Slashdot Mirror
Boston Using IBM Engineers To Solve Traffic Problems
vu1986 writes "Boston won the opportunity to pick the brains of six IBM engineers — including one from Tokyo — who flew in to check out its traffic situation and figure out a way to consolidate, analyze and use existing traffic data feeds as well as new data sources including (of course) Twitter feeds, to ease the city's notorious traffic jams."
All the IBM engineers will do is decrease the issue of traffic by a couple of percent, maybe raise efficiency by 10-20% here and there, but the real issue is cultural. Cars suck for a dense urban environment, you need people on bikes, carpooling and the most important thing: good public transportation.
Good public transportation means though forcing cars out from city centers by creating bus lanes, creating tram lines on previously car-only roads, building enough parking space at the edge of the city where people could switch over to public transport, etc.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
And that makes it our problem how? Because these companies decide to move somewhere that doesn't have sufficient services, they expect subsidies, tax abatements, and other taxpayer-funded giveaways.
Then, they'll be the first ones to lobby against tax increases or regulations because...teh free market!1!.
Like that Ricketts guy who is screaming about big government this and big government that, but wants the taxpayers to buy him a nice new stadium for the Cubs that he owns. And this is going on in practically every big city with a pro sports franchise. "Give us money for a new stadium or we'll move away."
I hope Boston decides to send the bill for these "IBM engineers" to the companies that are going to benefit from any improvements that make things easier for them, but somehow, considering the climate where states and municipalities have to provide juice payments for any companies that want to move there, they'll probably just take money from the schools or cut teacher salaries or firefighter health care to pay them.
You are welcome on my lawn.
right under the city? it would probably solve those traffic problems for good! also, it wouldn't cost that much, and it wouldn't take that long.
Exactly. Microsoft, on the other hand, has decades of expertise in this area. I'd recommend deploying Microsoft Traf-O-Data 2011, the newest version featuring seamless interoperability with MS Office and other popular software. That IBM stuff will still be using punch cards for sure anyway.
Ezekiel 23:20
You think punch cards are bad? IBM is till pushing Lotus Notes as an email application.
Think I would prefer punch cards.
If I had a DeLorean... I would probably only drive it from time to time.
My lab of engineers have came up with this. Take away the 1% of drivers who have no business driving and hold up hundreds of people behind them and get in multiple accidents that cause a 10 mile backup and traffic will move a hell of a lot better than 1% better. There have been numerous studies saying 1 person can affect hundreds of people in any traffic system. So get grandma, the 20 year old semis, and borderline psychological problems people off the road and that'll do better than any AI routing.
Everyone goes. When a collision is detected, everyone backs up and tries again.
Have gnu, will travel.
The trick with market-based pricing of 'public' infrastructure(whether or not this is an argument against it is a matter of taste) is that it requires you to take a sharp, and not uncontroversial, stand on the purpose and meaning of 'public'...
There are really three-ish basic possible positions(though it is certainly possible to mix and match and hedge and squirm a bit at the cost of some complexity, and certain sorts of 'public' things fit more naturally into one category or another).
1. 'Public' in the sense that ownership is vested in some body that represents 'the people', but exploited under the usual conditions of profit maximization. This one crops up with mineral and other natural resources most frequently. The nominal owner is 'the people'; but the obvious expectation is that 'the people' will sell/lease/etc. the asset for the best possible price to some other entity and then rake in the cash.
2. 'Public' in the sense that ownership is vested in some body that represents 'the people', and that the property in question is, in some sense, 'for' the people as well as owned by them. National Parks are the most obvious example. They are 'owned' in approximately the same sense as above; but public opinion would likely be hostile if we simply sold them off and cut everybody a check. There is a sense, often poorly articulated; but reflected in generally low ticket prices, that 'the people' should have enjoyment of them, as well as ownership.
3. 'Public' in the sense of being a necessary response to market failure. Utilities are the most obvious example. Unlike #1, 'the people' are both the owners and the customers, so profit is generally seen as a bad thing; but unlike #2, where appeals to intangibles like 'national heritage' are common, public opinion generally just wants the system to run not-for-profit; but as efficiently as reasonably possible.
If you adopt market-based pricing for roads, you are (though it is not polite to say so), adopting the theory that, if enough people cannot afford access to this 'public' feature, it will be more efficient, and more pleasant for the remainder who can. This isn't necessarily wrong; but it implies that you are essentially rejecting the notion that 'the people' have any right, beyond that of 'customer', to the enjoyment of a 'public' facility. This is pretty uncontroversial in something like a mineral deposit(Show of hands: would you rather have the right to grab your shovel and go get your share of the bauxite, or just sell the mineral rights to FooCorp and get your share of the proceeds?); but becomes a bit thornier when the 'public' asset is something more like a utility. Is a 'public' road a thing that 'the people' have the right to use, or is it something that 'the people' sell, by means of their representatives, to the subset of them that can afford the equilibrium price of access?