Questions and Answers About Your Commute : If Driver Is Slow but Legal- Just Relax

Dear Traffic Talk:

Each day during my commute from Woodland Hills to Universal City on the Ventura Freeway, I observe at least two drivers who fail to understand that slower traffic should keep right because the left lane is for passing. Doesn’t everyone realize that if they’re going 55 m.p.h., they should not be in the left lane?

Why is it that when a driver has more than enough space and time to change lanes to the right, allowing someone else to pass, he or she rarely does? When I observe one of these schmoes who thinks that it’s his right to police the streets and forbid all other drivers to pass, it instantly takes a few years off of my life because I get so angry.

Do these drivers ever get tickets for driving too slow? They are just as dangerous as the speedsters.

Kathleen Hegarty

Woodland Hills

Dear Traffic Talk:

The other day I got a speeding ticket. I am not complaining--I was speeding. However, the situation raised a question about driving technique.

When driving along at 55 m.p.h. and encountering a group of cars driving at the same speed, blocking three of four lanes, what do you do?

Staying behind the three cars and being surrounded by cars seems dangerous. They say in driver training to always have an escape route, and I worry about a chain-reaction accident.

Changing lanes and being the fourth car and blocking the entire freeway seems like a dangerous situation also. If you drive 55 m.p.h., you get run over by everyone. People shout, “Get off the road, farmer!”

If, on the other hand, I pass them up, I get a speeding ticket. This has happened three times to me, about once every five years.

Alberto P. Sanchez-Chew

Sherman Oaks

Dear Readers:

Both of you touch on an interesting dilemma--what to do when real-life driving situations conflict with the vehicle code.

Like it or not, virtually all freeway drivers ignore the 55-m.p.h. speed limit. Some sneak above it by a few miles per hour and others stomp on the accelerator as though they’re on a qualifying lap for the Daytona 500.

Wherever your driving habits place you relative to those extremes, there’s little to be done if you come upon a vehicle that is actually obeying the law. If a driver obstructs the prevailing flow of traffic but is going the maximum speed limit, he or she won’t get a ticket, said Rob Lund, a traffic officer for the California Highway Patrol.

“You can’t cite them for that,” said Lund. “I agree that it can be frustrating, but they are already doing the maximum.”

As for whether to pass a clump of cars going 55 m.p.h., don’t expect anyone in law enforcement to tell you it’s OK. If you choose to risk the traffic citation, however, safety tips about following the flow of traffic and leaving a safe distance for braking still apply.

The safest of all options, of course, is to take a deep breath, relax and simply slow down. Traffic Talk appears Fridays in The Times Valley Edition. Readers are invited to submit comments and questions about traffic in the Valley. Please write to Traffic Talk, Los Angeles Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, Calif. 91311. Include your full name, address and day and evening phone numbers. Letters may be edited, and no anonymous letters will be accepted. To record your comments, call (818) 772-3303. Send fax letters to (818) 772-3385.