[rcthompson]

This partly falls under "3 hours to pass through legally", but I would add to this the significant number of major intersections where the marked lanes are completely ignored at all times. For example one intersection I'm familiar with has a single lane out of 4 leading to the highway on ramp. However, probably at least 60% of cars passing through the intersection want to get on the highway, so in practice both of the lanes adjacent to the designated lane are also used to access the on-ramp, resulting in an uncontrolled 3-way merge during a sharp left turn in the middle of an intersection.

Edit: For anyone curious, my particular example is getting on 278 South coming from the southeast on Prospect Ave.

https://goo.gl/maps/ySokhy6uXEPPGoG8A

[crmd]

> one intersection I'm familiar with has a single lane out of 4 leading to the highway on ramp.

I suspected instantly you were talking about the prospect Ave BQE entrance . I make that left off third ave onto Hamilton most mornings, and the difference between being in the first- or second-from-left vs third-from-left turning lane is probably an extra 10 minute delay for exactly the reason you describe. I’m no expert in self-driving cars/line following robots, but I suspect real-world NYC driving is computationally impossible at this time.

[totoglazer]

Yes, this also describes, for example, the next entrance at Hamilton and Hicks. Although there’s it’s narrower so primarily just one extra lane.

[emodendroket]

I used to have a drive home where one of the roads had a single lane that everyone local treated by convention like it was actually two lanes, one lane to go straight through and one to turn right, which worked fine until someone from out of town was driving in it and got in the wrong "lane" or just stayed in the middle

[pricecomstock]

I was curious! But not too curious, since this maybe describes most of the on-ramps to the BQE