0329

I made an interesting observation while driving to Bountiful yesterday; “traffic” in Utah is not the same as traffic in California…at all. It is basically the complete opposite. I noticed while driving that I was regularly gravitating toward the farthest right lane. When I drive I take what I like to call the path of least resistance. Basically I change lanes every time I see a faster lane. Sometimes I may pretend to be a NASCAR driver looking for the best pocket to drop into, but most of the time, I find the best lane by choosing several cars ahead of me then figuring which one is moving the fastest. It startled me that I kept finding myself in the 3^rd or 4^th lane because those are supposed to be the slow lanes. When there is traffic on a California freeway, it is a result of the fact that so many cars are leaving the freeway that the off ramps can’t handle them so they backup onto the freeway. When this occurs, there is a slowing from the farthest right lane (lane 6 or 10 depending on where on the freeway you are) and gradually slows the other lanes making 1 the fastest lane. In Utah however, the exact opposite occurs which means that the slowing isn’t a result of overpopulated freeways but is instead a result of the fact that no one actually is in a hurry to get anywhere.