Differential lane speed adjustmnet

[PRLM3]

In 40.2.1 Tesla added a feature to slow the car when on autopilot when traffic in an adjacent lane was significantly slower. Today I encountered what seems to be an unexpected adverse consequence of this, at least as currently deployed. Here in southeast FL we have a plethora of "sunpass" tolls. The state has created "express lanes" and put sensor readers up ie "pay to play." (these have replaced the "car pool lane" of yesteryear.) Separating the express lane from the rest of the road are foot high rubber posts placed very close together.

The problem with the new feature is that if you're in the express lane immediately adjacent to the regular lanes, you will be routinely going 40mph+ faster than the other vehicles. Since the lanes are separated by the posts, the feature does not make sense -- and if it read the posts and "understood" it would not activate.

In my case today, the car began intermittently braking in fairly dramatic fashion, then releasing, then repeat, etc. It was nearly comically bad. Given our use of express lanes, not uncommon in my experience in multiple states, this feature either needs to be rethought -- or significantly improved to recognize lane separators. Our use case of express lanes is way more common than the use case the feature was designed for.

 

[Watts_Up]

In 40.2.1 Tesla added a feature to slow the car when on autopilot when traffic in an adjacent lane was significantly slower.

Is it a requirement from the DOT or is it Tesla own specification?

Note: In Northern California, if the carpool lane is not a dedicated lane, there is no noticeable separation between the carpool lane
and the other lanes. There is only a posted sign (indicating when the carppol is available, and the minimum number of people inside the car).
Also there are no specific zones designed for enterring and exiting a carpool lane.

I never felt very comfortable driving at high speed in the carpool lane when the other lanes are moving very slow or not moving.
In particular I always worry about a car trying to enterr or to exit the carpool lane which might force me to slow down
but the car following me might not notice it immediatly.

There are also people using the carpool lane as a passing lane just to pass one car, so they suddenly enter and exit the carpool lane.

 

[PRLM3]

Note: In Northern California, if the carpool lane is not a dedicated lane, there is no noticeable separation between the carpool lane and the other lanes. There is only a posted sign

Yeah, that's the way FL used to be. And the feature may make sense in that environment, where both it and your own good human sense says "hey this is dangerous."

But in FL and other places where there is a small-ish physical barrier ie our small red rubber posts that may be difficult for the Nav to read, but are sufficient to keep the human drivers in their lane(s), the feature should have an override - ie, turn it off setting. It's kind of dangerous by itself, ie, when it kicked in my passengers were like "whoa, what the heck was that?" and anyone behind me if following closely would have been challenged to brake. Remember, there's a human driving that car!