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How we can reduce traffic congestion

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Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#61

Post by collabs »

antiframe wrote: post #55
baggy_trough wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't have a community like that, then the best way is congestion pricing.

The best way is to change our communities, even if that takes time and money.

It is difficult for me to admit I'm an idiot but when I was younger and living in an apartment, I loved the idea of a single family home. And now that I'm living in a single family home, I feel like I was wrong all along. Not that I want to go back to the apartment I was in before. Dear lord no but the idea of a mixed use building not too tall only like first floor with high ceilings for business or shops with two or at the most three floors above for residential units feels like the ideal sweet spot. Ideally with a lot of these close together to have everything I need within a walking distance but also a subway station within a walking distance if I need to go farther.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#62

Post by baggy_trough »

antiframe wrote: post #55
baggy_trough wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't have a community like that, then the best way is congestion pricing.

The best way is to change our communities, even if that takes time and money.

What if you don't want to live in a dense community?

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#63

Post by mordechai9000 »

pretzellogician wrote: post #59
cortesoft wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would Google help with a carpooling profile? They are looking at ways they can improve traffic that are actually in their control. They can change how they route traffic that is using their app, they can’t change public policy or driving choices. They are working with what they have.

Much as they have features for walk / bike / transit traffic, they could suggest step-by-step carpool instructions: "1. meet with (other Google Map carpool user) X at location Y. 2. In one car, both of you drive to location Z." Obviously, huge challenges here (is person X a serial killer, etc.) But Google can handle moonshots.

> Obviously, huge challenges here

Social credit score? I've seen that Black Mirror episode.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#64

Post by esafak »

ventana wrote: post #49

The same things keeps happening every time I find myself stuck in traffic on the interstate. Out of nowhere, a popup appears in Google Maps: a faster route is available! 4 minutes faster! Unless either the passenger or the driver are fast enough to hit "No thanks", the change auto-applies, and Google now wants me to exit the interstate at the nearest exit and drive some random road I had no idea about, to rejoin the…

Now they did the obvious thing and load balanced the alternative routes. Somebody could have done this long ago and got a promo.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#65

Post by slyall »

baggy_trough wrote: post #62
antiframe wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best way is to change our communities, even if that takes time and money.

What if you don't want to live in a dense community?

Well just live somewhere that is so lacking in density there is no congestion.

Or a small town that is surrounded by farms.

Just avoid suburban housing as far as the eye can see with a limited number of roads everyone gets funneled on to.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#66

Post by david-gpu »

baggy_trough wrote: post #62
antiframe wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best way is to change our communities, even if that takes time and money.

What if you don't want to live in a dense community?

Then you don't. But don't expect people who live in urban centers to cater to your needs when you don't live there.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#67

Post by ezfe »

ericbarrett wrote: post #54
ventana wrote: post #49

The same things keeps happening every time I find myself stuck in traffic on the interstate. Out of nowhere, a popup appears in Google Maps: a faster route is available! 4 minutes faster! Unless either the passenger or the driver are fast enough to hit "No thanks", the change auto-applies, and Google now wants me to exit the interstate at the nearest exit and drive some random road I had no idea about, to rejoin the…

Same. This is why I switched to Apple Maps. Sometimes the Google detours would end in dangerous situations, like a left turn with no light across a major road. And it would be to save 2 minutes-ridiculous!

Apple Maps does this too but the threshold seems to be higher - it's a lot less willing to do it.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#68

Post by ezfe »

bravoetch wrote: post #25
wxw wrote: post #20

> For this study, the Google Maps algorithm was modified to prefer alternative routes with similar travel times and segment types, effectively guiding trips away from the pre-selected congested segments > Over a six month period, we adopted a city-wide switchback (also known as crossover) experimental design, alternating between this treatment and the control (unaltered) routing algorithm over consecutive days to app…

I read the article and didn't see anywhere if they collaborated with city planners, or just ran this on their own. I get the techno-optimism of making traffic 'better' and also it may be concerning if trucks are being routed through neighborhoods where planners didn't build for it.

I think that's already very much a problem, and given that they constrained it to routes that didn't have a significantly different drive time the risk seems low.

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#69

Post by ezfe »

dtgriscom wrote: post #4

Traffic apps only know about congestion if someone running the app goes down the congested road. Because of this, I've always suspected that the apps, from time to time, will route someone down a route they haven't gathered data on in a while, just to collect the data, and even if the route is likely to be suboptimal.

> running the app

At least for Apple, iPhones always report this data, not just when using Apple Maps

Re: How we can reduce traffic congestion

#70

Post by ezfe »

gruez wrote: post #3

>During “treatment” days, the modified routing guided all trips that encountered the pre-selected congested segments toward alternative routes with similar travel times. Why would they specifically need to route people away from congested segments? Presumably if a segment gets congested enough, it'd be considered slower and therefore won't get picked in the first place?

Because those roads are still maybe 30 seconds or 60 seconds faster on paper and critically they're the major roads with minimal intersections, which all apps prefer.
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