A break for I-95 drivers

Interstate 95 commuters could not have been happy to read in The Post that it will be several more years before all of the highway in Palm Beach County is widened to 10 lanes. But many must have been happy to hear that they won't face one more potential daily irritation.

Last month, the Florida Department of Transportation canceled plans for doubling the hours of the High Occupancy Vehicle lanes. The lanes are being added as each newly widened stretch opens. Currently, only vehicles with two or more occupants can use the lanes between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. and between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. Monday through Friday. The idea is to encourage carpooling, and the DOT wanted to extend the two-person rule for an hour on either side of the morning and afternoon rush hour.

Supposedly, state studies showed that changing work hours were causing the HOV lanes to draw more traffic earlier and later. State Sen. Ron Klein, D-Delray Beach, was skeptical. He asked the DOT to review those studies to see whether they applied in Palm Beach County, which has a job hub in West Palm Beach but where overall traffic flow is more balanced than in Broward or Miami-Dade counties. Sure enough, the DOT first postponed the new rules, which were to have taken effect July 1, then dropped the idea, at least for the time being.

We would agree with DOT engineers who maintained even before Katrina caused another big spike that higher gas prices will force more commuters to carpool. The state can't widen I-95 to more than 10 lanes, and Palm Beach County will grow by several hundred thousand more people. In addition, jobs in Palm Beach will draw more and more people who live in Martin and St. Lucie, especially if The Scripps Research Institute creates a new biotechnology industry.

So local traffic planners and the state should begin now to craft a system that will allow people who live near each other and work in the same area but not necessarily at the same business to find carpool partners. Studies of Palm Beach County traffic as the widening progresses can determine whether longer HOV hours make sense.

It hasn't been fun to drive through a construction zone for the past five years, and it won't be fun for the next four or five. But as the opening of each portion shows, the work is necessary, and DOT has kept things moving about as well as drivers could expect. Keeping the HOV lanes on their normal schedule is the right decision until all the work is done.