[icarus_drowning]

Late merging makes better use of available road bandwidth. That's not anecdotal, that's simple math.

[ronaldx]

Late merging makes more effective use of the car waiting area, at the expense of a faster flow.

[seanmcdirmid]

So you mean the flow through a straw is better than through a funnel?

[abstrakraft]

Bandwidth is probably the wrong term here. It keeps traffic from backing up as far, true, but this really only matters to people who are turning off before the merge.

Ignoring early exits, at steady state, the only thing that really matters is flow _after_ the merge - that's what determines the rate at which traffic passes the restriction.