Slugging - Background

Background

In order to relieve traffic volume during the morning and evening rush hours, high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes that require more than one person per automobile were built in many major American cities to encourage carpooling and greater use of public transport; the first were built in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area in 1975. The new lanes, and frustration over failures of public-transport systems and high fuel prices, led to the creation in the 1970s of "slugging", a form of hitchhiking between strangers that is beneficial to both parties, as drivers and passengers are able to use the HOV lane for a quicker trip. While passengers are able to travel for free, or cheaper than via other modes of travel, and HOV drivers sometimes pay no tolls, "slugs are, above all, motivated by time saved, not money pocketed". Concern for the environment is not their primary motivation; Virginia drivers of hybrid automobiles are, for example, eligible to use HOV lanes with no passenger.

In the Washington area—with the second-busiest traffic during rush hour in the United States and Canada as of 2010—slugging occurs on Interstate 95 and 395 between Washington and northern Virginia. As of 2006, there were about 6,459 daily slugging participants there.

In the San Francisco Bay area, with the third-busiest rush hour, slugging occurs on Interstate 80 between the East Bay and San Francisco. As of 1998, 8,000 to 9,000 people slugged in San Francisco daily. However, after bridge tolls were levied on carpool vehicles in 2010, casual carpooling saw a significant decline and etiquette became more uncertain.

Slugging also occurs in tenth-busiest Houston, at a rate of 900 daily in 2007, and in Pittsburgh.

Slugging is more used during morning commutes than evening commutes. The most common mode that slugging replaces is transit bus.

David D. Friedman's The Machinery of Freedom proposed a similar system (which he referred to as "jitney transit") in the 1970s. However, his plan assumed that passengers would be expected to pay for their transit, and that security measures such as electronic identification cards (recording the identity of both driver and passenger in a database readily available to police, in the event one or both parties disappeared) would be needed in order for people to feel safe. Although slugging is informal, ad hoc, and free, in 30 years no violence or crime was reported from Washington D.C. slugging until October 2010, when former Sergeant Major of the Army Gene McKinney struck one of his passengers with his car after they threatened to report his reckless driving to the police.