[Shaggin Wagon]

This is regards to the comment that you shouldn't leave space because that would cause delays:
It's a vicious cycle. No one leaves enough room so people are forced to "steal" your two second gap. If everyone left more space, lane changes could occur as needed rather than looking for the weak link and forcing your way in.

My theory is that if everyone left a gap traffic would move quick like a centipede but with tailgating the calgary commute moves slow like an inchworm. An example is southland merging onto southbound deerfoot. Everyone tries to merge when traffic is going 10 km per hour when the andreson/deerfoot split doesn't happen for a km. I stay in my lane until traffic is up to speed and lane changing is quite simple. That is a huge reason why Deerfoot south is backed up from southland to the airport.