Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war • Hacker News Board

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#321

Post by pilsetnieks » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:00 PM UTC

pnathan wrote: post #246

FroshKiller wrote: post #2

I'm a homeowner and an active Waze user. The street I live on is not "my" street. It's a public street that any licensed driver may use. I did have an issue with drivers coming around a blind curve too quickly to be safe, though, so I did what these homeowners ought to be doing and contacted my local government about getting my street assessed for a traffic calming project. The city created a three-way stop before th…

> I'm a homeowner and an active Waze user. The street I live on is not "my" street. It's a public street that any licensed driver may use. This is the correct analysis. Unless it's a gated subdivision, the streets are operated by the government for the broad public benefit; not the local benefit of the homeowners.

There is actually such a thing as city planning and many streets could, in fact, not be operated by the government for broad public benefit but for the benefit of the people living nearby. E.g. in a residential zone in a suburb the streets may actually be intended to connect the homes not for through traffic.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#322

Post by takno » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:01 PM UTC

serge2k wrote: post #266

takno wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The approach in the UK is increasingly to regard the gridlock as an educational opportunity, whereby drivers learn to leave their cars at home and take public transport. combined with decent public transport investment, heavy road calming on non-main roads and progressive removal of parking spaces in town centres it's really having a very positive impact for everybody except the people who bizarrely still choose to s…

This type of attitude is part of what drives people to take residential streets.

while this clearly does happen, urban residential streets in the UK are usually much narrower and invariably reduced to a single lane by parked cars. They are also less often in a grid pattern which supports rat-runs, and most problem rat-runs have been identified and either blocked or traffic-calmed to death 20 years ago.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#323

Post by joncp » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:02 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #39

Ithaca had this problem arise spontaneously about a decade ago. If you're driving to the Wegmans supermarket from east of town, the official routes you are supposed to use are badly congested, and drivers "in the know" have long been aware you can save a few minutes sitting in traffic by going through a certain residential neighborhood. When they put traffic calming in place and made it illegal to drive through the n…

I wish I had a route to a local Wegmans, congested or not.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#324

Post by ThomaszKrueger » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:03 PM UTC

In Rio some tourists had a pretty harsh reception when they made a turn suggested by Waze.. got riddled with bullets.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/10/05...

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#325

Post by mjevans » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:06 PM UTC

rlucas wrote: post #26

paulddraper wrote: post #4

If it's faster to take a neighborhood street than the interstate , there's a problem. It's not normal. It sounds like residents are at war with transportation infrastructure instead.

For the record, see Braess' paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braess'_paradox "Normal" and intuitive behavior is not what you can expect from a busy traffics system.

While this paradox might be a good theoretical tool for theory, I've disagreed that it is a good tool for modeling real situations since first hearing about it.

* It is unrealistic that the mid-route would ever be created as described.

* It is also unrealistic that the capacity of two parallel routes would also vary so much and have a mid-point where that reverses.

* It would be much more realistic to have two routes, one of higher natural capacity, which react differently to increased load (not a static, no matter what, over-simplification).

* Finally; it still does not address the issue of systems that are literally unable to cope with peek load; such as modern metro freeways in the US.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#326

Post by zeveb » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:07 PM UTC

knieveltech wrote: post #276

protomyth wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Militia had a specific meaning to the founders. Alas, if people today would study what the words they used actually meant.

Conversely, if folks got treatment for their paranoia and compensation issues we wouldn't be literally awash in guns so there'd be nothing to debate.

Is there even treatment for unjustified feelings of superiority?

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#327

Post by mathattack » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:07 PM UTC

One thing that Waze misses (perhaps in the interest of simplicity?) is nudges. As in, "I prefer highways" and "I prefer no speedbumps". I don't know a clean way to map it against time (Don't go residential unless you save me 10 mins) but this could be a start.

I like Waze for helping me survive Bay Area traffic. If there's an accident, I do like the roundabout directions.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#328

Post by jonknee » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:09 PM UTC

gooseus wrote: post #196

As a Waze user, this has actually been a source of increasing frustration for me. I do not want to save 1-3 minutes on a commute by cutting through unfamiliar residential areas where deaf kids play and homeowners give me dirty looks as I go over their oversized speed bumps. I use Waze not so much as a super-optimal routing tool, but as an aggravation-avoidance tool. Traffic and speed-traps aggravate me, sure... but n…

On the other hand I appreciate its advice, but don't always take it. I like knowing there could be a way around it, but I use my judgement on what shortcuts to take.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#329

Post by mikeash » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:10 PM UTC

pc86 wrote: post #288

mikeash wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think there's much irony here. It's a matter of what came first. If you move to a busy downtown then you should know full well that dealing with heavy traffic on your streets is going to be a fact of life. If you move to a quiet suburban street which then years later transforms into a busy artery, that's a completely different situation. I also completely disagree with your evaluation of pointlessly twisty ro…

> If you move to a quiet suburban street which then years later transforms into a busy artery, that's a completely different situation. I say this as someone who bought a house because of most of the reasons mentioned here. That being said, buying property does not somehow imbue you with the right to keep things exactly as they are for three decades while you pay it off. Cities expand, people move in, population incr…

I agree that you don't get to claim sovereignty over your local streets. At the same time, there's an expectation that the character of a neighborhood won't change radically and I don't think that expectation is entirely unreasonable. It's a matter of balancing competing interests. The answer is definitely not to let the local homeowners determine everything about how their street is used, but at the same time the answer is also not to destroy the quality of life of residents for the convenience of through drivers.

Re: Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war

#330

Post by jd20 » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 8:12 PM UTC

gooseus wrote: post #196

As a Waze user, this has actually been a source of increasing frustration for me. I do not want to save 1-3 minutes on a commute by cutting through unfamiliar residential areas where deaf kids play and homeowners give me dirty looks as I go over their oversized speed bumps. I use Waze not so much as a super-optimal routing tool, but as an aggravation-avoidance tool. Traffic and speed-traps aggravate me, sure... but n…

I don't really think Waze can be blamed here though... it's not as though it's going out of its way to choose more dangerous routes. It has no notion of how well-lit a street is, or the incline, or how many cars are parked along the curb. No GPS app has all this data. As drivers, it's our responsibility to be aware of our surroundings and make wise choices, not to rely on an app for that. If you don't feel comfortable taking a road, don't take it. How do you know Google Maps is choosing "safer" roads for you?

That said, one thing I've noticed is to actually save time on these empty side streets, you have to disregard the speed limit and stop signs. I suspect you have enough people blasting through at high speed, rolling through stop signs, that Waze learns time can be saved. Because in my experience, if you stay under 25, and do full stops, you're losing time not saving it. Waze probably knows this, and chooses not to fix it. IMO, that's the real moral dilemma at hand: you've got an app recommending routes that can save time, but only if you choose to drive recklessly.