> and you're expected to keep up with the flow of traffic.
This is very state dependent, if we are talking about legality.
In WA state, for example, there is no "flow of traffic" law or similar. The limit is the limit, and any excess of the speed limit is illegal regardless of what all other drivers are doing. So even if the right/slow lane is going 100MPH through the 70MPH zone, you are legally expected to still go 70.
Thankfully we do have laws against left lane camping, but I rarely see it enforced.
You’re confused. If you know of ANY US state that has a flow of traffic law that allows cars to exceed the speed limit so long as they are keeping up with other traffic, I’d love to see a link to their traffic codes. Speeding doesn’t suddenly become legal because two or more drivers do it together.
This has nothing to do with the expectation that slower traffic stay in the rightmost lanes, which is what GP is addressing.
> Speeding doesn’t suddenly become legal because two or more drivers do it together.
That's not true. Examples:
I once pulled out my local newspaper where local judges were petitioning to have speed limits raised because they were throwing out speeding tickets due to excessive fines. This was in Massachusetts, in the late 1990s or early 2000s, about a road in Shrewsbury near lake Quinsigamond. The context was that the speed limit was 25, traffic flowed at 40-45, and they would throw out tickets for people doing 50.
I was once pulled over in a Massachusetts tollbooth even though I was the slowest driver on the road. (2004, I90 westbound at the intersection of 128, when EZ Pass still had to go through actual tollbooths.) If I was given an actual ticket, I would have point-blank told the judge that I was going half the speed of everyone else and feared getting rear-ended; then the case would have been dismissed. (The cop also knew this, because he recognized me from traffic court and knew that I'd make him look like a fool for pulling over the slowest driver.)
This is very state dependent, if we are talking about legality.
In WA state, for example, there is no "flow of traffic" law or similar. The limit is the limit, and any excess of the speed limit is illegal regardless of what all other drivers are doing. So even if the right/slow lane is going 100MPH through the 70MPH zone, you are legally expected to still go 70.
Thankfully we do have laws against left lane camping, but I rarely see it enforced.