legal to drive in it.  I'm talking about a pure, single lane).

One I see on a regular basis is the outer ramp of a cloverleaf exit, from NJ 29 North to Calhoun St. in Trenton, NJ. ( http://goo.gl/maps/A6FQo , the ramp is the one that starts at the bottom (Rt. 29) and ends at the top (Calhoun St)) The width of the ramp is only about 16' wide or so, but almost every morning, two lanes of vehicles will form on the ramp.  The left lane normally is for people turning left at the light (onto State Street) just beyond the interchange; the right lane is for people turning right at that light.  For those going straight thru the upcoming intersection and staying on Calhoun, they tend to take either lane, then eventually merge in on Calhoun when possible.  It's not possible to squeeze two rows of vehicles next to each other when buses or wide vehicles use the ramp.

Another I see when traffic is heavy, mostly due to issues on I-295 North, is US 130 North between the Brooklawn Circles ( http://goo.gl/maps/ErUXX , going left to right).  The lane is a wide single lane, but two lanes of traffic will form when severely congested, and it gets fairly tight at the yield into the circle. 

The main circle itself has always been assumed to be two lanes wide, even though there's no striping to indicate that.  When motorists on the right creep a little to the left, they usually get a horn toot in response.

[Brandon]

That's very common around Chicagoland.  Some municipalities gave up and restriped some two-lane streets as four-lane streets.

[myosh_tino]

A notorious one in the San Francisco Bay Area is the southbound I-280 offramp to Page Mill Road in Palo Alto.  The ramp is a single lane ramp but does eventually widen to two lanes near the base of the ramp.  However, because the ramp is controlled by a stop sign resulting in horrendous backups during the morning commute, drivers routinely form two lanes on the single-lane portion of the ramp almost all of the way back to the gore point on the freeway.

[deathtopumpkins]

Any road in the state of Massachusetts.

[Duke87]

This used to be a constant occurrence on the ramp from the Major Deegan (I-87) south to the Cross Bronx (I-95) west/south. Most of the ramp was wide enough for two lanes and traffic would queue up astride on it (that ramp is almost never not backed up). For the past few years, though, ongoing construction of the interchange has meant barriers have gone up reducing the available width below that where two cars could go side by side.


New York City is also home to an example of the opposite phenomenon: the inner roadways of the Williamsburgh Bridge are striped as two lanes but are only 17'6" wide - these roadways as originally designed carried a pair of trolley tracks each, not cars.

[kphoger]

State laws generally allow passing on the right if the roadway is wide enough for two vehicles.  So, in a sense, a lot of these really could be considered two lanes.

[Darkchylde]

You see that a lot at the offramp from Causeway Boulevard which connects US 190 East to itself in Mandeville. It's only striped for one lane until the very end, but cars can be seen waiting two abreast halfway up the ramp.

[1995hoo]

You see that a lot at the offramp from Causeway Boulevard which connects US 190 East to itself in Mandeville. It's only striped for one lane until the very end, but cars can be seen waiting two abreast halfway up the ramp.

I see this sort of thing frequently at red lights where people not turning right try to move over so people can go right on red. The off-ramps from the I-95 HOV to VA-289 (the Franconia—Springfield Parkway) were an excellent example of this (single-lane off-ramps where left-turners stayed further over to allow right-turners through) until they were narrowed for construction within the past two or three months.

Totally different scenario: Whenever I've taken the Lincoln Tunnel into New York, I've found that the unlined area between the toll plaza and the tunnel entrance essentially operates as "create as many lanes as you want to try to shove your way ahead prior to cramming into two lanes."

[NE2]

I see this sort of thing frequently at red lights where people not turning right try to move over so people can go right on red.

Like holy crap I do this all the time on my bike.

[kphoger]

I see this sort of thing frequently at red lights where people not turning right try to move over so people can go right on red.

If there's room between the lines, why not make room with your car?  I do this all the time (both moving over and squeezing in).  The exit I use to get to work, in fact, is striped as one lane but functions as two.  If people didn't form two lanes, the tailbacks would get quite long.

[1995hoo]

I see this sort of thing frequently at red lights where people not turning right try to move over so people can go right on red.

If there's room between the lines, why not make room with your car?  I do this all the time (both moving over and squeezing in).  The exit I use to get to work, in fact, is striped as one lane but functions as two.  If people didn't form two lanes, the tailbacks would get quite long.

I agree completely and I find it rude when people don't do this, especially if they're busy playing with a mobile phone and thus they fail to notice the car trying to squeeze by to turn right.

[jp the roadgeek]

Any road in the state of Massachusetts.

Or Connecticut

[Alps]

Any road in the state of Massachusetts.

Or Connecticut

Or New Jersey. I've seen us go THREE abreast in places. I passed someone earlier today in a de facto 2-lane, for that matter. The NJ 17/NJ 4 cloverleaf ramps used to stack up two by two. Then there's the "Jersey Right" where people (like me) will sneak by on the shoulder (unless signed or crosshatched to prohibit such behavior) and blow past the traffic signal queue on the green.

[akotchi]

The one that comes to mind for me is the ramp from U.S. 1 north to Route 29 and Warren Street in Trenton, NJ.  This ramp is a wide lane, but stacks two abreast from the ramp nose onto Warren Street and to the striped two-lane approach to Route 29, especially during peak periods when the ramp traffic backs up onto the Trenton-Morrisville Bridge.

[roadman65]

We do that a lot here in Florida.  I even see many use the median that is not pavement  as a defacto lane when trying to bypass traffic at that intersection where the signal waiting line is longer than that of the left turn lane with a left turn signal.  You then have someone who needs to make a left turn, who is blocked by the straight through traffic to actually even reach a perfect left turn green arrow, so they drive the median as another lane.

However, once in a while you will  still get a very conservative cop who might tell you that you should not pass a left turning vehicle on the right where the road does not have striping for two lanes that is extremely rare, but nonetheless happens.  Also using shoulders to go around stopped vehicles is common where applicable as Florida does not use them on off interstate highways, but if it does on occasion we do that.

[BuildTheRussian]

This is very common in Russia.
We have plenty of roads with wider than normal lanes, due to them being too narrow to be striped as proper 4-lane roads. In these cases, usually the lanes are wide enough for 2 cars, but not wide enough for 2 buses or trucks.
Example 1.
Example 2. In this one, drivers form a "3rd lane" in rush hours, because there's a lane for left turns after the crosswalk.
As for the legal side of it, the Road Rules do not directly prohibit multiple vehicles to be driven abreast in a single marked lane. In this case, the road is considered to be 2-lane, but with 2 "positions" or "rows" in each direction. These are basically imaginary lanes that the drivers create by dividing the carriageway (when all markings are not visible or absent), or in this case, their side of the road in half, considering the size of their and other vehicles and the distances between them. Changing "rows" will be considered "changing lanes".

[Rothman]

In Soviet Russia, the lanes drive you.

[SectorZ]

https://www.mass.gov/event/burlington-and-billerica-resurfacing-and-related-work-on-route-3a-2022-11-17t180000-0500-2022-11-17t200000-0500

A local one to me, MA 3A in Burlington, that has 18' wide lanes that people erroneously double up is being reconstructed to fix the issue. Granted, a simple lane stripe on each side could have fixed the issue when Carter was president, but that's just my opinion.

[index]

The intersection between Elk Ave and Broad St in Elizabethton before the redo sort of featured these:

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.3495962,-82.2243223,3a,48.2y,299.97h,80.85t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNA6JiaHy2jEBZTvSWrgvEw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu

There used to be lines marking two lanes, but at one point I believe it was repaved without the lines. People would still line up side-by-side here.

[kphoger]

Crazy to think, isn't it? ... that people will drive two cars abreast in places where there's room for cars to drive two abreast.  It's almost like people are smarter than little bits of paint on the ground.

[webny99]

NY is way more stripe-heavy than many (most?) other states. It's relatively rare to have room for two cars in the same direction but only striping for one.

As such, most of the examples I can think of are where shoulder drivers form a defacto right turn lane.

[Big John]

In Wisconsin, where there is a single-lane off-ramp, if there is a lot of right turning traffic, they will slide over to the right rather than wait behind the left turning traffic.

[GaryV]

In Wisconsin, where there is a single-lane off-ramp, if there is a lot of right turning traffic, they will slide over to the right rather than wait behind the left turning traffic.

I've seen this happen many times at traffic lights, where there is no dedicated left turn lane and someone is turning left. The other traffic sneaks around next to the curb. Also used for RTOR situations.

[kphoger]

In Wisconsin, where there is a single-lane off-ramp, if there is a lot of right turning traffic, they will slide over to the right rather than wait behind the left turning traffic.

Isn't that just common practice?  Like here, on my daily commute.

[CovalenceSTU]

I wouldn't count going around one or two stopped cars as forming 2 lanes, but on S Marlin Ave in Warrenton the entire line forms 3 lanes every time, with only 2 present. Although the lane is up to 20ft wide at the intersection so it's encouraged in a way.