State transportation officials worry that surging sales of hybrid-electric cars and SUVs could flood “high-occupancy” lanes with single-occupant vehicles, slowing travel times and defeating the purpose of carpooling and mass transit.
Recent laws passed by Colorado and Congress allow low- emission vehicles to use HOV lanes even when the driver is the sole occupant.
The Colorado Department of Transportation is waiting for federal officials to decide which hybrids and other energy-efficient vehicles qualify for the single-occupant exception.
It could mean that a driver of a 2006 Lexus RX400h hybrid sport utility vehicle, which costs $50,000 and gets about 25 miles per gallon on the highway, would be able to drive in HOV lanes reserved for carpoolers and buses.
Already, HOV lanes are in place on Interstate 25 north from downtown Denver to the Boulder Turnpike, and on South Santa Fe Drive.
Hybrid-electric vehicles are powered by a combination of a gasoline engine and battery- powered motors.
Local transportation officials are concerned that the HOV exception would benefit larger hybrid SUV models with worse fuel economy than smaller conventional cars.
“You might have a single driver in a ‘green’ vehicle that only gets 20 or 21 miles per gallon taking priority” in HOV lanes over a small nonhybrid sedan that gets 30 mpg, said CDOT deputy executive director Peggy Catlin.
Programs to give hybrids access to HOV lanes are part of a broader national movement to reward buyers of low-emission, energy-efficient vehicles. Colorado is one of a number of states that offer tax credits to consumers buying hybrids. There also is a federal tax credit.
Some cities have experimented with free metered parking for operators of hybrids. Baltimore reportedly is offering hybrid drivers discounted parking at city-owned garages.
The plan to allow single- occupant hybrids in carpool lanes comes just as Colorado’s tolling authority plans to convert HOV lanes on the Boulder Turnpike and I-25 into “high- occupancy toll,” or HOT, lanes.
Under the plan, single- occupant vehicles can buy their way onto HOV lanes by paying a toll. Detractors call HOT lanes “Lexus lanes,” claiming they favor wealthier motorists.
Laws that let single-occupant hybrids travel in HOV lanes also allow them in HOT lanes for no toll or a reduced toll.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected to decide early next year what qualifies as a low-emission vehicle for HOV lanes. Colorado’s conversion of the I-25/Boulder Turnpike HOV lanes to HOT is scheduled for spring.
Virginia has allowed hybrid vehicles with just a single occupant in HOV lanes for about six years, but the state’s transportation officials are recommending that the privilege end.
“Hybrids really have started to crowd us out,” said Virginia Department of Transportation spokeswoman Joan Morris. “The number of hybrids using HOV lanes has exploded.”
As many as 20 percent of the vehicles using Interstate 95’s HOV lanes in Northern Virginia are hybrids, Morris said.
Virginia had the second- highest number of hybrids registered last year among all states, after California, according to research firm R.L. Polk & Co.
California registered 25,000 hybrids in 2004, about five times Virginia’s number, and has allowed them in HOV lanes since August. California also requires that hybrids get at least 45 mpg to use the carpool lanes. Virginia has no such requirement.
Although the number of hybrid vehicles registered in Colorado last year – 1,654 – is relatively small, it represents a 72 percent increase over the previous year, Polk research shows.
Nearly all were registered in the Denver area, which ranked 13th nationally in year-over-year hybrid growth among major metropolitan areas.
This year’s hybrid sales are even more robust.
“Dealers can’t get them fast enough,” said Tim Jackson, president of the Colorado Automobile Dealers Association.
For the first eight months of this year, 2,618 hybrids have been registered in Colorado, 58 percent more than in all of 2004.
Allowing solo drivers to buy their way onto HOT lanes makes sense because the volume can be regulated by raising or lowering tolls, said Robert W. Poole Jr., a transportation expert with the Reason Foundation, a California think tank.
But letting in hybrids and other low-emission vehicles is a bad idea, Poole said.
“HOV lanes are intended to be a traffic solution,” he said.
“If you open them up to the rapidly rising number of hybrids, you are going to destroy their usefulness.”
State Sen. Ron Tupa, D- Boulder, who helped sponsor the 2003 measure that gave low- emission vehicles with solo drivers access to HOV lanes, said Colorado is many years away from having that problem.
“We’re not even close to the point that the number of hybrids in HOV or HOT lanes are enough to consider changing the law,” Tupa said, adding that the number needs to be at least 10 percent.
While the growth of hybrid sales in Colorado is impressive, the hybrids still represent only 1.6 percent of all the vehicles registered in the state, according to Polk.
In Virginia, many consumers appear to be buying hybrids specifically to gain access to HOV lanes, said Morris, of that state’s transportation department.
Kuni Lexus in Littleton has sold about 100 hybrid SUVs since April, and another 100 customers are on a waiting list.
Most buyers don’t appear to be aware of the hybrid-in-HOV lane option, said general sales manager John Mathieson.
Customers aren’t buying the $50,000 vehicles primarily for fuel economy, although hybrids typically get 30 percent better gas mileage than comparable nonhybrid models, said Kuni salesman Charlie Mullison.
Instead, he said: “They’re making a statement that we don’t want the oil companies to hold us hostage.”
Staff writer Jeffrey Leib can be reached at 303-820-1645 or jleib@denverpost.com.
