Foo - Is it ethical to drive in an HOV lane with an infant?

My wife posited this question to me.

She was driving to pick me up from work yesterday on our way to take our infant son to the hospital. He was in his car seat, so she used the HOV lane. Is it ethical? Doesn't it defeat the purpose of the HOV lane?

HOV lanes I'm familiar with require at least two people in the car. And infant is still a person. Don't see any ethical problem.

I always thought the rule for the HOV lane should only count licensed drivers. Alas, it only counts human beings, so you're off the hook.

... but what about a hearse?

I can tell you that based on the court cases, this is perfectly legal in Washington state. It does not have to be an adult passenger. I can also tell you, based on the court cases, that you cannot drive in the HOV lane legally while pregnant with no other passenger. Several women have tried this and all have been convicted of a violation. But driving in the HOV lane with the baby in the car on your way home from the hospital after giving birth, no problem.

To bad we have no HOV lanes in Ohio.
Mango is headed this way and we know how the Amish pack those window vans with people.

I can tell you that based on the court cases, this is perfectly legal in Washington state. It does not have to be an adult passenger. I can also tell you, based on the court cases, that you cannot drive in the HOV lane legally while pregnant with no other passenger. Several women have tried this and all have been convicted of a violation. But driving in the HOV lane with the baby in the car on your way home from the hospital after giving birth, no problem.

Now what if you give birth while driving in the HOV lane? Depending on the labor, I imagine the cop has to write pretty quick to get the ticket done before the baby is born.

silli Australians

If you kill a pregnant woman and her viable, unborn child it counts as a double homicide.

If a pregnant woman, in her third trimester, drives on the HOV lane without another passenger she is fined.

Gotta love our legal system!

If you kill a pregnant woman and her viable, unborn child it counts as a double homicide.

If a pregnant woman, in her third trimester, drives on the HOV lane without another passenger she is fined.

Gotta love our legal system!

I don't see a problem with it. HOV lanes are intended to reduce traffic congestion and encourage people to carpool.

If pregnant women were allowed to use it, you'd get into the sticky area of making them have to prove pregnancy when they got pulled over. There would be women who were 3 weeks pregnant wanting to use the lane, or women who were just overweight but claiming to be pregnant.

Now what if you give birth while driving in the HOV lane? Depending on the labor, I imagine the cop has to write pretty quick to get the ticket done before the baby is born.

Despite the things many here say about cops my bet is one would not ticket a woman in labor in the HOV lane. Well at least not one who could at least make a decent argument whe was driving to the hospital.

I don't see a problem with it. HOV lanes are intended to reduce traffic congestion and encourage people to carpool.

If pregnant women were allowed to use it, you'd get into the sticky area of making them have to prove pregnancy when they got pulled over. There would be women who were 3 weeks pregnant wanting to use the lane, or women who were just overweight but claiming to be pregnant.

Portable ultrasound unit and a sonographer in every police car.

HOV lanes were invented to solve a problem by people that have no clue what the problem is or how to solve it. We had HOV lanes in the freeway outside of my office. The freeway had 5 lanes for everybody to use, then they took one to make an HOV lane leaving 4 lanes for everybody else. Now you have 4 very congested lanes, with traffic barely moving, and one empty lane with nobody in it. So instead of solving the problem, or even barely improving the problem, they made the problem worse. And they spent a very large amount of money to do it. When this freeway gets to an intersection with another freeway there are big overpasses and ramps to allow people to go from one freeway to another. Now that there are HOV lanes involved they had to build another set of large overpasses just for the HOV lanes.

bj, this wasn't to discuss the efficacy of HOV lanes. Don't be so serious.

If parents with kids need parking close to the store doors, how can driving in the HOV be wrong?

HOV lanes were invented to solve a problem by people that have no clue what the problem is or how to solve it. We had HOV lanes in the freeway outside of my office. The freeway had 5 lanes for everybody to use, then they took one to make an HOV lane leaving 4 lanes for everybody else. Now you have 4 very congested lanes, with traffic barely moving, and one empty lane with nobody in it. So instead of solving the problem, or even barely improving the problem, they made the problem worse. And they spent a very large amount of money to do it. When this freeway gets to an intersection with another freeway there are big overpasses and ramps to allow people to go from one freeway to another. Now that there are HOV lanes involved they had to build another set of large overpasses just for the HOV lanes.

well, the main problem is that there are too many cars on the road at certain times in comparison to the carrying capacity of those congested roads.

You can add capacity by increasing number of lanes, but that only works if you have lots of money and have available land. At other times in the day, those added lanes are completely useless and only serve to further the burden of road maintenance. Let's keep in mind, that adding lanes only pushes back the congestion further back and doesn't actually solve it. Like if you have two 3 lane highways merging into a 4 lane highway, you're still short 2 lanes on the merged highway. If you make the merged highway 6 lanes, then yes, you can alleviate the congestion, but what if that 6 lane highway merges with another 2 lane highway? you're going to be short by 2 lanes and that will mean congestion. If you keep adding lanes, you're eventually going to have a problem with the amount of space all of those lanes are going to eat up.


Another idea is to stagger the road usage demand, so that the peak demand will never exceed the carrying capacity. It can be very cost effective, since the city doesn't need to add anything, but many businesses and people prefer the same old routine of going to work in the morning and going home in the evening.


So, then, we're left with HOV lanes. You get rewarded if you carpool and nothing changes if you don't. By reducing those 3 lanes to 2, what they've done is reduce the capacity requirements for the merging highway. At best, you only need 5 lanes now, because single lanes are easier to merge together, while the regular lanes only need 2+2=4. Realistically, HOV lanes are the least worst idea stemming from bad urban planning.


Also, have you ever tried crossing 5 or more lanes of congested highway traffic? It's not realistic.

I don't think infants should drive in the HOV lane. They can't even see over the wheel or touch the pedals.

But what about the hearse scenario? There are two people in the car... it's just that one of them is dead.

What cop is going to stop a hearse? I don't think you can count the deceased though, as that would open the door for the use of cremated remains.

What cop is going to stop a hearse? I don't think you can count the deceased though, as that would open the door for the use of cremated remains.

One who is really into catching carpool violators?

Whatever floats her boat, just tell her to more over and let faster traffic pass (if she doesn't already). I freaken hate when people park it in HOV lane and serve as damn rolling road blocks. The super bonus when they can't read and think it's HOV lane all the time and not just during a week and certain hours. Cars with "baby on board" are the worst, followed closely by damn priuses.

Not a lot of people use it :(

bj, this wasn't to discuss the efficacy of HOV lanes. Don't be so serious.
For some reason, I heard Beavis and Butthead laughing when I read this.

No, driving a car is not ethical


I don't think infants should drive in the HOV lane. They can't even see over the wheel or touch the pedals.

excellent point.

I don't see a problem with it. HOV lanes are intended to reduce traffic congestion and encourage people to carpool.

If pregnant women were allowed to use it, you'd get into the sticky area of making them have to prove pregnancy when they got pulled over. There would be women who were 3 weeks pregnant wanting to use the lane, or women who were just overweight but claiming to be pregnant.

A pregnant driver on the HOV is not the issue that I was referring to. I understand the reasoning for HOV lanes, though in So.Cal. They don't seem to help much.

The issue is how our legal system changes the definition of what "is" is depending on the situation.

It makes for interesting contrasts along the way.

If you kill a pregnant woman and her viable, unborn child it counts as a double homicide.

If a pregnant woman, in her third trimester, drives on the HOV lane without another passenger she is fined.

Gotta love our legal system!

If a pregnant woman is convicted of a crime, her unborn child also goes to jail with her, flaunting the little person's USA inalienable right to due process.

No, driving a car is not ethical
Why not?

Why not?

Cars kill, man, cars kill...

Cars kill, man, cars kill...
What is this? A&S?

It's not ethical, but it is legal.

The concept of the HOV lane, not that many people understand, is to get commuters to car pool. 2 people in a car is the minimum, more is better.

A child is not typically a commuter - I.E. somebody that might otherwise be driving alone in a car. Thus it defeats the original purpose which is to get folks to use fewer cars, save gas, less pollution, etc... Even a mom driving a kid to school is not the idea. Let the friggin kid take a bus, the ultimate commuter vehicle.

bj, this ... Don't be so serious.

OK, I vote that any person more than age 1 hour qualifies as a "human occupant" for purposes of counting the number of occupants in the vehicle.

Less than 1 hour of age and you probably don't have any business with that person in the car with you unless you are on the way to the hospital and then I think you would have sufficient evidence to get a pass from law enforcement.


not so serious huh, well you asked for it:

'The young woman got on the crowded bus and was standing there since all the seats were taken. She asked a man in a nearby seat if he would give up his seat for a pregnant woman. He looked at her for a minute then let her have his seat, but he said "you look really good for a pregnant woman, how long have you been pregnant?". She said "about 30 minutes and I'm still a little bit tired." '

You can add capacity by increasing number of lanes, but that only works if you have lots of money and have available land.

We have lots of land, and theoretically sufficient money since all of the cars using that road pay taxes for it. The 8-lane freeway outside my office is currently being rebuilt into a 12-lane toll road, somebody is thinking that they will make a lot of money off of high tolls.



At other times in the day, those added lanes are completely useless and only serve to further the burden of road maintenance.

My point was that we already HAVE the expensive road construction and added lanes that need to be maintained because they are the HOV lanes that were added to the existing freeway.



Let's keep in mind, that adding lanes only pushes back the congestion further back and doesn't actually solve it. Like if you have two 3 lane highways merging into a 4 lane highway, you're still short 2 lanes on the merged highway.

I'm a structural engineer so I understand problems but I more importantly understand how to SOLVE problems. The problem with most areas is that the politicians in the highway departments are not as smart at solving problems as poor engineers in private practice. I'm not making any money right now and I'm doing good work, if I couldn't solve problems any better than the engineers that build most of our roads I would have been out of business many years ago.

This place is ridiculous sometimes.