The Virginian-Pilot
                             THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Monday, October 23, 1995               TAG: 9510210021
SECTION: FRONT                    PAGE: A6   EDITION: FINAL 
TYPE: Letter 
                                             LENGTH: Short :   36 lines

BOULEVARD HOV-3 IS A FAILURE

This letter concerns the HOV-3 Hampton Boulevard entrance to the Norfolk/Portsmouth Midtown Tunnel. For the past three years, I have sat in traffic each evening in the extreme right lane waiting patiently for my turn to merge with traffic coming around the overpass-loop approach from Brambleton Avenue.

Every night while waiting five to 15 minutes within sight of the HOV-3 approach, I have been counting the cars using the HOV-3 approach.

The results are quite interesting, and the city and tunnel authorities don't need to hire a six-figure consulting firm to tell them that the HOV-3 lane is a failure and actually a hazard that slows down all tunnel traffic.

During my nightly delay between 5:00 and 5:30, I have counted seven to 11 automobiles using the HOV-3 lane. The number of occupants in each car is almost always the same: one. My figures indicate that only one in 12 cars using the HOV-3 lane actually carries three people.

All traffic waiting on Hampton Boulevard is delayed by letting these single-occupant vehicles sit in line.

You don't have to be a rocket scientist or a traffic engineer to see that this experiment is a failure. Either the HOV-3 lane should be done away with or a police officer should be stationed there at rush hour to enforce this joke on every decent motorist using the tunnel.

LEROY WILLIAMS

Portsmouth, Sept. 25, 1995 by CNB