Traffic Studied Using Computer-Linked Cars

mprindle writes "Yahoo News has an AP article about a system that links individual cars to analyze traffic patterns, which allows the drivers to avoid traffic jams and accidents. This system is part of the 'smart highway' initiatives. The data from the car is sent to a central server and from that data traffic patterns in a 40 mile radius. According to the article this technology is less expensive than using poll mounted antennas or ground sensors."

Comments

That's all well and good...

[RyanFenton]

But how long until we can get some level of computer-controlled vehicles? Once the technology has matured a bit, I'd MUCH rather trust a reasonably engineered computerized system than the thousands of other drivers around me on my way about town. Not that I shouldn't be able to turn it off, but I think the concept would really grow once we switched the carpool lane to the auto-drive lane, and manual drivers learn to stay clear of the 80+mph traffic that flows on it.

Ryan Fenton

Re:That's all well and good...

[MBCook]

That option to turn it off is the problem, as I see it.

• If every car on the road is human controlled, things are fine (as we have it today).
• If every car on the road is computer controlled, things are fine (computer knows what's happening)
• If only some cars (possibly as few as one) are controlled by humans, things are MUCH more complex than if computers controll everything.

It is this kind of thing that will make switiching over very tough. My guess it there will be special lanes at first (not unlike the carpool lane, speedpass lanes) that you drive into manually (or into an "entrence zone") and press a button and let the car take you in, and it takes you out (into an "exit zone") where the car puts you back into controll and you drive the rest of the way.

As things progress, there are more and more of these lanes, and fewer and fewer "normal" lanes until you only have these lanes on highways and such. Then people only drive on streets (which would be safer anyways, no 80+ mphs speeds). From here you can make specific streets (the largest ones, one way streets, whatever) computer controlled only. Then you expand that untill you get to where cars are computer controlled only everwhere.

All this would take years, to weed out the "normal" cars as people bought cars that had these functions, and that could be speed up by governement encouragement (tax breaks on buying them/gas/licenses/incentives/etc) and such.

It will probably happen in our lifetimes (unless someone invents a transporter or an aircar or something that is computer driven from the start and those quickly supplant the car as the main mode of transportation). Should be interesting to watch.

Nothing more than a kludge to a broken system

[MarkRose]

It's funny how we spend so much time on alleviating traffic concerns, when it would be simpler to just abandon the car. It's to the point where it's often twice as fast and cheap to use public transport. When I'm in a large city, I park my car at a terminal, hop the train, and go. Not only do I not have to worry about traffic and the associated stress, I also buy back all the time I'd waste behind the wheel to catch up on reading and paperwork. And while using public transport can sometimes mean walking a block or two, it's no worse than finding a parking spot. Really, why, in North America, are we so fixated on the automobile for personal transport?

Re:Let's think about this for a second...

[MBCook]

Nope. That won't be true for a few reasons.

• First is that everyone will never have this technology. There will always be a few without it. But that's a minor reason.
• Not everyone will follow the system's advice at all times.
• As people follow the advice and go to side streets, the severity of the origional backup will decrease so that fewer people will bother to avoid it.
• Not everyone CAN avoid the problem. There is no way for me to get from my house to the local college without traveling on the highway near my house. To avoid traveling that highway would be 30+ minute detour. Short of actually closing the road, it is usually better for me to just drive through it.
• People will go elsewhere. If I'm planning to go to spot A for one errand and find out there is a traffic jam there, I'll go to spot B for a different errand and avoid that whole area. I may avoid it for the day (errand at A was unimportant), or just put it off 'till later (say after C and D) at which time the traffic may have subsided, and I may be in a position where instead of having to drive north to my destination through the traffic, I now must drive east so the traffic jam wouldn't be in my way.
• Last is there is more than one alternate route. As the traffic jam happens, people will turn off who are near there because the system tells them too. As those streets start to slow, the system will warn people who get close to take different alternate routes avoiding both problems. And as the do that, the origional will clear up, leading me back to my first point.

I don't think it would be a problem. I think it would help. Kansas City's Scout System provides simple info on some routes (big accident at X and Y, avoid) so that people can avoid it, and it does help. Plus because the message is on many signs (instead of right before the problem) you can avoid the problem from 1 mile away or 20.

Re:Let's think about this for a second...

[shawb]

It really isn't immaterial. Treating traffic flow as a fluid dynamics problem, it becomes apparent that reducing the flow of traffic will untangle traffic snarls, improving the flow. Basically, the more cars try to jam into a bottleneck, the slower traffic becomes, the slower it becomes, the worse the bottleneck becomes, untill traffic comes to a standstill with people still trying to jam themselves in. Sort of like early in rush hour, traffic flow is generally very heavy, but quick. Somebody having to hit their brakes, due to tailgating, being cut off, or not let into a lane causes small ripples of congestion which add up to the point that traffic flow comes to a standstill or at least a major slowdown. Appropriately reducing traffic flow at key points could eliminate or at least reduce congestion, without the costs (financial, social and environmental) of adding more lanes of concrete.

Although teaching people how to drive and to actually use lanes appropriately would probably do more than any technological gizmo that we could create at this point.