Crusade to end HOV lanes in Las Vegas gathers speed

Lt. Gov. Stavros Anthony is still pursuing the removal of high occupancy vehicle lanes from Las Vegas Valley freeways.

“We are moving forward with trying to eliminate them altogether,” Anthony told the Las Vegas Review-Journal last week in a phone interview. “We’re going through the process with the federal government. It’s going to take a little bit of time. It is what it is, but we’re going to keep moving forward until we get some kind of final action.”

Anthony, who in 2019 started his crusade against HOV lanes while he was a Las Vegas city councilman, was a major player in the HOV lane regulation hours being shortened by the state. Last year the regulations went from being in effect 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to being limited to between 6 a.m.-8 a.m. and 4 p.m.-6 p.m., Monday through Friday and open to all on weekends.

Challenging process

That change was made after Anthony brought the subject to the attention of the Nevada Transportation Board of Directors, for which he serves as vice chairman, something he had been working at for several years.

“The process to get here has been long and a lot of people standing in the way,” Anthony said. “Especially when I was on the Las Vegas City Council and the Regional Transportation Commission (of Southern Nevada). There were just a lot of people who would just not listen to me and basically wanted HOV lanes all the time. Once I was able to become lieutenant governor and the vice chair of the Nevada Board of Transportation, I was in a position where I could actually get something done with the approval of the board, which approved it unanimously when I brought the motion to them.”

The carpool lanes were added to Interstate 15 in 2019 as part of Project Neon — adding to the existing HOV lanes on U.S. Highway 95 at the time — new regulations went into effect limiting the use of the lanes to vehicles with two or more people and were in place for 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Once that occurred many motorists complained about the round-the-clock regulations and the lack of entry/exit points, which was addressed in mid-2020, nearly just nearly six months after the lanes went live.

Between April 25, 2023, and July 2 of this year, after the shorter carpool lane hours went into effect, Las Vegas Municipal Court has seen 90 HOV lane violations submitted by law enforcement officials. That equates to about one every five days following the new lane regulation hours went into effect. That compares with Las Vegas Municipal court between Jan. 1, 2021, and April 3, 2023, handling 814 carpool violations, which equated to just under one per day.

There’s no study noting what the outcome of lifting the restrictions has been, but Anthony said that he has received overwhelmingly positive reaction from the public. “They said thank you for opening them up,” Anthony said.

‘They still think it’s 24/7’

He also noted that he’s also heard from the public that they weren’t aware that the regulations had changed. This is despite new signage installed on I-15 and U.S. 95 that notes the change in regulation hours.

“They still think it’s 24/7,” Anthony said. “Just trying to get the word out that they can enjoy that lane basically 90-95 percent of the time.”

One potential impact of removing the carpool lanes could be having to close left-hand exit/entry points on freeways, such as the HOV drop lanes on I-15 at Harmon Avenue and the Neon Gateway farther north on I-15, near Charleston.

Additionally, as part of the ongoing process, the state is looking to figure out whether there would be any financial implications with the federal government if the HOV lanes were removed. A portion of Project Neon’s funding was awarded with ties to including the carpool lanes.

What, if any, changes will have to be made clear as the process between the federal government and the state moves forward.

“We put in the application and that’s why we’re going through the steps the federal government wants us to go through and that’s what we’re trying to find out,” Anthony said. “Obviously if they want millions of dollars in return, we’re going to have to find out why that’s the case. It’s hard to speculate this point. We’re going to keep moving forward and the director of NDOT (Tracy Larkin Thomason) is just pushing us along, which I appreciate.”

Contact Mick Akers at makers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2920. Follow @mickakers on X. Send questions and comments to roadwarrior@reviewjournal.com.