It’s official: HOV lanes soon will be open to all drivers for more hours

The high occupancy vehicle lanes are largely empty in both directions on Interstate 15 near the East Flamingo Road exit on Thursday, June 20, 2019, in Las Vegas. (Benjamin Hager/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @benjaminhphoto
State regulators voted Monday to even more decrease the hours carpool lanes in the Las Vegas Valley are controlled.

The Nevada Department of Transportation's Board of Directors voted unanimously to cut back the hours for lanes committed as "high occupancy vehicle" lanes to in between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. and between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, and to open the lane to all on weekends.

The new hours are set to be carried out within the next 30 days= and will be studied to ensure they are working efficiently.

Lt. Gov. Stavros Anthony asked for the HOV product be heard at Monday's meeting, with the hope of removing the lanes entirely.

NDOT studied three choices: Convert HOV lanes to basic purpose, transform them to reveal lanes with restricted access, or even more reduce functional hours and improve enforcement.

Converting the lanes to basic function or express lanes would need a prolonged ecological study that might take in between 18 and 24 months prior to either of those modifications could be considered.

The board also voted to go ahead with the study, to think about getting rid of the lanes entirely in the future.

The broadened HOV lane system went into result in 2019 with the $1 billion Project Neon. The hope was that the addition of the lanes would change motorist habits, pushing more homeowners to carpool and, in turn, eliminating more automobiles from valley highways.

In 2015 NDOT began a pilot program that reduced the 24/7 nature of the lanes and opened the carpool lanes to all drivers in between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m

. This is a developing story. Examine back for updates.

Contact Mick Akers at makers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2920. Follow @mickakers on Twitter.