T.O. suffers from the HOV virus

Is there a single member of Premier Kathleen Wynne’s cabinet, caucus, Ministry of Transportation bureaucracy, group of advisers — anyone she knows — who has half a clue about how traffic operates in the Real World?

Not if the decimation of our highway system during the recently concluded Pan Am Games is any indication.

I am, of course, referring to the virus that affects every segment of our society. It starts with “H” and ends with “V.” Yes, HOV, or High-Occupancy Vehicle lanes.

Wynne’s current minister of transportation, Steven Del Duca, was quoted as saying the temporary Pan Am HOV lanes were “very successful.” Maybe from the back seat of a chauffeur-driven limousine. But for the other 99.999 per cent of GTA drivers, they were an unmitigated disaster.

Originally, I thought the reason they upped the minimum occupant count from two to three was so the entire crowd for most events could travel to the venues in a single car.

To be fair, the opening ceremonies were by all accounts spectacular. Once Canada started kicking Pan American butt, the crowds filled in. Less than a third of available tickets went unsold.

I am a law-abiding citizen. Perhaps selectively so, but probably more so than many. I do not use the HOV lanes when I don’t have the required occupant count.

But, I’d estimate eight out of 10 vehicles I did see in those lanes over the “official” time period did not have three people in them.

Any vehicle that had a Pan Am sticker was exempt from this rule. If you were in any other business, even one where time is critical — surgeon, obstetrician, automotive journalist — you couldn’t. Where’s the fairness in that?

And how big were these stickers? I sure didn’t see one on a beat-up old Dodge Caravan I saw trundling down the HOV lane on the Gardiner a couple of weeks ago.

It should be no surprise the HOV lanes didn’t work, because they have never worked anywhere they have been tried. They weren’t just stupid here during the Games. They are stupid everywhere, all the time.

Surely, the objective of HOV lanes is to change behaviour, to encourage people to carpool, thereby reducing traffic congestion.

Do you know a single person who calls up his buddy and says, “Hey Chuck; if you carpool with me we can use the HOV lanes!”? I don’t. Maybe these people are out there. But the fact that the HOV lanes are almost always empty, even when the rest of the lanes are jammed, proves their objective is not being met.

In California, foreigners with two passengers can scream along, only having to watch out for people playing tennis in the HOV lanes — the locals never drive in them. All that pavement going to waste.

The two countries that have the most efficient, safest and fastest highway systems, in my extensive driving experience, are England and Germany. Nary an HOV lane in either country, that I can recall. Their secret? Lane discipline. Taught at birth (OK, driving school) and properly enforced. Yet we’re taking lessons from the Americans?

Wynne said the HOV lanes won’t necessarily be made permanent, although they will remain through the Parapan Am Games.

As of last Tuesday, the three-person minimum has been reduced to two again. That means two people in an infinite-litres-per-hundred-kilometres Cadillac Escalade can use the HOV lanes, but a single soul in a Smart car cannot. Where’s the logic in that?

But Wynne also said the idea of converting HOV lanes to toll lanes might come up, to help pay for transit systems. Er, Madam Premier, our highway system IS our transit system. If people want to ride a bus or subway, let them pay for it.

If they are going to make HOV lanes permanent, they should at least make them the rightmost lane on our highways

Speaking of Cadillac Escalade, my stance on this issue puts me onside with former mayor Rob Ford. First time for everything. No, wait — second time. He was right about bike lanes on Jarvis St. Hey — even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Ford said recently that he drives his ’Slade in the HOV lanes all the time. He has places to be and if he gets caught, he just pays the fine.

My favourite Pan Am HOV story, though, was the one about the guy caught with two dummy mannequins in his vehicle.

Apparently, mannequin suppliers had trouble keeping them in stock during the Games, so this guy wasn’t the only Einstein on our roads.

He might have got away with it, too, except the female-ish shotgun rider was wearing a little black flowered number, with a Montreal Expos baseball cap pulled over “her” eyes. This raised an officer’s suspicions. This driver was not only guilty of the crime of illegal HOV lane usage, but a crime of fashion, too.

A friend of mine suggested there were actually three dummies in that vehicle. But I think this guy was done wrong. HOV lanes were designed by dummies. Why can’t they be used by dummies? Freelance writer Jim Kenzie has been writing for Toronto Star Wheels since 1985. For more Star Wheels stories, go to thestar.com/autos. To reach Wheels Editor Norris McDonald: nmcdonald@thestar.ca