Just one more lane bro! That’ll get rid of the traffic bro!
Texas agrees:
Is that actually real
Yes, Murica!
Texas The Katy Freeway, boasting a jaw-dropping 26 lanes, is the widest highway in the world, found deep in the heart of Houston, Texas.
Can somebody tell them that that’s not how cars work
Them: I know we need a tunnel!
Read a book a few months ago by Tom Vanderbilt called traffic that was an academic look at the titular traffic and it showed negative returns on adding lanes.
Can you summarize the gist of it? I keep seeing this claim and it is extremely non-intuitive.
Supposing it’s true, how is it we’ve magically arrived at the optimal number of lanes as of the uttering of the statement?
If it’s a basically linear function where the lowest traffic is near-zero lanes, is there an implication that mass transit would be built in tandem with lane reduction, or does everyone just get more miserable?
Edit: I’ll add that what I’ve heard is that more people choose to drive until the misery-equilibrium is reached. So roads will always be as busy as they are now because they are at their max tolerable level of drivability. That seems plausible for some roads and for some finite number of lanes, but not generally applicable.
Essentially you need all streets to be serviceable by trucks, ambulances, etc., and therefore the general minimum is 1 lane. As you add car infrastructure, it becomes relatively more convenient to drive to a destination than take other modes of transport. You are also typically investing in the car infrastructure at the expense of alternatives, a straight opportunity cost and a sort of spiralling trap, as development becomes more and more centred around the car.
Braess’s paradox outlines adding a route can actually worsen overall network flow, and more broadly, new capacity just attracts new drivers until congestion returns to roughly where it started. Suboptimalities like the accordion effect are compounded as more traffic is added to the system.
Induced demand doesn’t imply the current number of lanes is optimal, just that expansion tends to be self-defeating.
Lane reduction alone would just increase misery, so the answer is redirect road space into transit, which absorbs displaced drivers at higher capacity. Otherwise it’s just misery.
I have a civil engineering degree with a focus on transport but never really used it for that, so this is something that I was taught, but had over a decade to devolve more into opinion.
Lane reduction alone would just increase misery…
Agreed, mostly. In my neighborhood (Grid system) they updated the 4-lane roads in the area to 2-lane roads with center turn lanes. It’s made traffic much better, simply because there’s no traffic waves created by people lane changing around people turning left.
You’d be surprised by how widely applicable it is, it works for virtually any road. Small city roads, highways, even residential streets.
There also isn’t a maximum number of lanes for this effect (well, there technically is, but it’s too large to be feasible) because cars are an extremely inefficient way of transportation, so they take up a lot of space.
Roads also become increasingly more expensive with each extra lane added, to the point where it becomes economically impossible to keep adding lanes. You also need to demolish buildings if the road was already too close to them. And the cost of the extra lane isn’t a one off, it also generates a running cost for repairs and inspections.
That money is better spent on making viable alternatives to cars, which actually will help traffic or even fix it.
More accurately…you’re the gray car wanting to turn right, but there is about 1/2-1/3 full car length in-between the black-green-white cars blocking the lane.
This is why commuting on a motorcycle is so nice. In this situation I’d just filter through the cars and into the turn lane.
I was at a traffic light with my support worker a few weeks ago, and this dumb fuck wasn’t on the sensor. He was sitting there for like ten minutes and wouldn’t move forward. My sw got out of that lane and went a different way. When we came back a couple mins later he was still there!
I was this person once. I think it was around 2015 I got stuck at a left turn light that puts you on the exit ramp to the interstate. I had only had my license for a year (if even that) and couldn’t tell where the sensor was. I’d keep getting blinking yellow lights, but traffic was a lot coming the other way so I could never go. I kept feeling as I scooted up I was getting too close to the cars crossing the intersection. I swear I was there for like 10 minutes or something.
Is that how traffic lights work in your area? Like they don’t cycle at all when you’re not on the sensor?
In theory, it’s an efficiency measure.
If there is a main road with higher volume, various side roads and no other bottleneck down the road that needs to be accounted for, it doesn’t make much sense to regularly interrupt main road traffic if nobody else needs the intersection. Conversely, depending on the interval, the side road drivers may have to wait a long while if they just barely missed a green.
Both of these cause traffic risk as well: Firstly that the main road driver who decides the red light is stupid and cuts off a side road driver they didn’t see, secondly that a side road driver who barely missed green doesn’t want to wait and tried to squeeze in before main road traffic picks back up.
Having the traffic lights switch on demand reduced those risks: Main road drivers who know that it’s red only if there’s gonna be some other car may be less reckless in running it, while side road drivers don’t have to wait as long and don’t feel the need to squeeze in.
Of course, it can’t ever remove the risks entirely because humans are what they are. It also depends on people actually driving up to the point where the sensor detects them. If they don’t know about the concept, they’ll have a hard time understanding what’s wrong. I was taught those things in driving school, but if it’s not a thing in your area or wasn’t when you learned, chances are nobody told you about it later.
In my area the sensor turns on at (???) some time at night. Otherwise it always cycles. At night though, if you aren’t on the sensor it will skip.
depends a lot, but yes some lights are like that.
Am I the only one deeply irritated that the left going lane has no arrows and no one is indicating left either?
This intersection really hurts my sense of order!They’re all BMWs…
Can’t be. Then there’d be no signals at all.
Ok, that explains a lot. I am actually very surprised BMW was allowed to implement it this way.
My headcanon is that the right turning person’s blinker is the only one out of sync
Thanks, that idea has a certain beauty to it.
I will now adopt it and move closer to inner peace again!
Here, I fixed it. The person in the back row has their right blinker on so they can get into the left-turn only lane.
has no arrows
How do you know? They’d all be obscured by the cars.
Should be visible on the first panel, unless painted totally randomly out of sync to the right-pointing arrows.
But that would also trigger my sense of order, soooo… :-)
I don’t think you have to indicate left when it’s the only possible direction you can go
I don’t think you have to indicate left when it’s the only possible direction you can go
But with no arrows on the ground, you could also go to the right.
Had to learn that the hard way some years ago, when a car standing on a arrow-less lane, unexpected by me, also turned left together with myself standing on the left-arrow-lane.
We then had a crash while merging lanes, and it was determined to be my fault entirely.So the comic also triggers a bit of PTSD for me… ;-)
Sounds like a fucked up intersection if two lanes merge into one during the turn. Usually they will be two lanes with a solid white to indicated not to switch lanes.
This is precisely why you always indicate. In the absolute worst case scenario, it’s redundant information. But it also indicates unambiguous intent even when the traffic pattern is confusing or unfamiliar.
You also need to indicate even when you think you are alone. Again, worst case scenario, nobody sees it. But on the off chance that your awareness is not perfect, it indicates unambiguous intent to anyone - including pedestrians - you might have not noticed.
You do, because the other drivers cannot be expected to track whether that’s your only possibility.
It’s a left-only lane, why would you have a blinker on?
Because your indicator signals unambiguous intent to any observer who does not possess the same universal mental database of every intersection in the world that you must possess.
Why would it be a left-only lane?
There are no arrows on the lane…And even if it was, you still have to indicate your desired direction, as the direction of the lane might not be clear to all traffic participants.
Because going forward would lead you into the railing and grass. You can literally only make a left or illegal right.
You’re the reason we have to add “coffee is hot” warnings on take away cups, mate.
You can literally only make a left or illegal right.
Why would turning right be illegal?
As far as we can see, it is a lane with no mandatory direction (which is the thing that has been bugging me in the first place).But, TBF, I believed that myself for a long time, only to have the called police give me a little crash course in traffic lane rules after I had a car crash in a somewhat similar situation…
Those are your options from the left lane
Because you’re a good driver who signals instinctually when turning rather than using your attention to look for excuses not to tell people what you’re planning to do?
Man, I could have saved like ten, or even fifteen seconds if the infrastructure was bigger.
Fantastic! You have a source?
Just look around.
I’m missing something? I was hoping for a link to the artist’s site
I think it was a joke: reality. The source is reality (around us).
Thanks Ants. Thants.
Inaccurate. It’s two cars with 1.5 car lengths in front of each.
You’re right, this is worse.
So close. The first car is too close to the line.
I drive to patients homes all day and I daily see people in the suburbs stop far enough back that they don’t always trip the left turn arrow, sometimes leaving that lane stuck an extra cycle. It would be infuriating, except that my drive time is paid and mileage reimbursed, so I’ve chosen not to let it bother me. I just roll my eyes and wait.
Generally when approaching a intersection on a red light you should stop the car so that you see the white line at the top of your hood. This allows you to also see the painted crosswalk and any pedestrians in the crosswalk (no matter their height) when sitting in your car.
If it’s a two lane or more roadway it also has the added benefit of letting the driver to your right see pedestrians more clearly if they are making a right turn.
The person in the car furthest right can now pull up and have their wheels touch the white line (if turning right) and not have to block a crosswalk, while having a full unobstructed view of the intersection to the left, it also allows a pedestrian crossing to see the car in the far right line as they approach the end of the intersection.
At least here in Austria we often have left turning lanes, that have a magnetic sensor/loop in the street and the traffic light only switches, when you’re on top off it.
People stopping way too early and especially people leaving too much space between cars is really infuriating in the city…Those sensors are the apex of Modernist arrogance, where people just decide they know every detail about any system they look at and can control everything.
There is no single place where they work. But at least people have been steadily removing them for the last 30 years.
I’m not really sure, if I understood you
In streets with high traffic, the left turning red light only goes to green, if someone is actually there waiting. Because else it would make a longer red phase for the opposite drivers going straight
So, it seems like an improvement to me
What am I missing?
What am I missing?
Every traffic situation where people would need to cross but there won’t be a car stopper exactly over the sensor.
Not exhaustively:
-
pedestrians
-
motorcycles
-
bicycles
-
cars stopped at the wrong place
-
no
Canada, in a single image? I’ve driven cars in most European countries, Canada, US (small amount), Mexico.
Canada has the worst road designs of them all, though since almost everything here is modelled after the US, I guess it could still be worse there
I regularly see road situations where I can only wonder how high they were, what they were smoking, and where I can get some
Intersections where only one lane has traffic lights, the other doesn’t. How are you supposed to cross that? Simple: you throw a hail Mary, close your eyes, andale a run for it while praying to some non-exist God. This is howy stepson got sideswiped, by a guy having to do exactly that.
Making a left turn in Canada? Great, you got green! Go? Well no, cars are still coming from the other side, they inexplicably got green too so now the intersection with traffic lights also acts as an intersection without traffic lights. Amazing designs!
But wait, there is more!
Once those cars from the other side are gone, you might be tempted to think that you can now just drive, but noooooooh, this is Canada! Pedestrians also got green so now you need to try and avoid those too if you can. The amount of near misses that I’ve had and that I’ve seen with others is staggering, crossing roads in Canada is fucking dangerous.
All this adds up to that going left basically means that you get green light and you can’t do shit until it gets orange, then you quickly squeeze yourself through and pray that you didn’t murder a school class by accident.
This, in turn, means that going to the left is an exercise in patience, because each green red cycle, about one car will be able to go to the left. If each cycle takes a minute, and you have ten cars in front of you, that means you’ll have to wait ten minutes I shit you not.
Compare that to the Netherlands, where intersections get redesigned and rebuilt every time when anyone sees there are tooany accidents, and there are soany amazing traffic flow control designs there. Here in canada, traffic flow designs is “road, done”
I love Canada, I feel proudly Canadian, but Canadian road designs are removed as fuck.
Making a left turn in Canada? Great, you got green! Go? Well no, cars are still coming from the other side, they inexplicably got green too so now the intersection with traffic lights also acts as an intersection without traffic lights. Amazing designs!
Sounds normal to me and I’m in Europe. Unless it’s explicitly signaled with an arrow in the traffic light expect oncoming traffic and of course there are pedestrians.
Here in 'Merika, it would only take two cars to block the turning lane, because half of these morons are oblivious and/or on their goddam phones.
I thought you were going to say because the cars are the size of tanks.
Can you help me understand the image? The turning lane here is foiled by more than two-ish cars, but that’s still better than the one car it would take to block the right turners otherwise.
Sure the person who posted this has no idea how to drive.
In the image, the 4 cars on the left are blocking the fifth car who wants to turn right even though there’s a green arrow. I’ve experienced this lots of times, but on left turns, and a lot of times because too many assholes in front of me aren’t pulled up as far as they can.
I mean, you also don’t want to pull ahead as close as possible. What if the vehicles infront of you need to back up, or an ambulance needs through. You don’t wanna be packed like sardines at an intersection.
This feels like an analogy for bike lanes.
No, the analogy for bike lanes would be what has been posted in another comment:
Right-turning cars typically have to cross the bikelanes going straight on, being one of the most dangerous situations for bicyclists and showing just how much of an afterthought the bikelanes are.
I was more thinking “The lane you’re supposed to be using is blocked by a bunch of parked cars”
Is that right-angle traffic light a common thing? I’ve never seen one like that before.
Yes.
In my experience the turn lane doesn’t have a hard cutoff like that, you can usually ride the shoulder a bit to get around people if needed
And some people make it a sport here! Zooming by on the shoulder. For…waaay too long.
Prime candidate for a roundabout conversion.
Prime candidate for a bus
the nightmares of being European raised and trying to drive in Sarasota Florida’s roundabout system
The problem with roundabouts in the States is that a large percentage of drivers were never taught how to navigate a roundabout we were just given them with an implied “you’ll figure it out.”
Where exactly are those cars heading? There’s no road forward and only one lane to the right.
Turning left.
The comic definitely made it more confusing by choosing the main (non-intersecting) road of a T junction to illustrate this. In most countries, if this road splits into two lanes, the left-turning lane would split off, and the right-turning lane would go straight.
Edit: Apparently, this style of junction is more common in the US. In Europe, I’ve only seen this kind of junction on highways, but that would be without traffic lights and with a much longer turning lane.
I mean, it’s just a comic, not a rendering drawn by a traffic engineer. There’s plenty about it that isn’t quite right, but it gets the point across so there’s no need to nitpick it. (Source: I’m a traffic engineer, among other things.)
As an aside, are there real L-shaped traffic light stacks? I’ve always seen them with the arrow at the bottom. The direction of the arrow makes it perfectly understandable without putting it off to the side. But I could imagine a traffic light company marketing these.
Germany:
Depends on the country. I’ve only seen these.
It’s informative in that you can guess what the extra light is even when off.
I guess, but in my experience there’s red, yellow, green, and any extra bottom one is an arrow.
With us, it can be an arrow right, an arrow forward, a light saying bus, a bunch of things
Idk, my city in UK has those, though it’s usually backwards L for left turn.
I’ve noticed a lot of little routine things in UK are different from US where I live. I really wish we had more roundabouts here.
I live on a street that’s got two roundabouts. It’s a residential area and people really don’t know how to use them. If you don’t signal, nobody knows what you’re doing. Please signal. I’m begging you. It’s not that hard.
