My favorite are the people in large vehicles who decide to be the police of this bullshit methodology and straddle the lanes.

Zipper merge mther fcker!

Just merge and move on with your life

I don't know what it is, but in my experience, Hawai'i driving is just so much better than anywhere else I've lived--especially when it comes to this exact scenario. When there's a lane closure, most people just... get over. Give a shaka, get a shaka, done. When you do have someone blast past everyone to try and merge at the last possible minute people just... let them in. Might get stink eye for do it. Maybe "one finger shaka." But it's either some tourist who doesn't know better and we all feel smug knowing that they have to go back to where they came from or it's someone in a genuine hurry and just let em go.

I think it's partly due to Hawai'i having a more collectivist mindset. Everybody is just trying to get to where they need to be, everyone kind of understands that traffic can suck and so no one is too concerned with "being on time" (again, my experience). Plus there aren't any billboards on the roads (at least not that I've seen) and you pretty much have something pretty to look at the whole time you're in traffic. Lower speed limits too. It's peaceful. You rarely hear someone honk. Though I will say that I've noticed drivers getting more aggressive as more local kine people move away.

I went back to Florida a few years ago to visit my mom while she still lived there and it was miserable to drive anywhere. I got the sense that no one wanted to be where they were--they didn't want to be in their car so they raced off to work, where they also did not want to be, so they raced home, where they also did not want to be; all in Florida where I feel like most people who live there don't want to be tbh. I used to be an angry and impatient driver. In Hawai'i I'm like one grandpa. I stay in slow lane and drive the speed limit.

That sign was for him and for you to prepare to leave the room for a car to zipper merge when the time comes, dummy.

Jesus, the only thing worse than incorrect is confidently incorrect.

Oh he read them. He just don’t give a fuck about anyone but him.

OK people, this is not a hard concept but apparently I have to spell it out: It's the same as an on-ramp.

If you're racing up an on-ramp just to slam on your brakes and merge with a highway that's already slow... you are part of the problem! Period. Full stop. Fuck you.

"Fill the lane"? Why? It's going away. Again: same as an on-ramp. If you're speeding up past what the traffic is already going, you're not practicing a zipper merge!

Yes yeeees Everyone fight

I don't really understand what zipper merging has to do with this if the issue is that they waited until the very end of the lane to try and merge and now have to do it immediately. (At least that's what I assume is happening based on the description)

There’s Zipper Merge, and then there’s “I’m more important than everyone else, so I’m going to the front of the line and force my way in.”

See, the single file line continues to move if everyone gets over when the sign clearly says “Lane Ends Ahead Merge Now”. It may move slowly, but it moves. If people pass everyone in line and speed ahead to force their way in, the single file lane then has to repeatedly stop to let those people in. The people who followed the road sign and moved over (by zipper merging at the right point) are now being punished, forced to repeatedly stop, and keep getting pushed farther and farther back by those prima donnas whose trip is way more important than everyone else’s.

You can keep yelling “ZIPPER MERGE!”, but those assholes saw the same sign I did telling them that they should move over, but they didn’t. Now they can wait.