How Much Road Capacity is Wasted Due to Poor Driving?

Anyone want to take a guess as to how much of our existing road
capacity is wasted by LLBs, poor mergers, Sloths, rubberneckers,
people who don't speed up when the traffic ahead of them does, etc.
etc.?

I'd say the waste is at least 40%, i.e. that our roads never achieve
more than 60% of their true capacity due to incompetent drivers.

What's your guess?

Scott en Aztlán wrote:
> Anyone want to take a guess as to how much of our existing road
> capacity is wasted by LLBs, poor mergers, Sloths, rubberneckers,
> people who don't speed up when the traffic ahead of them does, etc.
> etc.?
>
> I'd say the waste is at least 40%, i.e. that our roads never achieve
> more than 60% of their true capacity due to incompetent drivers.
>
> What's your guess?

Until cars are computer controlled and linked to a central controller,
driving will be horribly inefficient.

"Scott en Aztlán" wrote:
>
> Anyone want to take a guess as to how much of our existing road
> capacity is wasted by LLBs, poor mergers, Sloths, rubberneckers,
> people who don't speed up when the traffic ahead of them does, etc.
> etc.?
>
> I'd say the waste is at least 40%, i.e. that our roads never achieve
> more than 60% of their true capacity due to incompetent drivers.
>
> What's your guess?

Don't forget to add in the waste that is caused by rude and
inconsiderate drivers who jump lanes at intersection, who
squeeze people out who are trying to merge, and who
constantly switch lanes in an attempt to get ahead in slow
traffic situations.

Ed

Scott en Aztl=E1n wrote:
> Anyone want to take a guess as to how much of our existing road
> capacity is wasted by LLBs, poor mergers, Sloths, rubberneckers,
> people who don't speed up when the traffic ahead of them does, etc.
> etc.?
>
> I'd say the waste is at least 40%, i.e. that our roads never achieve
> more than 60% of their true capacity due to incompetent drivers.
>
> What's your guess?

You are a fuzzy-brained moron. Like the idiots who say baseball is 80%
pitching.

Anyway - the big problem is penalties for reckless driving are too
light. If people knew they would go to prison if found at fault in a
personal injury crash, then everyone would be a 1000 X more careful.
But criminal coddlers like you think fines are sufficient.

In article >,
JohnH > wrote:
>
>Until cars are computer controlled and linked to a central controller,
>driving will be horribly inefficient.

Because centralized decision making has worked SO WELL in society as a
whole.
--
There's no such thing as a free lunch, but certain accounting practices can
result in a fully-depreciated one.

Coming up with a quantitative answer is one of those math problems that
I won't even approach -- the rusted weapons and armor at the mouth of
the cave and the glowing red eyes inside are enough.

As an intuitive guess, I'd say it wastes a huge amount of time, at
least for the people who could and would go faster if only the drivers
ahead would make some attempt to sort themselves by speed, and also
contributes to some accidents.[1]

Rubberneckers -- Make 'em sit in a penalty box by the side of the road
for ten or fifteen minutes. I can't count how many times I've been in
a traffic jam caused solely by people slowing down to gape at someone
else's misfortune.

Hey, maybe that's a better solution. The cops cordon off an area where
rubberneckers can pay to PARK and enjoy their schadenfreude off the
road. Everybody else has to keep their scan predominantly forward
where it belongs and move along at all prudent speed.

If you want to see a wrecked car, go to a junkyard. You can look at it
as long as you want and not inconvenience anybody.


Left-lane bandits -- Sand in the gears of society's attempt to get
from A to B with safety and efficiency. Here I refer not to people who
are staying left for a while because they see something happening up
ahead and to the right like a merging truck, or because they are
completing (if you will) a macropass, but because they like to cruise
there no faster than the traffic to the right. [2] This of course
mixes like potassium and water with people who are in a hurry and thus
start weaving in and out of traffic.

Multi-lane urban freeways that are not quite chockablock with traffic
are the best opportunity to see the cost of this. Often there is
plenty of room more toward the right, if only people had the
self-discipline to stay there when driving slowly. Alternately --
hey, the one under your right foot makes it go faster.

Oh, yes, and signs reading something like EXIT 2 MILES seems to be
considered semantically equivalent to STAY LEFT AS LONG AS YOU CAN, OR
EVEN MERGE LEFT FOR ONE LAST BURST OF SPEED, THEN EXPECT THE WATERS TO
PART BEFORE YOU IN THE LAST HUNDRED YARDS. I see that sort of thing
a lot lately. Either the conservative and safe strategy for
overcooking an exit (steady on and double back at the next one) is not
taught anymore, or some people's sense of self-importance outweighs
other people's desire to retain their front bumper.

Maybe these people are the same ones who think LANE ENDS MERGE LEFT
means the same thing as a right turn signal up ahead of you, i.e., LAST
CHANCE TO MERGE RIGHT AND PASS.

Grab the vines real tight when you swing, 'cuz it's a jungle out there,
--Joe

[1] Twice I've watched someone crash because he was rubbernecking an
earlier accident by the side of the road -- practically under the nose
of the policeman attending to said accident -- instead of watching
where he was going.

In one of these incidents, the culprit was in a Ford Ranger
middie-truck from before rear antilock brakes became a common feature.
As I watched in my mirror, he came boiling up to the back of the pack
far too fast, saw the sea of brake lights way too late, and couldn't
think of anything to do except stomp the brake pedal.

The truck skidded right, kinda tripped over its own feet, and rolled,
coming to rest upside down and facing backward in the left lane. The
driver was unhurt and, even more amazingly, put on this mini air show
in the morning commute without hitting anyone.


[2] Don't even get me started on the left-lane bandit's open-road evil
twin: the cruise-control addict who does not want to disturb The Peace
That Understandeth Not Passing in order to go noticeably faster than
the people he's overtaking -- no matter how many people stack up behind
him as he oozes past , or how the problem-solving of the people in the
right lane is knocked for a loop by his glacial advancement in their
mirrors.

Matthew Russotto wrote:
> In article >,
> JohnH > wrote:
>>
>> Until cars are computer controlled and linked to a central
>> controller, driving will be horribly inefficient.
>
> Because centralized decision making has worked SO WELL in society as a
> whole.

Who's talking about society? I'm simply suggesting cars are in essence
machines better controlled by computer(s) than moody, differeing and
sometimes drunk humans.

I'd friggin LOVE to go take a nap in the back of the car as it's safely
computer controlled going down the highway at 90.

"Scott en Aztlán" > wrote in message
...
> Anyone want to take a guess as to how much of our existing road
> capacity is wasted by LLBs, poor mergers, Sloths, rubberneckers,
> people who don't speed up when the traffic ahead of them does, etc.
> etc.?
>
> I'd say the waste is at least 40%, i.e. that our roads never achieve
> more than 60% of their true capacity due to incompetent drivers.
>
> What's your guess?
>
I'll say 25% to 50% on 4-lane interstates, but not for cars, including any
LLB's that can easily be passed on the right.

Rather, it's those big rigs that occupy the two right lanes that effectively
turn a 4-lane interstate into a two-lane interstate. Notice how freely
traffic flows during time periods where trucks are NOT on the road in
masses?

In article >,
JohnH > wrote:
>Matthew Russotto wrote:
>> In article >,
>> JohnH > wrote:
>>>
>>> Until cars are computer controlled and linked to a central
>>> controller, driving will be horribly inefficient.
>>
>> Because centralized decision making has worked SO WELL in society as a
>> whole.
>
>Who's talking about society? I'm simply suggesting cars are in essence
>machines better controlled by computer(s) than moody, differeing and
>sometimes drunk humans.

Unfortunately for that suggestion, most drivers are better able to
drive a car than any computer. In the "Grand Challenge 2004", a DARPA
initiative to develop an unmanned ground vehicle, no team was able to
pass the challenge. And that's _without_ traffic. It's a
surprisingly difficult problem.

--
There's no such thing as a free lunch, but certain accounting practices can
result in a fully-depreciated one.

On Mon, 20 Jun 2005 07:19:57 -0700, Scott en Aztl=E1n , said the following=
=20
in rec.autos.driving...=20

> Anyone want to take a guess as to how much of our existing road
> capacity is wasted by LLBs, poor mergers, Sloths, rubberneckers,
> people who don't speed up when the traffic ahead of them does, etc.
> etc.?
>=20
> I'd say the waste is at least 40%, i.e. that our roads never achieve
> more than 60% of their true capacity due to incompetent drivers.
>=20
> What's your guess?

I was going to say about 95% to 100%