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Google Maps Crunches Data, Tells You When To Drive On Thanksgiving
Nerval's Lobster writes Whatever your plans for Thanksgiving, Google can offer some advice: try to avoid driving anywhere the day before. Analysts from the search-engine giant's Google Maps division crunched traffic data from 21 U.S. cities over the past two years and found that the Wednesday before Thanksgiving is by far the worst traffic day that week, with some notable exceptions. (In Honolulu, Providence, and San Francisco, the worst traffic is always on Saturday; in Boston, it's Tuesday.) Unfortunately, Wednesday is often the only available travel day for many Americans—but Google thinks they can beat the worst of the traffic if they leave before 2 P.M. or after 7 P.M. on that day. Traffic on Thanksgiving itself is also light, according to the data. When it comes to driving back home, Sunday beats Saturday from a traffic perspective. According to Google Maps' aggregated trends, Americans also seek out "ham shop," "pie shop," and "liquor store" on the day before Thanksgiving, as they rush to secure last-minute items.
Most people drive the day before Thanksgiving because it's the first day of their vacation. They can't really leave on Tuesday unless they drive at night, because most people will be working that day.
It's Nerval's Lobster. He's a Dice employee who submits Dice stories to Slashdot. No, seriously, click on his user name, all his activity is submitting Dice stories. You'd think Slashdot could at least mention the Dice connection, but they never have.
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
And what if EVERYBODY follows Google's travel advice?
Ken
Aggregate historical data is better than nothing; but I'd just fire up Waze.
Google hasn't killed Waze off... yet.
#DeleteChrome
At airports, the lines aren't longer, but they are slower. Many flights actually have fewer than average people on them during that week. Sure, more people are traveling for pleasure, but many, many fewer people are flying for business that week, so it usually evens out. The reason the line is slower, and air travel so much harder despite this, is because frequent business travelers know where they're going and what to do at the airport so they get through quickly, and rarely have children with them. Pleasure travelers generally don't know what to do because it's their first time flying or they rarely fly, and they also tend to have children with them.
If Google really wanted to help out, they would scan their database to find your blog/twitter/facebook/etc. postings about your family; then they could make much more useful suggestions, like "Hey, Uncle Norm is a real pain - why don't you relax and stay at home this Thanksgiving?"
Seriously. I have a 450 mile drive ahead of me. I will be driving on Thanksgiving, not the day before.
Not because Google told me to, but because I'm not a fucking idiot.
Driving ON the holiday is much, much easier than driving the day before.
Another tip: The day before a 3-day weekend, the local news will run a story about how cops are cracking down on speeding over the holiday weekend. This is bullshit intended to scare you into compliance - police presence on the roads will be greatly reduced.