This driver in a white Cruze blocked a Honda from zipper merging for 200 meters for some odd reason.
California commuter and Redditor /u/OliverQueen111 perplexing dashcam footage from earlier this week (Aug 4, 2024) from CA-156 in Castroville to the /r/IdiotsInCars subreddit showing a driver in a white Chevrolet Cruze being an absolute a**, preventing a driver in a black Honda Accord from zipper merging for all of a 1/8th of a mile.
Check out the ridiculous display of driving below.
[oc] Two cars fighting it out to merge into single lane after lane ends
byu/oliverQueen111 inIdiotsInCars
As mentioned, the incident happened on State Route 156 in Castroville just before Castroville Blvd. (Exact location on Google Maps linked here.)
As the dashcam footage shows, drivers on CA-156 merge from three lanes to one as they drive over this causeway or elevated road.
As such, traffic bunches up as vehicles let each other merge in front of one another in a zipper merge fashion.
We can see a driver in a black Honda Accord approaching the merge point which, if they followed the merge pattern, would slot them in front of a driver in a white Chevrolet Cruze (License plate 7ZIW179.)
To be fair, the Accord driver had plenty of opportunities to merge in front of the Cruze but was not aggressive enough and too timid to change lanes.
The Accord would’ve merged in front of the Cruze but the Cruze driver accelerates, blocking the Accord.
They then drive next to each other for the entirety of the lane funneled down to one.
I measured and it’s only a single lane for 1/8th a mile (200 meters.)
The single lane opens up into a turn lane and single lane and the Cruze driver slots behind the Accord, thus ending their unnecessary road rage.
“Chevy was clearly being an a**. First blocking the truck then blocking the Honda. And for what? He immediately turns left and all the effort to be first means nothing. Honda was also an idiot but not at the same level,” /u/Al_Tilly_the_Bum commented.
“ZIPPER! Just f***ing ZIPPER already. Good lord people are petty,” /u/Stellarbelly_Korz30 added.
“When a lane ends, and it’s stop-and-go traffic, the zipper merge is the law of the land. F*** the Chevy,” /u/appa-ate-momo concurred.
This was a demonstration of driving that was completely unnecessary.
All the Chevrolet driver did was increase both their chances of getting into a side-by-side collision.
Unfortunately, since the Accord driver was the one merging into the lane that wasn’t ending, any collision would’ve been likely their fault as the driver in the merging lane has the responsibility to yield their right of way.
In cases like this, it’s best to avoid the road-raging driver who wouldn’t yield and to slot behind a driver who doesn’t have a screw loose.
