Traffic

[2liveque]

I'll reserve most of my judgement until the construction is over. I'm certainly grateful that after many years, our highway widening project finally came to fruition. Based upon what afternoon traffic has been like however, it leaves me wondering just how much relief we will see. The morning commute has certainly improved after Shower. And why is that shoulder lane closed at 6pm headed into Puna?

[leilanidude]

As I have mentioned before, the merge backup will simply move towards Shower as not enough vehicles exit the highway before that point. The extra lanes should go all the way to Paradise and be open on both sides, 24x7 with real shoulders.

[lavalava]

Pahoa bound shoulder lane is closed at 6pm because some moron State highways clown who lives on Oahu has decided in his infinite wisdom that rush hour ends at 6pm and therefore we have no need of the extra lane that we just paid for.

[bystander]

The thing that bothers me is that the Keaau bound lane also has a time restriction on it. The signs say the "shoulder" lane is open between certain morning hours. But this is the new lane and not a shoulder lane like the other side. It was supposed to stay open all the time. Perhaps this is just temporary and it will stay open when it's done.

[TomK]

I agree the signs are very confusing. My take is when that solid white line ends it is now two lanes in the Keaau direction and will drive in the right lane, as do other drivers (but not most). The signs clearly say "shoulder lane", not right hand lane, and since there is a shoulder lane on the far right, then I'm assuming both lanes are open 24-hrs. That's what I'll tell the judge anyway!

Even though I drive in the new right hand lane (not the shoulder, it's coned off anyway), I'm still very cautious when approaching the transfer station. I fully expect drivers to turn right into the station from the left hand lane.

[ericlp]

The way I see it?

They require a BREAK down lane. There is no way to pull your vehicle off the road to the right or the left of the break down lane, that is why there are no dashes to separate the lanes. Next time you drive 130, you'll see that it's a SOLID white line indicating the break down lane.

Those signs will be there to stay. If someone does break down, and someone doing 55 rear ends the car that is trying to fix a flat or engine trouble could have a very big law suit on their hands from the county. They are taking a pretty big risk just keeping it open for 3 hours of the day.

Maybe and hopefully I am wrong and it will be 24 hours of 4 lanes but I don't' see it.




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[lavalava]

You don't need a whole lane to breakdown in, you just need a shoulder to pull over and cry on...

[Kapohocat]

Was pretty happy driving to town yesterday @7:45 am. Allowed 1.25 hrs to get to downtown and made it in just over 45 mins. (like the old days!)

Coming home at 2:30 pm only traffic was between zoo and shipman.

Better than a month or so ago when it took us 1 hr to get only from Pahoa to Keaau.

Maybe this all has flaws but so far it seems like can deal with them.

[cwoods61]

Today, (Fri, 3/6) Pahoa bound traffic was backed up past Kukula St. BEFORE 3:00 PM!

[TomK]

Wondered why there was still an enormous backup at 6pm - on a Friday too when the backups are generally much less. Road crews were doing work in the middle of the road in the morning, so suspect that work may have caused the problem if it continued to around 3pm.