The Simple Solution to Traffic

The way we can make traffic disappear.

Special Thanks to:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHzzSao6ypE

stuck at an intersection you always watch unfold the fundamental problem of

traffic on green the first car accelerates and then the next and then

the next and then the next and then you only to catch the red had the cars

accelerated simultaneously you would have made it through coordination not

cars is the problem because we are monkey drivers with slow reaction times

and short attention spans

even if we tried getting everyone to press the pedal on 321 now would be

challenging this disc ordination limits how many cars can get through an

intersection and when one backs up to the next that’s when city-sized gridlock

cascades happen taking forever to clear in general more intersections equals

more dis coordination which equals more traffic this is the motive behind big

highways no intersections splits and merges yes intersections no no stopping

no coordination problems no traffic

well that’s the theory anyway intersections outside of a highway will

back up onto it again because human reaction times limit how many cars can

escape the off-ramp when the light changes but even without intersections

there would still be traffic on the highway traffic can just appear take a

one lane highway with happy cars flowing until a chicken crosses the road the

driver who sees it breaks a little the driver behind him doesn’t notice

immediately and brakes a little harder than necessary the driver behind him

does the same until someone comes to a complete stop and oh look cars

approaching at highway speeds must now stop as well though the chicken is long

gone it left a phantom intersection on the highway

this is what happened when you’re stuck in traffic for hours thinking there must

be a deadly pile up ahead and then suddenly the traffic’s over with no

wreckage insight to your relief if you’re a good person and mild annoyance

if you aren’t you just pass through a phantom intersection the cause of which

is long gone and this phantom intersection moves it’s really a traffic

snake slithering down the road eating oncoming cars at one end and pooping

them out the other on a ring road a single car slowing down we’ll start a

roberts of traffic that will last forever even though there’s no problem

with the road if the drivers could coordinate to accelerate and separate

simultaneously easy driving would return but they can’t so traffic eternal on

highways traffic snakes grow if cars are heated faster than excreted and they

Frank if excreted faster than eat it dying when the last car accelerates away

before the next car must stop now in multi-lane highways there needs be no

chicken to start gridlock a driver crossing lanes quickly with cars to

close behind is enough to birth the traffic snake that lives for hours and

leads its this quick crossing the causes drivers behind to over break and begin a

chain reaction but we can make traffic snakes less likely by changing the way

we drive your goal as a driver is to stay the same distance from the car

ahead is from the car behind at all times

tailgating is trouble not just because it makes accidents more likely but

because you as the tailgater can start a traffic snake if the driver ahead breaks

always in the middle

this gives you the most time to prevent over-braking but also gives the driver

behind you the most time as well and when stuck in traffic this rule would

get all cars to pull apart the snake faster

that’s the simple solution to traffic getting humans to change their behavior

perhaps by sharing this video to show how and why traffic happens why

tailgaters are troubled and how we can work together to make the roads better

for all the end except yeah

wishing upon a star that people are better than they are is a terrible

solution every time instead what works as a structurally systematized solution

which is exactly what self-driving cars are self-driving cars can just be

programmed to stay in the middle and accelerate simultaneously they’ll just

do it the more self-driving cars and an intersection of the more efficient the

intersection get a solid lane of self-driving cars vastly increases

throughput hmm actually if you been humans from the road which we should

totally do any way you can get rid of the intersection entirely after all a

traffic light is just a tool for drivers on one road to communicate with drivers

on another poorly in coarsely red equals don’t go now we are coming through the

intersection green equals good to go but self-driving cars can talk to each other

at the speed of light with that kind of coordination no traffic light necessary

just as with the highway the best intersection is no intersection humans

will never drive this precisely at the intersection the fundamental problem

with traffic that you watch unfold as well

everything is people so the real simple solution to traffic is no more monkeys

driving cars this video has been brought to you in part by audible.com with over

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to audible.com if you like thinking about how the future can be

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The Simple Solution to Traffic