A Snooze Fest, I Tell You

You know what I really dig? Being in the carpool lane on the 87 S during rush hour traffic and blowing past all the cars in the adjacent lanes. Of course, I'll only do this when I have someone riding with me - the hell if I want to get pulled over for that, or at all. However, I do have some concern regarding the carpool lane and the rules that govern it.

What is the goal of the carpool lane? I think it serves as an incentive for daily commuters to group together and reduce the number of vehicles on the road, thus cutting emissions. Afterall, the law defines a carpool as a vehicle containing "2 or more persons". The incentive lies in the fact that the carpool lane moves faster than the lanes bogged down by vehicles containing but one driver and no one else. The rules of the carpool lane apply only during certain hours of the days Mon-Fri. I am completely on board with this otherwise lofty and idealistic endeavor, but I do have on central gripe about it. I genuinely feel that the rules of the carpool lane ought to limit the understanding of "2 or more persons per vehicle" to "2 or more licensed drivers per vehicle".

Fathom, please, this scenario: a woman in an Escalade enters the freeway during rush hour traffic. I have already been on the same freeway for a good twenty minutes in my manual transmission pickup truck that receives close to 30 miles a gallon. However, just having gotten off work, I am alone in my vehicle. The woman in the gas-guzzling Escalade is traveling with her three-year-old and proceeds to enter into the carpool lane and whizzes by me, leaving me miserable and hating life. Explain to me how her actions were environmentally conscious, allowing her to defy the laws of traffic. I'd be much obliged if you could.

Oh, duh. My bad, I forgot. Had she not been transporting her three-year-old son, he'd have been right behind her in his Hummer, putting out around three times as many emissions. So that was definitely a sustainable decision on her part to cart his ass 75 miles an hour through the carpool lane. Good to see at least one government institution isn't being completely taken advantage of.