The More Things Change...Oh Hell, There's Always Going To Be That One Guy Driving Slow In The Passing Lane...

A few posts back I wrote about how much faster people are driving due to the roads being somewhat wide open during the day, what with traffic being less than 70% of normal.

Well, yesterday I decided to take Co route 36 eastbound to I-25 to go home from work as I hadn't driven that route in over a month.

Colorado route 36 features two open lanes in each direction, with a third far left lane for HOV's or people willing to pay to use it (so naturally I never use it). 

What that means to the average driver tooling along route 36 is that instead of the far left lane being the passing lane, it is the lane that runs parallel to the far left lane that is the passing lane. 

In Colorado the passing lane is exactly what it implies, a lane used to pass the slower traffic driving on the right.

However, there are some drivers who are seemingly unaware of this. 

There are some drivers who seem to believe that, due to the fact that the passing lane is frequently devoid of traffic because no driver has deemed it's necessary to pass a vehicle driving in front of them, that they can use the passing lane as a leisurely cruising lane.

And that, my friends, is exactly what happened yesterday. 

There I was in the right hand lane of a stretch of Co route 36 with a posted speed limit of 65 MPH, and soon I was behind a driver traveling at less than 55 MPH.

So naturally I made the decision to utilize the passing lane to pass that driver and resume my commute at the posted limit of 65 MPH. 

Except, when I made the transition to the passing lane I found myself behind a driver also driving less than the posted 65 MPH speed limit, and with barely a gap of a car length between that driver in the passing lane and the driver I was previously behind in the right lane.

The driver in front of me was apparently oblivious to me being right behind them, or that they were impeding the flow of traffic.

The driver in front of me just kept on toddling along in their Subaru, maintaining the aforementioned less than one car gap between their car and the car in the right lane, both of which were traveling about 55 MPH in a clearly posted 65 MPH zone.

After a few minutes there were at least ten vehicles behind me and also behind the driver I had previously been behind in the right hand lane. 

And not one car in front of the car driving ahead of me. 

So, a traffic jam. A completely unnecessary traffic jam on a highway with 70% fewer cars driving on it than usual.

And people wonder what causes road rage.