17 September 2008

Letter to the Editor: The Tennessean

(this letter was submitted on Wednesday. September 17, 2008)

Dear Sir,

I have a question about interstate driving conventions in Nashville: Is there a law requiring drivers to travel in the far-right lane at all times on Tennessee highways? The reason I ask is that since moving here from Boston, I have either observed or been involved in several near-accidents while merging on to the interstates, particularly the ones immediately surrounding the city. I have never driven in another state or city where drivers clogged the travel lane as they do in Nashville, and it makes merging at highway speed a perilous endeavor.

In Massachusetts (home to notoriously erratic driving practices), where the law requires that cars travel in the right-hand lane except when passing, it is nonetheless customary to to move over one lane when traffic is merging on the right. In ten years of driving in the northeast, I cannot recall having had trouble merging more than once or twice; here, I have trouble that often each week. Am I out of my mind?

Sincerely,

James Harrington
Nashville, TN

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