meanwhile if you did this in my home country, half the people there would just pass to the corridor never questioning for a single second why that corridor exists and why all the others are not using it
Same! Are you in Korea?
nope turns out there is more than one in that case
Yep, we do not have the wide ass shoulders on our Autobahn network. We also know how to merge using the entire merging lane and the zipper effect. In the USA, it’s cross the white line at lower speeds to create an accordion effect.
What would they do if it was five lanes each direction?
Everyone goes to the right, except the left most lane. They go to the left. This is independent of the number of lanes.
Americans would be too angry about the one or two cars or motorcycles that might occasionally take advantage to be able to do this. Even merging results in a lot of grumpy drivers trying to prevent “cutting”.
Great idea, though.
Americans literally do the same thing…
Driving through the rettungsgasse is punished very heavily though
How can there be traffic if there are two empty lanes? We’ve already added more lanes, the traffic has been solved. If the ambulance needs to get through, they should add a fifth lane. (/s)
wait hold on. i don’t see an emergency vehicle. you just do this because traffic is stopped?
Yes, we are taught to move left or right to create a middle lane during a traffic jam.
how do you think it would work if they only did it when there was an ambulance?
That’s how it works in the UK. You see a blue light in your rearview, then everyone tries to find space and the emergency vehicle proceeds at a clip of 5-10mph, while the affected people ahead burn/bleed etc.
I wonder how much more time they would have needed in this example:
I guess 10 minutes?
Yeah same in France
Same way as in statesia. It wouldn’t
Yes
this makes my “i must sort my wires into different lengths and colors” gland so very happy. i must learn your ways.
As a german I’m always flabbergasted when people from other countries are amazed by that. It makes sense to do that - help get’s faster to the accident and therefore the road will be cleared much faster than if the emergency services are stuck somewhere in the traffic jam. Do you have this strange behavior in other parts of your daily life, too?
I know atleast one country where half the people there would try to use that corridor. So yea it requires some couple levels in civilization.
This would require people capable of thinking and having empathy for others
In the US? You mean other than keeping the shittiest health care system in the world just to be sure no money would go to someone who can’t pay?
Our culture is narcissism
Here in America you’d get people peeling through the middle
That’s what’s amazing to me. Every single driver resisting the urge to cut the line when the opportunity is right there? Couldn’t be America.
It’s also severly punished
Around here, emergency vehicles just drive in the shoulder when this happens.
We Brits got rid of a lot of them (and laughably called them “smart” motorways), so now we just sit there and watch people burn.
Yes, but you’re ignoring the advantages of smart motorways. By removing the hard shoulder, that ensures people who break down can block an entire lane and endanger themselves and others in the process! Smart! Bonus! Win! 👍👍👍👍
This is how I’ve always seen things done in the US, tbh.
I always regret accidentally posting on lemmy.world.
No you haven’t. I’ve never seen this. I regularly see people who use the shoulders as passing lanes the moment traffic slows a little bit. Then completely block them. I see drivers trying to get in front or behind an emergency vehicle to take advantage of the rest of the drivers moving to the side with a complete disregard for how they’re slowing everything down. I’ve seen drivers proudly park their car infront of an emergency vehicle and block them, then honk and flip the firetruck off for trying to pass them. I’ve seen drivers shoot at emergency responders because they were blocking the highway. I have never seen American drivers making an emergency lane.
While I’ve never seen this, it’s worth noting that driving culture is pretty significantly different across the US even in the same state but different cities.
Merging in Philly? Bring your knife. Merging in Pittsburgh? They’ve already made room.
So it’s possible that this person at least sees more pleasant driving behavior wherever they’re at in the US.
In Paris, government people and/or VIP use fake ambulances to take advantage of this and avoid beeing stuck with us peons.
People might not like me pointing this out, and, admittedly I’ve never been to Germany, but doing such a thing does not matter in the US since there seems to be no real shoulder to this road. Anywhere in the US, whatever emergency vehicles that need to get to places don’t require this at all - they will drive by on the shoulder of the road at break neck speeds even if no car has moved on that road in the last 10 minutes.
In the picture the right most cars have switched to the shoulder to make the Rettungsgasse big. I forgot the exact reasons but the shoulder is not used for emergency vehicles on purpose.
I forgot the exact reasons but the shoulder is not used for emergency vehicles on purpose.
The shoulder has no shoulder. Probably not safe.
It’s bcs it’s intended for ‘emergency stops’ (including ppl going for a piss), ‘emergency vehicles’ (ambulances, etc) have a safer & more predictable way down the middle of the road away from the edges of the road.
There shouldn’t be anyone in the middle of the road, but there could be someone on the emergency lane.
It’s not just the stopped cars that might be on the shoulder / emergency lane, but it’s also that there might be more loose stones there and in winter snow and ice. The middle of the road is then safer.
Do Germans regularly piss by the side of the road? In America it’s a great way of ending up on a sex offenders registry.
In Europe usually you get a fine at most. Imagine being on a road trip with a 3yo in the back, if they say they have to pee it’s not like "I hope this queue moves in the next 30 minutes, it’s RIGHT NOW! So off on the shoulder they go.
That’s crazy, all these suckers waiting while there is an open lane right there!!
There are easier ways to say you drive a Mercedes.
Lol.
Sorry, it’s just… Have any of you seen LA freeway lane widths?
This doesn’t work everywhere. Love the idea, though!!
The system works for arbitrarily wide roads:
Over there they really do love to say ‘that’s brilliant but it’s absolutely impossible that would ever work over here in basically the same or easier situation bcs over here is not over there’.
The system works for arbitrarily wide roads
No, only up to 5 lanes, then you’re out of fingers.
I didn‘t see any comment mentioning this, but not creating an emergency lane only 10 years ago was a huge problem in Germany. Then the government increased the fines massively and started a big awareness campaign. It took several years, but now it is the norm.
Intervention and change is possible as long as their is political will.
That push in Germany quickly got wider EU traction & it’s finally starting (5~10 years ago?) to be the norm in the main countries too (not just for when the traffic stops completely but even in cases of slow moving traffic like below 60 or maybe 80km/h).
Thx!
Interesting. I was going to reply that I have been in plenty of traffic jams on the Autobahn that did not have such a lane, but that was indeed more than 10 years ago!
As an Austrian, this works good but not always so good as it should
Here in the UK we do something similar, though not until we see the flashing lights. We pull across as far as we can in order to allow as much space as possible.
That is the law in the US as well. TWICE I’ve seen someone ignore it and both times other citizens (in cars as well as pedestrians) bully the driver into following it.
Driver: I didn’t have anywhere to go!
Bike messenger: Turn into the fuckin alley or I’m breaking all your lights
Just the other day I watched some luxury SUV sitting dumbfounded in a left turn lane with an ambulance flashing lights and blaring the horn behind it. Oh yeah, the left turn lane was the one that led to the emergency room parking lot. I wish that bike messenger was around then
Bike messenger are the real police. They’ll give a homeless guy a sandwich a then turn around and beat the shit out of a pickpocket.
You do not fuck with bike messengers, they’re pissed off at the world and right to be. Plus they know all the escape routes.
i’m just trying to think of the synchronicity of this. i did the running sports in school because i got good legs. i did the kicking martial arts thing because i got good legs. i am doing the leg exercise midlife crisis thing because blah blah. i’m wondering if i should get some mall ninja throwing stars to go with my new angry midlife crisis this sounds fun
