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Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

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Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#261

Post by natmaka »

netcan wrote: post #12

In practical terms, we can consume as much transport as we get. If it was cheap and fast I could have ramen lunch in Tokyo. Pick up the kids from crèche in Portugal on my way home to New Zealand. So, unless we get teleport watches... congestion is the "price," the thing that limits consumption. Economists would prefer the price to be price, being economists. One thing this article leaves out is what the value of all…

Thoreau and Illitch, among others, had interesting ideas.

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.576...

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#262

Post by kadendogthing »

closeparen wrote: post #89
honkycat wrote: post #71

If you are sitting there thinking: "So what", I highly recommend you educate yourself on how building roads actually affects US infrastructure. We have a CRUMBLING infrastructure in the US, and people are constantly complaining about potholes in major metropolitan areas. And the solution is build more roads? We cannot even maintain the ones we have! Recommended reading: - https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-…

Counterpoint: I grew up in an area which allegedly has some of the worst roads in the country. They're fine . Sure they're not silky-smooth surfaces ready for MotoGP but contemporary mass-market vehicles have no problem traversing them. At worst you're going to feel uncomfortable for half a second. Really bad construction might slow you down 10-20 minutes. Meanwhile America's best, most expensive, most politically su…

> most expensive, most politically supported public transit systems barely work

Source?

>but the quality just isn't there

Based on what metrics? Last time I checked, public transportation in any city doesn't routinely suffer breakdowns around the same time, every work day. It also doesn't suck money from productive city centers into outlying suburbs to pay for an absurd amount of infrastructure to support a particular, luxurious transportation lifestyle.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#263

Post by pavelrub »

CalRobert wrote: post #257
pavelrub wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spending less on housing has tremendous value for the people who benefit from it, including the ability to pay for better medical treatment, and lead an overall happier life. It's unclear what evidence you have that the net effect would be an increase in the overall number of deaths, or - more importantly - human suffering. Other than that I do not really understand your "astonishment": you've artificially constructe…

We both want affordable housing. I just want it to be legal to build it closer to jobs. Driving is dangerous, as are its byproducts. More driving kills more people.

If the choice is between cheaper housing with a longer commute, or expensive housing with shorter commute, it's completely unclear that the latter is more beneficial to humanity than the former, even if we only consider the number of deaths caused by each scenario. At the very least you haven't presented any evidence that this is so.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#264

Post by dirkgently »

bb88 wrote: post #214
realityczeque wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your windshield perspective is showing. The reason people in cars don't notice bike traffic is because a bike is small and unobtrusive and silent. Fifty cars in the same place is an epic disaster but fifty bikes in the same place is not a problem. Take for example this data in London, which was produced in response to a question from a member of the public having essentially the same bias as your statement "nobody us…

> In London some bike lanes have slightly increased travel times by car but cycling has increased more than 50%. 50% of anything near zero is still darn close to zero. But at the same token, a 5 minute increase for 1000 people is a loss of 5000 minutes. > The reason people in cars don't notice bike traffic is because a bike is small and unobtrusive and silent. False. A single bike sticks out like a sore thumb in traf…

> so pissed off

> single bike sticks out like a sore thumb

Now it totally makes sense.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#265

Post by CalRobert »

pavelrub wrote: post #263
CalRobert wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We both want affordable housing. I just want it to be legal to build it closer to jobs. Driving is dangerous, as are its byproducts. More driving kills more people.

If the choice is between cheaper housing with a longer commute, or expensive housing with shorter commute, it's completely unclear that the latter is more beneficial to humanity than the former, even if we only consider the number of deaths caused by each scenario. At the very least you haven't presented any evidence that this is so.

That is not the choice.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#266

Post by pavelrub »

CalRobert wrote: post #265
pavelrub wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the choice is between cheaper housing with a longer commute, or expensive housing with shorter commute, it's completely unclear that the latter is more beneficial to humanity than the former, even if we only consider the number of deaths caused by each scenario. At the very least you haven't presented any evidence that this is so.

That is not the choice.

When people say that doing X has "negative value", they usually mean that it has negative value compared to not doing X, not compared to some imaginary solution that doesn't exist in reality.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#267

Post by dovvdkc »

ubercow13 wrote: post #256
bb88 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In London some bike lanes have slightly increased travel times by car but cycling has increased more than 50%. 50% of anything near zero is still darn close to zero. But at the same token, a 5 minute increase for 1000 people is a loss of 5000 minutes. > The reason people in cars don't notice bike traffic is because a bike is small and unobtrusive and silent. False. A single bike sticks out like a sore thumb in traf…

Have you considered using the bike lane yourself?

To start off that’s ableist. And reeks of privilege (can he afford to live a biking distance to work?)

But that doesn’t matter - someone unilaterally changes something and everyone else is supposed to get with the program or find a hole to die in.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#268

Post by dovvdkc »

dirkgently wrote: post #264
bb88 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In London some bike lanes have slightly increased travel times by car but cycling has increased more than 50%. 50% of anything near zero is still darn close to zero. But at the same token, a 5 minute increase for 1000 people is a loss of 5000 minutes. > The reason people in cars don't notice bike traffic is because a bike is small and unobtrusive and silent. False. A single bike sticks out like a sore thumb in traf…

> so pissed off > single bike sticks out like a sore thumb Now it totally makes sense.

Well when you have to dodge an unfit person going up a hill you notice.

I’m all for bike lanes. And bicycle licenses. Can’t go up the 80 percentile hill in your town at 20 mph? You fail.

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#269

Post by netcan »

natmaka wrote: post #261
netcan wrote: post #12

In practical terms, we can consume as much transport as we get. If it was cheap and fast I could have ramen lunch in Tokyo. Pick up the kids from crèche in Portugal on my way home to New Zealand. So, unless we get teleport watches... congestion is the "price," the thing that limits consumption. Economists would prefer the price to be price, being economists. One thing this article leaves out is what the value of all…

Thoreau and Illitch, among others, had interesting ideas. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.576...

thanks. Interesting

Re: Fundamental rule of traffic: building new roads makes people drive more (2015)

#270

Post by BurningFrog »

zmmmmm wrote: post #242
BurningFrog wrote: post #203

Here is the BIG elephant on the road. Why road consumption is different than all other consumptions: We don't pay for road usage!!! Anything useful that is handed out to consumers at the cost of $0.00 will be overused and develop a shortage. This is so ingrained that it can be hard to think about. Anyway, if we had to pay to access roads, depending on the traffic load, traffic could always flow at full speed, road in…

> Anything useful that is handed out to consumers at the cost of $0.00 will be overused and develop a shortage. Can you explain how I still seem to have enough oxygen to breathe? I get the point, but I don't like the absolutism applied in these kind of arguments. Similarly, I can go to a small country town with a 2 lane highway through it and somehow building that road did not induce congestion despite the fact that…

> Can you explain how I still seem to have enough oxygen to breathe?

This is a fundamental question in economics, and the answer is that oxygen is (currently) not a scarce resource.

This is not an inherent property of oxygen. In a Mars settlement, oxygen would probably be a costly manufactured good.

Economics is sometimes called the "science of scarcity", and the basic economic problem as the gap between limited resources and theoretically limitless wants: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/scarcity.asp

Resources that are in bigger supply that the demand have nothing for Economists to study.

As for roads, I'd note that they're only scarce some times. I wouldn't expect much or any road pricing to apply at nights or weekends even in heavily congested big city commute paths.

And as for my "absolutism" and "dogma", I don't know what that specifically refers to. I think I'm just calmly explaining the state of the science in this field. Let me know if I need to clarify anything!

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