Earlier quoted context omitted.
yes but that’s also what makes it regressive
By that same logic, purchasing hamburgers is regressive.
No, you don’t have to purchase a hamburger to earn a living, but you probably have to travel.
Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
61–70 of 302 posts
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#62Why are roads an elastic demand but it seems that other transportation methods, like light rail, aren't? I've seen cases of quite a few expensive lines and rail-stops that have lower than expected utilization, but it seems like new highway roads and lanes get immediate use. Is it down to the fact that there is simply more "freedom" with regards to roads over rail?
Elastic demand requires free-flowing masses. I'm quite sure New Yorkers or Londoners would be able to fill as many new subway trains during the rush hour as you could humanly add to the rail network, at least on the sections that are most commonly shared between lines to different destinations.
On the other hand, if the on-ramp of a highway would only let cars through for one minute every 10 minutes (which would be considered a good service interval for any suburban public transit), the demand for roadspace would likely be a bit less elastic. Ditto, if the highway would only go to a set of destinations with no connections.
Motorists can embark on a trip any time, join the highway any time, and take any exit, and continue from there to local destinations. This free schedule suits way more people than fixed departures to fixed destinations using public transit.
Only in a densely built city you can achieve the same: people sharing segments of public transit before diverging to a number of different destinations.
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Is this even a problem? It’s a problem if your assumption was that demand was closer to fixed and building more roads would “spread drivers out”, reducing congestion. This was for decades, and still to some extent is, a very wide-spread assumption in local politics, leading to incredibly questionable urban planning decisions.
If we paved every square inch, traffic wouldn't go to infinity. It's pretty rare to go driving for no reason. Country roads don't have rush hour. It seems reasonable to assume that latent demand per capita is fixed, but at a level too high for a city to accommodate without destroying its density advantages.
People will also adjust their housing and working decisions based on road availability, although the lag here is a little long.
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#64Is this even a problem? People are given an opportunity to do something and then they do it. That's way better than new roads going unused, isn't it? I like congestion charging alright, which the article advocates at the very end, but it has a habit of being regressive - it's easy for me, as a software engineer, to show up at work at 11AM, but that might not be the case for those who can less afford to pay those char…
It is, yeah. Roads are bad and toxic to the businesses and areas around them. Nobody wants to hang out next to a 4 lane blacktop with cards screaming down it at 60 miles an hour.
It spreads out businesses and makes our cities utilities spending less efficient. The roads need to be maintained, and it is very expensive to maintain them.
https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2018/1/16/why-walkable-s...
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is also question of externalities. Building roads is not without hidden costs. Splitting communities in cities, making distances to travel longer because adding places for streets and parking places spreads infrastructure, air pollution killing people, lack of movement killing people, noise pollution, ugliness etc. I really like Dutch approach. Take away some space from cars in order to build biking infrastruct…
That works great in countries one can bike across in a day. It’s not really a solution for American commuters. People mainly choose long commutes for housing affordability. When workers can’t afford to live within biking distance of work, then it’s not a viable solution.
> When workers can’t afford to live within biking distance of work, then it’s not a viable solution.
This is a catch 22 because the way our cities are designed in America makes them unaffordable. American zoning in most cities prohibits the kind of dense mixed use development that makes low cost housing near work possible. We need to reform the zoning code in most cities and improve bike safety, walkability and public transportation to make headway.
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#66TLDR there is a service/good that is useful (point-to-point personal transport) and in high-demand.
This whole notion of "induced demand" seems like a suspicious artificial label used to position roads as a negative. The reality is that roads provide something people want - the ability to get around quickly, on one's own terms, without dealing with waiting times or trip planning, and without some of the unsavory experiences that can sour public transit (e.g. https://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/BART-takeover-robbery-5...).
Building roads doesn't "induce" demand. Rather, it _fulfills_ it. There is a limit to that demand - it's not like supplying infinitely more of something would infinitely scale the associated behavior. There are only so many humans and only so many trips they are willing to make in a day. And an area that is 100% roads obviously would not have any destinations worth traveling to (leaving aside edge cases like race tracks).
So as far as I can tell, this is just regular supply-demand: people want something, and supplying it satisfies that need. Why is this noteworthy except that it lends dubious credence to a narrative Vox likes to push?
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is also question of externalities. Building roads is not without hidden costs. Splitting communities in cities, making distances to travel longer because adding places for streets and parking places spreads infrastructure, air pollution killing people, lack of movement killing people, noise pollution, ugliness etc. I really like Dutch approach. Take away some space from cars in order to build biking infrastruct…
That works great in countries one can bike across in a day. It’s not really a solution for American commuters. People mainly choose long commutes for housing affordability. When workers can’t afford to live within biking distance of work, then it’s not a viable solution.
It might also be worth starting to let go of the notion that you need 2000+ sq ft and a 1/4 acre yard as a minimum. Roads are effectively a subsidy to that life style (everyone shouldn't be forced to pay for the life style of a few).
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Is this even a problem? It’s a problem if your assumption was that demand was closer to fixed and building more roads would “spread drivers out”, reducing congestion. This was for decades, and still to some extent is, a very wide-spread assumption in local politics, leading to incredibly questionable urban planning decisions.
If we paved every square inch, traffic wouldn't go to infinity. It's pretty rare to go driving for no reason. Country roads don't have rush hour. It seems reasonable to assume that latent demand per capita is fixed, but at a level too high for a city to accommodate without destroying its density advantages.
I don’t think anyone proposed people would drive for no reason. When there is more road capacity, people find more reasons to drive. More people get cars and more businesses use cars to move goods around. In the future self driving cars can be used on the road for any business reason someone could think of. There’s probably reason for 10x the cars we have today if they could fit on the road, which most cities could not handle.
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#69For any practical purposes road traffic can be considered a gaseous element that quickly fills as much space as is allocated for road space, with heavy emphasis on segments that lead to several destinations.
Conversely, when roads are put on a diet and lanes are removed it generally turns out that the traffic does not pack into queues twices as long, as is often expected or feared, but generally disappears.
To control congestion is to control the space available where congestion can happen. Build a two lane road and you will have two lanes of congestion. Build an eight lane road and you will have eight lanes of congestion.
Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)
#70Is this even a problem? People are given an opportunity to do something and then they do it. That's way better than new roads going unused, isn't it? I like congestion charging alright, which the article advocates at the very end, but it has a habit of being regressive - it's easy for me, as a software engineer, to show up at work at 11AM, but that might not be the case for those who can less afford to pay those char…
> it's easy for me, as a software engineer, to show up at work at 11AM That's the point -- we should incentivize people who can time shift to do so thereby alleviating traffic for those who can't.
As a software engineer who shows up at 11, I can tell you that there is a significant current against us late starters. I agree with you that it would be good for us to move this way, but it is hard for all the early birds to swallow.