Hacker News Reader

Comment by 0x00000000 | Hacker News Reader

> The best you can do is increase the glide time between stops

Do you understand what causes traffic? That harder you brake, the bigger and longer the wave of people braking behind you will be. By braking less hard, you are causing less traffic.

And yes, 99% of people driving in traffic are idiots who don't know how to drive or they wouldn't be tailgating and slamming the brakes every 6 feet wasting thousands of hours of people's collective time by causing needlessly large waves of braking behind them due to the fact that those people are also following too close, amplifying the problem.

See http://trafficwaves.org/ for further reading

View on HN

I have somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 hours operating a stick vehicle in high congestion traffic. I went to engineering school and studied traffic both academically, and experientially. Yes, I understand traffic better than you do.

Do you understand traffic? I pretty much doubt it.

No, 99% of people driving in traffic aren't idiots. About 5% are, and that's all it takes. My most pleasant finding from all those years of driving was to note that the vast, vast majority of Houston daily commuters were absolutely pro drivers when it comes to congestion.

What do you think about this article? https://www.technologyreview.com/s/607841/a-single-autonomou...

So how does tailgating people and braking hard and often not make traffic worse? Or is it the same? You didn't explain why you think slowing down more gradually is not better or how tailgating does not cause traffic.

I have more than 35 years driving all kinds of vehicles and what i've learned is that "all the other drivers are wrong" or at least is what everyone says. Probably we all need to learn to better ourselves and be a bit more patient and courteous.

You know what else increases traffic? Merging too soon.

A good friend of mine and I have a standing argument about proper behavior when, driving, one encounters a "lane closed ahead" sign. He insists that the right thing to do is to abandon the to-be-closed lane as soon as feasible [tangent: he also gets mad at drivers who want to merge later, describing them as "cutters"], while I maintain that the best way to minimize the effect of a lane closure is to use whatever lanes are legal/open for as long as possible -- because leaving an open lane of travel unused only exacerbates the problem.

Who's right?

Disclaimer: I grew up driving in the Boston area (yes, among other "Massholes"), and my philosophy is "try never to use your brakes on the highway, and try even harder never to require anyone else to brake unnecessarily".

What's right, if drivers are doing it, is to zipper at the point of the merge.

But that's a big "if" -- too many drivers are like your friend, and work themselves up into a blood-boiling rage at the thought of someone "cutting" by engaging in proper zipper merging. Tell your friend the problem is he's thinking of the merge as a competition with a "winner" (person who ends up in front) and "loser" (person who ends up behind), instead of looking for the option that maximizes efficiency for everyone.

You are right.

If everyone merges early, the cars that could have been in that mile of unused lane, will instead be in the full lane, moving the entire queue backwards a mile, clogging up more exits and onramps, and making the jam worse.

Use all available road, that's what it's there for.

German traffic law also says you're right (StVO §7(4)). Does the US not have a law for that?

I maintain that the best way to minimize the effect of a lane closure is to use whatever lanes are legal/open for as long as possible -- because leaving an open lane of travel unused only exacerbates the problem.

I agree with you. Fully packing an 'ending' lane until it actually ends is most efficient from a road usage point of view.

(I have lived for 10+ years in the Boston area but did not grow up there.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com