The Absurdity of Fastrak and the HOV lanes

The state of California continues with the ridiculous HOV or High Occupancy Vehicle lanes that are intended for Electric Vehicles, hybrids with limited issue permission stickers, motorcycles and multiple occupant vehicles. As you can guess, eventually these lanes won’t move any quicker than other full access lanes. That’s how stupid they are. They are so poorly thought out that there are multiple scenarios that the system can be foiled.

Of course, not everyone can use these lanes which I covered in a previous article here: http://cartruthblog.blogspot.com/2016/07/abolish-wasteful-and-unfair-hov-lanes.html so they are patently unfair. Now in the infinite wisdom of CalTrans and others, the Fastrak was introduced in order to charge a fee for solo riders who want to use the lanes. This meant adding sensors to detect vehicles but still no cameras for reading license plates. Of course cameras came next along with a revised Fastrak that has a switch to indicate how many passengers are in the vehicle. Now imagine the infrastructure needed to support all this.

The cameras cannot see occupants such as children behind the front seats, especially in vehicles with tinted or covered windows. Lighting and windshield angles with reflections can come into play as well. Will cameras with those abilities come next? How will they be monitored? There’s talk that sensors will be incorporated to somehow detect how many occupants are really in the vehicles. When will this madness ever stop? Until then the poorly conceived notion of the HOV lane, the Fastrak and lanes monitored with license readers can be cheated in multiple scenarios.

Finally, how silly to have to manipulate a essentially a cell phone sized object to adjust for the number of occupants, or keeping it covered in its ESD bag so the sensors can't pick it up. And keeping it glued or velcro'd on our dashboard? That's absurd. Here's another problem about the Fastrak system. A couple lines of code can easily determine the speed traveled between the sensors. And finally, if tolls must be collected, it should be in every lane, the same amount, for everyone and done by a bar code sticker on the windshield or by license plate.

Below are the numerous situation that can be encountered and bluffed. Lie at your own risk.

Solo or Multiple occupants, no vehicle sensor, no license plate reader. Example: San Tomas Expressway:
No Charge

Solo occupant, vehicle sensors but no license plate reader. Example, 680 Southbound, Sunol to San Jose
1. No FasTrak – No Charge
2. FasTrak covered – No Charge
3. FastTrak displayed – disputes charged claiming passenger(s) in vehicle – Account Credited

Solo driver on a license reader equipped road. Example:  580 Eastbound, Pleasanton to Livermore
4. FaskTrak displayed, disputes charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle - Account Credited
5. FasTrak covered, disputes charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle – Account Credited

Solo driver with FasTrak Flex on a license reader equipped road. Example: 580 Eastbound, Pleasanton to Livermore
6. FastTrak Flex set to 2-4 people – No charge
7. FastTrak Flex set to 1 person - disputes charge claiming passengers in vehicle – Account Credited
8. FastTrak Flex covered – charged, dispute charge claiming passengers in vehicle – Account Credited

Multiple Occupants with vehicle sensors, no license reader:
9. No FasTrak – No Charge
10. FasTrak covered – No Charge
11. FasTrak displayed – charge is invalid, disputes charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle - Account Credited

Multiple Occupants with FasTrak and license reader equipped road:
12. No FasTrak – dispute charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle  – No Charge
13. FasTrak covered – dispute charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle - No Charge
14. FasTrak displayed – dispute charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle – No Charge

Multiple Occupants with FasTrak Flex and license reader equipped road:
15. FastTrak Flex set to correct setting – No Charge
16. FasTrak Flex set to incorrect setting – dispute charge claiming 3 passengers in vehicle – No Charge
17. FasTrak covered – dispute charge claiming passenger(s) in vehicle – No Charge

It’s been said, and a Google search indicates that an HOV lane violation is not a moving violation and doesn’t add points on a license in California. They key is to contest the ticket in court, if the officer isn’t there to testify, conventional wisdom says to plead not guilty and no witness present means the ticket will be tossed. If the officer is present, I would ask for forgiveness and a reduced fine. It’s a travesty that a texting ticket is less than a carpool violation ticket. The travesty of the existence HOV lanes and the Fastrak system also needs to be fixed. As in abolished.

Do you really think putting more vehicles in fewer lanes is a good idea? Don't be absurd.