Move over laws are not simply about obedience and enforcement.  To think about them as if they were is a naïve exercise reminiscent of high school driver education.  (Just be good and do the right thing.)  Move over laws must deal with highly ramified situations, so they are necessarily unwieldy.

Some of the factors that jump instantly to mind are:  Impairment by alcohol, drugs, medicine, stress, exhaustion, electronic and natural distractions, and ignorance.  Impediments like vehicles designed with inadequate front, rear, and side vision; road design; construction zone signage and pavement markings; blinding or attention grabbing lights – especially from first-responders’ vehicles.  Worker mistakes.

Only after all these and probably others, can we think about the driving stuff!

The fact is that the move over maneuver is, as they say, a judgement call.  It’s not anything at all like, say, a speed limit.  The sign has a number, that’s it!

The move over decision and maneuver are determined by so many things:  Moment of perception ( by each driver involved in the situation), distribution of surrounding traffic as well as its speed (s) and possible individual speed changes.  Ability to see surrounding traffic and traffic approaching from the rear.  Availability of a move over space.  Suitability of the move over space.  How my movement will/might affect traffic flow.  Are surrounding drivers aware of the situation?  Which ones?  Who else knows the law?  Do they expect me to pull over in front of them?  And who knows how many other questions.

How much slower should I go?  Is slowing down legally defined in relationship to the prevailing speed of traffic, the speed limit, the weather, or the judgement call of some police officer who might get involved?  Originally, Scott’s Law in Illinois said that the traffic in the next lane over should not slow down – a much better idea, because it lessens the strong possibility of bunching-up and resultant rear-end collisions or spin-outs and evasive swerves that might end in crashes into the original emergency.

The last brings up the whole idea that uninterrupted flow is essential to safety.  Here reference the horrific 1955 Levegh crash at Le Mans, the reverse side of a decades old Chicago vehicle tax sticker that said in part, “Do not change lanes,” and the standard advice to match the speed of traffic so as not to disturb the flow.

As I stated above, this move over stuff is highly ramified and unwieldy.

How about enforcement?  Unless a police car happens to be included in, or in visual range of the particular move over incident, there can be no enforcement.  Enforcement is thus unlikely.  Setting up a move over situation, as I’ve heard has been done in some places, is probably entrapment.  Regardless, a ticketing officer would have to witness pretty much the entire situation unfold AND somehow understand from that observation precisely the perception and thinking process of the ticketed driver.

Nobody wants to get a ticket.  Remember those times when a truck driver, spotting a vehicle on the shoulder with its lights flashing, and not wanting to get a ticket, quickly moved over right in front of you – nearly or even actually cutting you off.

We must be extremely careful to ensure that move over laws and their penalties do not encourage such robot-like obedience.  The purpose of such laws is to save lives, not to get drivers to do knee-jerk maneuvers to avoid harsh punishments.  And that’s a tricky business.  People can be intimidated into obeying the letter of the law while thoughlessly ignoring and even forgetting the spirit of or reason for it.  ( Gotta make sure I stop for that stop sign. Okay, I made a full stop, now go.  Uh-oh, where the heck did he come from?  CRASH!  Well, I definitely stopped.  What I forgot was to check the intersection properly.)  What we really want is drivers to know the roadside situation, because they have noticed it early enough and then checked it our thoroughly.  Unfortuantely, one law cannot bring this about.  REAL driver education can implant in drivers a sound foundation they can reference the rest of their lives!