Mathematicians have solved traffic jams, and they’re begging cities to listen

[WraithKingOstarion]

https://www.fastcompany.com/90455739...ties-to-listen

as somebody who deals with traffic daily where i live, reading this is very interesting. but i don't think it's as simple as a fix as it proposes.

Most traffic jams are unnecessary, and this deeply irks mathematicians who specialize in traffic flow. They reserve particular vitriol for local transport engineers. “They do not have competencies in the field of system-related increases in traffic performance,” says Alexander Krylatov, a mathematics professor at St. Petersburg University. “If engineers manage to achieve local improvements, after a while the flows rearrange and the same traffic jams appear in other places.” Burn!

Krylatov would like to solve urban traffic jams forever, so much so that he has coauthored a book of new math approaches to traffic and ways to implement them. (Translation: Engineers, Let Us Handle This.) Four takeaways:

1.) All drivers need to be on the same navigation system. Cars can only be efficiently rerouted if instructions come from one center hub. One navigation system rerouting some drivers does not solve traffic jams.

2.) Parking bans. Many urban roads are too narrow and cannot be physically widened. Traffic-flow models can indicate where parking spots should be turned into lanes.

3.) Green lanes. For cities that want to increase electric car use, special lanes should be created for electric cars, providing an incentive for their use.

4.) Digital twins. Traffic demands and available infrastructure can only be balanced with digital modeling that creates an entire “twin” of existing roadways. The software will be “an extremely useful thought tool in the hands of transport engineers.”

Traffic modeling is a complex branch of applied mathematics, partially because it assumes that drivers are selfish and pursuing their own goals, rather than any predictable or shared efforts. “Every year a considerable budget is allocated for improving roads. [Our models] suggest a set of solutions for the efficient management of these funds.”

And just in case you were wondering, “The mathematical approach in this case is superior to the engineering and economic one.”

[XDurionX]

I can solve traffic jams, too: Ban private transportation in inner cities.

[Draco-Onis]

Traffic jams will become irrelevant once everyone has self driving cars.

[Nnyco]

Theres already so little parking space available wher i live and the plan is to even reduce that? 'Mathematicians' my arse if they cant even calculate in that problem.

[Elegiac]

Man if only we could fit more people into one vehicle somehow. We should get Elon Musk on the case.

Car culture continues to be fucking ridiculous.

[WraithKingOstarion]

Theres already so little parking space available wher i live and the plan is to even reduce that? 'Mathematicians' my arse if they cant even calculate in that problem.

where do you live?

[Temp name]

Cars are incredibly space inefficient. They're typically ~4 meters long, with lanes being ~3 meters wide. That's 12 square meters. During rush hour there is normally 1-2 people in a car, let's say 2. So that's 6 square meters per person on the road. Even if you fit 5 people in the car, you're at 2.4 square meter per person
A standard bus is 14 meters long and equally as wide as a car (Due to the lanes on the road), so 42 square meters. A standard bus can seat 50+ people. Let's just assume it's at half capacity, so 25 people. That's 1.68 square meters per person on the road. A bus, at half capacity outperforms a car at full capacity.

The way to solve traffic jams is simple. Discourage cars and encourage public transport


Edit: Reading through what OP posted, I don't know how #3 would even help. If no one swaps to electric cars, you just have less space on the roads. If everyone swaps, you have the same as you do now, except people are in electric cars. It changes nothing.

[Rennadrel]

Engineers generally can't engineer their way out of a wet paper bag, let alone design a city or roads. The only way to improve traffic flow is to reduce the population and eliminate the number of drivers on the road. Less density and smaller population sizes means less traffic.

[d00mGuArD]

Engineers generally can't engineer their way out of a wet paper bag, let alone design a city or roads. The only way to improve traffic flow is to reduce the population and eliminate the number of drivers on the road. Less density and smaller population sizes means less traffic.

Omg really? Less people is less traffic? How come no one thought of that!

Swarm autonomous cars are the solution. And engineers are -of course- designing it, like everything else.

[Afrospinach]

3.) Green lanes. For cities that want to increase electric car use, special lanes should be created for electric cars, providing an incentive for their use.

Nothing to do with traffic jams?

And just in case you were wondering, “The mathematical approach in this case is superior to the engineering and economic one.”

The dream is superior to the reality? Colour me shocked.

[Poopymonster]

https://www.fastcompany.com/90455739...ties-to-listen

as somebody who deals with traffic daily where i live, reading this is very interesting. but i don't think it's as simple as a fix as it proposes.

Too many words, means it costs too much money. Fuck it. Let's build a new stadium!

[PC2]

Engineers generally can't engineer their way out of a wet paper bag, let alone design a city or roads. The only way to improve traffic flow is to reduce the population and eliminate the number of drivers on the road. Less density and smaller population sizes means less traffic.

Joke? In my experience engineers are the most creative problem solvers of any profession.

Unless you have a counter-example?

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4.) Digital twins. Traffic demands and available infrastructure can only be balanced with digital modeling that creates an entire “twin” of existing roadways. The software will be “an extremely useful thought tool in the hands of transport engineers.”

A real-time digital twin at the level of an entire city is a powerful but also creepy idea. I'm 50:50 on the societal safety vs societal privacy debate, leaning towards privacy atm.

[Spectral]

I'm not a mathematician, but I'd wager that bikes would help more than electric cars, yet I don't see them mentioned.

I don't really mean to exactly disagree with their suggestions, but as @Elegiac and others have pointed out, the problem isn't that traffic isn't run with enough algorithms, it's that people are trying to drive in places that cars don't really belong in the first place. Urban core policy should focus on being as walkable, bikeable, and accessible by public transit as possible, not on how they can jam more cars in.

[Sunseeker]

Responding:
1: This is basically baby steps to remote-control driving. The problem is that you physically CANT install modern computer-controlled driving into some older cars. So you'd basically have to ban vehicles of a certain age from the road.
-1a: Who's going to providing this universal navigation system? A private vendor? That a driver has to pay a private subscription fee for?

2: Many of those "places where people shouldn't park" are in front of homes and businesses that have no other parking, either for residents, workers, or customers. Second, those "parking lanes" also provide a cushion between flowing traffic and pedestrians. Ever walk one of those streets where there isn't one? Fucking terrifying IMO.

3: The biggest problem with "green lanes" is their location. They're either on the inside or the outside of the freeway. If they're on the inside, the electric car still needs to cross all the other traffic to get to them, if they're on the outside, they can cause problems for oncoming traffic. And lets not even talk about freeways where there are onramps/offramps in the middle/inside of the freeway...DENVER!

4: Well I mean yeah, you oughta have this.

But before we talk about solving traffic, can we at least get some potholes filled? That'd be coolio.

[Rennadrel]

Joke? In my experience engineers are the most creative problem solvers of any profession.

Unless you have a counter-example?

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A real-time digital twin at the level of an entire city is a powerful but also creepy idea. I'm 50:50 on the societal safety vs societal privacy debate, leaning towards privacy atm.

It was very much a joke, unless you are talking about mechanical engineers. I work with some real dunces

[muto]

Reducing the amount of traffic seems more appropriate.

[Howel]

Oh those are super easy, super cheap implementations, truly I am puzzled why this isn't being done right now!

Freaking scientists

[Nellise]

They said the hardest problem with traffic modeling is that drivers have to be assumed to be selfish. So their first step is "make drivers not selfish". It's so easy to solve stuff when you just remove the thing that makes it difficult to solve. Why doesn't everyone do that?

I really hope their book isn't as dumb as this blurb makes it out to be.

[Howel]

They said the hardest problem with traffic modeling is that drivers have to be assumed to be selfish. So their first step is "make drivers not selfish". Duh, why didn't other people think of that?

I really hope their book isn't as dumb as this blurb makes it out to be.

Scientific reporting is rarely of high quality, so I'd venture their actual research is sound and good; we are just getting the snippets and such that a failed math student turned journalist, could spit out in whatever amount of paragraph they are allowed.

[AeneasBK]

Enough motorists are such cunts when driving that it's hardly discernable from just calling them all cunts and being done with it.