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Mathematicians Solve the Mystery of Traffic Jams
mlimber writes "Do you ever find yourself in a traffic jam, thinking, 'Man, there must be a bad accident up ahead,' but as you plod along you see no evidence of any crash? Some mathematicians have solved the mystery by developing a mathematical model that shows how one driver hitting the brakes a little too hard can cascade into a backup miles behind. The mathematicians' future research will investigate how automatic braking systems may alleviate the problem."
"...show the impact of unexpected events such as a lorry pulling out of its lane on a dual carriageway."
What? Look here, professor, I can't understand all your archaic, highly technical, mathematical mumbo-jumbo. I wouldn't be able to tell a differential equation apart from a dual carriageway if my lorry depended on it. Can you dumb it down a bit for the layman?
UK drivers are better than US drivers anyway. Driving in the UK, people would accommodate others and move slightly over to keep things running smoothly. In California people have an attitude and wont make any room. They make sure people can't move into "their" lane and I think they take a slight pleasure in cutting people off.
Here's an example scenario: If a truck is parked on the side of the road and there's 3 lanes where the truck is taking up part of one of the lanes, in the UK the cars will nudge over so other cars can pass. Here, people wont budge and force cars to sit in wait until there's an opening. If you try to squeeze past, they'll lay on the horn even though they could move slightly over and let you pass. Until we get people to understand how to be polite defensive drivers, we'll always have traffic problems.
That and the fact that it's way too easy for any moron to get a license in the US.