Yeesh! 50% preamble before getting to the point. I almost fell asleep. Puhleeese, do the executive summery paragraph first. This is a blog, after all.

Hybrids in HOV lanes is bogus, always has been. No logic to it. No benefit to society.

HOV means HOV. 2 or more people, mean less actual cars on the road, PERIOD.

For my the HOV lane should be reserved for high occupancy vehicles...not hybrids.

More heads in a vehicle , less vehicles, HOV lanes make sense, and so do Hybrids. The transition is in forcing people between the two. Letting them see the solution, perceive benifits, and become mad enough to take personal action, and then to update the standards in the future. Whatever happened to 55 the speed to drive. Large SUV's could have a higher head account requirement for HOV lanes. The real incentive is the $ i think, especially since being green is good $ sense these days.

More heads in a vehicle , less vehicles, HOV lanes make sense, and so do Hybrids. The transition is in forcing people between the two. Letting them see the solution, perceive benifits, and become mad enough to take personal action, and then to update the standards in the future. Whatever happened to 55 the speed to drive. Large SUV's could have a higher head account requirement for HOV lanes. The real incentive is the $ i think, especially since being green is good $ sense these days.

More heads in a vehicle, FEWER vehicles.

I don't know how we'll ever save the environment if we can't use proper grammar while talking about it.

how many people use HOV lanes because they "just happen to" have two people in the vehicle (i.e., they would have two people without the HIV lane, and how many do so to save gas (i.e., split commuting costs with a coworker), and how many do so to alleviate aggravation of commuting in traffic?

In many big cities, there is slow stop and go traffic in the normal lanes, and minimal traffic in the HIV lane. Converting the HOV lane to a regular lane would reduce the amount of stop in the stop and go driving. Stopped cars effectively get ZERO mpg, so having less stopping saves gas and does all the things the HOV lane wants to do but too few people take advantage of for various reasons.

If it's about congestion, call them HOV lanes and make it 2+ people only - no hybrid exceptions.

If it's about CO2 emissions, call them LEV (low-emission vehicle) lanes and allow access for vehicles above a certain PMPG (passenger-miles per gallon). A Prius (48c/45h) with one person is better than a hybrid Tahoe (21c/22h) with two, but loaded with 7 people the Tahoe uses 1/3 the CO2 per person.

If both congestion and emissions are important, require 2+ people AND have a minimum PMPG requirement.

If they are going to allow hybrids, then any hybrid should be allowed.

I'm with the majority on this one. HOV should be for two or more people in the vehicle. Just becuase you drive a Prius doesn't mean you are using any less fuel AT HIGHWAY SPEEDS. You are not using battery power at highway speeds, you are hauling the extra weight of the battery pack at highway speeds.

-Lego

I may be mistaken, but I don't believe that Ohio has any operational HOV lanes in the state. I know that Columbus allows busses on the shoulder of interstates during high traffic volume periods, but I don't think there are any marked HOV lanes in the state. I have lived here for 26 years and been all over the state and have never seen any. I checked the Ohio DOT website and there is no information on existing HOV lanes, just some plans in the Cleveland area of adding some to I-90 from 1999, but I'm almost positive that they have not done that yet. In a CNN article last March, a representatve of Ohio DOT told CNN (in an article about the baseball players from Bluffton College that were involved in the bus accident) that Ohio had no HOV lanes (here is the link http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/03/02/bus.accident/index.html). I guess I'm saying that there really isn't a point of debating this issue for Ohio, because they haven't taken the initiative to develop HOV lanes yet.

HOV lanes should be used for, well, high occupancy vehicles. Driving a Hybrid should not automatically allow a lone person to use the HOV lane.

Now, I must admit I couldn't read the entire article -- too many links! :) However, if the Hybrid Tahoe is loaded to its max passenger occupancy -- eight passengers, is it still denied from the HOV lane?

My place of employment has a shuttle bus that runs between our two sites: one in Virginia and one in Washington, DC. These sites are about 33 miles part. Commonly I am the only person on the shuttle bus, which has a capacity of at least 20. Talk about a waste to tote me around! In this case, I would be better off driving my Civic between sites instead of trying to use “mass” transit.

To be clear, any car can use an HOV provided that there are two or more people in the vehicle. What many states have done is allow hybrid vehicles in HOV lanes even if there is only one passenger in the vehicle.

Linus makes a great point about passenger-miles per gallon. The 9 passenger SUV is clearly better than the Prius if there are 9 passengers in the SUV and only one passenger in the Prius. In fact, two weekends ago my graduate cohort at Brown University went to New Hampshire for a field trip, and all nine of us fit in our department's Chevy Tahoe. In that case, we actually felt good about being in the SUV because, after all, that is what they are designed to do: to comfortably fit a lot of people and all their gear, rather than taking two or three separate cars.

I'm confused? Can hybrid vehicles not go into the HOV lanes at all? Or can the go in even when only one person is in the vehicle? If so, then why are they still called HOV lanes and not some more fitting name?

"For one thing, the most efficient vehicle in the world..."

...is the bicycle.

"For one thing, the most efficient vehicle in the world..."

...is the bicycle.

The High Occupancy Vehicle lane should allow a gargantuan such as a Suburban (hybrid or not) when it has four or more passengers onboard, and allow standard sized vehicles carrying two or more passengers. Single occupant vehicles (Myers Motors NmG) and motorcycles riding solo should be allowed, too. Beyond that, and it starts to smell of politics. That's if we are trying to reduce traffic/vehicular congestion.

In CA, certain hybrids are allowed in HOV lanes. Priuses and Civic Hybrids are about all I see in the lanes. Plenty of people drive Camry, Escape, Highlander, and other hybrids, but they are NOT allowed in the HOV lanes. Also in the case of bridge tolls, single passenger hybrids MUST pay tolls, while HOVs do not.

So far, I think this is a fair system, but I do agree that we should switch to some sort of mpg model. The carbon footprint model is not only impractical but also uncessary since two people in an SUV is better than two separate SUVs so they should be allowed to use the HOV lanes. If we got to some thing like 50mpg for gas or hybrids gas/diesel drive vehicles and all electric and plug-in hybrids get free use of HOV lanes then I'd think that's fair. This will get people to clamor for these vehicles.

What if too many people by hybrids and the lanes get clogged? Convert another lane of the freeway to HOV lanes. Two HOVs/alternafuel lanes, two regular lanes. You'd cause even more people to switch over. Then what? Just keep going to a 3/1 ratio, then only the sorry few saps like me who won't buy a new car until his old one kicks the bucket (not likely to happen for another 10 years since I have an Acura and it's only 5 years old) will be stuck in the single "regular" lane.

There's a reason it's called an HOV lane; high occupancy is the point. The point is to reduce vehicles on the road.

Aside from the HOV lanes, there are many parkways around the country that are used for commuting... GW Parkway in NoVA/DC, Lincoln Drive in Philly, Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn, Storrow & Memorial Drives in Boston, etc.

All of these prohibit the use of trucks. As SUVs are light trucks, with the corresponding waiver of fuel efficiency as well as tax incentives for small business purchase, aren't they banned from using these commuter routes?

We should push municipalities to start ticketing SUVs for driving on roads on which trucks are prohibited!

This is nice but I can not afford a new vehicle and right now I am getting an extra 4 MPG (20% more) with the Vortex Fuel Saver that GreenFuel recommended me to buy for a christmas presen. Well not only did I do that but I bought 4. one for each one of my kids and they ALL love it and my daughter, who has a Buick got over 35% more MPG so I am now DAD of the Year in her eyes!

This may be irrelevant, but I can't think of any HOV lanes that are IN Ohio.

IMHO, no. Though the Chevy Tahoe is a hybrid, it's still a gas guzzler. It only gives about 21 MPG, 13 MPG less than the Ford Escape which is currently the most fuel-efficient SUV. Quite frankly, I'm amazed that it won a "Green Car" award even with it's paltry fuel -efficiency. Maybe if GM lightens the materials that make up the Tahoe.

There are several overlapping points that should be teased out to be able to discuss and decide this issue.

1. HOV lanes are for multiple occupancy vehicles - in order to reduce congestion. A hybrid vehicle is not going to reduce congestion with one occupant. Enough time and education needs to be allowed so that people can become comfortable with HOV lanes and to understand how much commuting time they could save if they modify their behavior slightly.

Some HOV lanes get rather little use, leading to dissatisfaction from all those single passenger vehicles stalled in traffic.

Highways are a limited resource - there's only so much of them. So where there's great demand for vehicle traffic, and to minimize congestion, you should try to maximize throughput. That means trying to increase the number of vehicles using HOV lanes, but not past the point where traffic in those lanes is substantially slowed.

The point of HOV lanes is to favor multiple occupancy vehicles by giving them a time advantage. If the lanes fill with single passenger hybrids, then that advantage is lost.

The answer then, is to permit hybrid single passenger vehicles to use HOV lanes selectively, and to discontinue the practice if the HOV lane travel time starts to slow.

It is best for HOV vehicles to be as full as possible to maximize the reduction of single passenger vehicles. So, as HOV lane usage increases, then so should the requirement for there to be more passengers in the car, until all seats are filled. In the SF Bay area there was a waiving of tolls on the Bay Bridge and precedence granted to cars with more than 3 people. This was desirable that a min-industry of hitching a ride into SF emerged spontaneously.

Allowing hybrids in carpool lanes may convince some people to buy hybrids, which is a good thing generally, but might also eliminate their incentive to carpool. This is probably a pretty small number, but it could be modeled and studied. However, people have commuted with inflatable passengers to try to sneak into HOV lanes...

2. The Tahoe, if I recall correctly, is not much of a hybrid, with a pretty weak battery backup and electric motor. I think it relies on a heftier starter motor. And most of the fuel savings comes from shutting off at red lights. It's gas milage is also not especially high.

I would not consider the Tahoe (and similar vehicles) to be a true hybrid and would disqualify them from using HOV lanes, even if other hybrids were permitted to use them

If the Tahoe carries the minimum or larger number of passengers to qualify as an HOV, then it should certainly be permitted to use the HOV lanes as an HOV.

3. HOV lanes might further be restricted to automobiles with certain weight restrictions. The Tahoe is a fairly heavy truck, and could be further disqualified from using HOV lanes on multiple points - if the regulations were sufficiently specific.

When you ride alone you ride with Hitler.

If a state is going to allow hybrids in the HOV lane and if HOV lanes are typically highways, shouldn't a vehicle like the Saturn Vue Hybrid be allowed to use them? The Vue hybrid system is better than the Escape's at highway speed -- 32 mpg for the Saturn vs. 30 for the Ford hybrid.

The best bet is probably to simply keep HOV lanes for true car-poolers. Tax incentives and the price of gas should be enough to push people to more fuel effecient vehicles.

And to really beat congestion, we need better mass transit in cities where it could work.

I also tend to lean towards the HOV lanes being used for vehicles with multiple passengers. There are lots of small cars out there that get pretty good fuel economy, but aren't a Hybrid. Vehicles with differing energy sources (Fuel Cell, electric, other?) may become commonplace in the not so distant future, and so the Hybrid in the HOV lane rule will either have to accomodate these new powertrains, increasing congestion, or go back to the original intention. I think that the rule was changed initially to encourage sales of these high fuel economy vehicles.

As for the 2-Mode Tahoe Hybrid not being much of a Hybrid, trust me, the hybrid technology is cutting edge. You may be thinking of the previous GM Parallel Hybrid Truck, which just shut off the engine at a stop. The battery in the Tahoe Hybrid is essentially a Prius battery, which is undersized for this application, but is basically all that Panasonic (Toyota) would sell to GM. As for decreasing the mass, the hood and tailgate are aluminum instead of steel while the seats and rims were redesigned to reduce mass and the spare tire was dropped. Still ,the truck is big and weighs a lot and there is just no way around that combination.