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Rude Drivers Reduce Traffic Jams
BuzzSkyline writes "Traffic jams are minimized if a significant fraction of drivers break the rules by doing things like passing on the wrong side or changing lanes too close to an intersection. The insight comes from a cellular automata study published this month in the journal Physical Review E. In effect, people who disregard the rules help to break up the groups that form as rule-followers clump together. The risk of jamming is lower if all people obey the rules than if they all disobey them, according to the analysis, but jamming risk is lowest when about 40 percent of people drive like jerks."
Thank you for validating my mental model of the kind of person who drives like that. Your rage and frustration warms my cold, black heart.
On the other hand, MY pet peeve is drivers who drive 10 or 15 over the speed limit, then ride my bumper trying to get me to move over. Driving faster than the speed limit isn't a right.
so many people seem unwilling to even get up to the speed limit, let alone exceed it by a few miles per hour
When you are paying for my gasoline, I will let you choose what speed I decide to move at on the road. Here our speed limit is set to 70. I get better gas mileage at 65. Everyone else goes 83 except truckers, I guess gas just is not high enough for people who speed.
For me, however, I will go at the speed that I choose to move at. The "Speed Limit" is not the "Minimum Required Speed", here that is set to 40. So by my understanding of the law where I live, I am allowed to legally operate my vehicle between 40 and 70 miles per hour. Seeing how 65 is within that range, I am not sure what people do not understand.
as if you're going to get a ticket for 48 in a 45
Yes you will. At least in my state where the budget has been in such a crunch that 73 in a 70 will get you a nice $125 ticket.
To quote a friend of mine, who had a lovely encounter with the local boys in blue:
Officer: Good day, do you know how fast you were going?
Friend: I believe that I was going 57, sir? (this being a 55)
O: You do understand that is considered speeding?
F: Is there not a five mile give or take?
O: (just to be a wonderful asshole, I guess.) No, maybe you should write your representative and have it added to the state law, but for now I am writing you a ticket.
F: (mentally) *not safe for children*
So yes, I doubt that the majority of the time you will receive a ticket for one or two over the limit, but that legally does not hold water in my state and you may need to check yours.
it's the people who drop below the speed limit simply because one is nearby
Wow, this would not be a problem if say everyone say followed the law on the road. Now I know that may be a tall request or just simply an impossibility. But say 60% of the population, oh hell, say 40% of the population actually went the speed limit? How often would one encounter this type of sudden slow down?
"hypermilers" who don't understand lights are timed for the speed limit
I really want to live wherever it is you are. Here lights are timed to ensure that you receive a ticket by going an unsafe speed or rapid acceleration. Seriously, one light was taken down by court order. So I do not know about you, but I lack trust in this claim, call me paranoid.
I would like to point out that your suggestions are fine but really I do believe that a driver should respect other drivers and not make demands that they feel would "better" traffic. What is your hurry? People who tend (that is 40% by me) to be in a hurry did not plan enough time to execute whatever path they choose to take. That would also include time should traffic come to a stand still. However, it is how one values their time and life, neither are pairwise. One must choose to decrease their time on the road by increasing their speed, given equal times of departure. By doing so, one increases their risk on the road by reduction in reaction time, setting a new group trend where people make you "the rabbit" (you know the one that will get pulled over by the police should one be around the corner,) underestimating the operation parameters of your vehicle, and so forth.
Remember the speed limit is created as the maximum safe speed for a given length of road on favorable conditions. So I continue to ask everyone, what is your hurry?
For all those who are wondering about why people tend (see that 40% thing again) to speed up while you are passing them? Ask yourselves how many people who you have suggested that "keeping with the flow of traffic is safer than keeping with the speed limit?" Finally, ask yourself, "at face value what behavior does this encourage?"
This is my two cents. It is not an attack on what you believe because I simply do not buy the beliefs of other people. I blame 1984.
It's a big peeve of mine. I drive faster than the speed limit, I'll admit it. If I'm in the wrong, the cops will pull me over. However, get out of the left lane if you're going slow and there's 10 cars tailgating behind you! ...unless of course your speeding ends up killing someone. The cops pulling you over is suppose to be to prevent that. (Yes it gets perverted into a revenue raising excercise). Your attitude sucks. If you don't want to abide by the laws don't fucking use the road. Instead you break the rules then bitch and moan that someone else has inconvenienced you by abiding by the laws. What an asshole!
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer