Backfires

[webny99]

Attempts to calm traffic/reduce congestion that have failed miserably, creating even more problems than there was originally 

[corco]

Every single tope in Mexico

[RobbieL2415]

That time ConnDOT tried a ramp meter on CT 9 in Middletown.

[jakeroot]

Attempts to...reduce congestion that have failed miserably

Does the 10/Katy Freeway widening count?

[hbelkins]

Any roundabout.

[bzakharin]

That time they attempted to turn an existing lane on I-287 into HOV

[PHLBOS]

That time they attempted to turn an existing lane on I-287 into HOV.

A similar attempt was done with the Southeast Expressway (I-93) in Boston during the mid-70s.

[RobbieL2415]

Any roundabout.

MassHighway/MADOT says otherwise.

[hotdogPi]

Any roundabout.

MassHighway/MADOT says otherwise.

Rotaries and roundabouts are not the same thing.

[Brandon]

IDOT moving the merge point for the Eisenhower Expressway (I-290) about a mile east near Mannheim Road (US-12/20/45).  They still have the same number of lanes to merge together as before, but merely moved the merge point to the east.  Result: The Hillside Strangler is just as congested as it was before the "improvement".

[SectorZ]

Any roundabout.

MassHighway/MADOT says otherwise.

Rotaries and roundabouts are not the same thing.

Rotaries are thankfully going away in this state, slowly but surely. There are some roundabouts, like the couple of new ones in Fitchburg over the past few years.

[PHLBOS]

Any roundabout.

MassHighway/MADOT says otherwise.

Rotaries and roundabouts are not the same thing.

Rotaries are thankfully going away in this state, slowly but surely. There are some roundabouts, like the couple of new ones in Fitchburg over the past few years.

Which rotaries are going away?  While many have been restriped similar to roundabouts; the rotaries themselves still exist.

[Rothman]

Rotaries are just big roundabouts.  You yield to the in-circle traffic just like with roundabouts.

It's those traffic circles you have to worry about.

[jakeroot]

Rotaries are just big roundabouts.  You yield to the in-circle traffic just like with roundabouts.

I thought "rotary" was masstalk for "traffic circle"?

Then again, I never assumed "traffic circle" to mean "circles where you yield to entering traffic".

[jeffandnicole]

Yep...you may not eliminate all the congestion, but you definitely reduce the timing and severity of the congestion.

Of course, anti-car people don't want to hear about it. If they see traffic slowing down, it's immediately a failure.

[PHLBOS]

Of course, anti-car people don't want to hear about it. If they see traffic slowing down, it's immediately a failure.

I thought anti-car advocates wanted slower traffic.  The slower the traffic; the more advantageous are the alternative modes.

[SectorZ]

Any roundabout.

MassHighway/MADOT says otherwise.

Rotaries and roundabouts are not the same thing.

Rotaries are thankfully going away in this state, slowly but surely. There are some roundabouts, like the couple of new ones in Fitchburg over the past few years.

Which rotaries are going away?  While many have been restriped similar to roundabouts; the rotaries themselves still exist.

MA 110/113 at I-93 in Methuen is one.

[roadman]

In early 1985, MassDPW - based on an analysis from Central Transportation Planning Staff (the Boston-area MPO), decided to revise the northbound Central Artery/Tobin Bridge interchange to force all traffic entering from Storrow Drive onto I-93 north, and not allow this traffic to make the crossover to the Tobin Bridge.  The idea was to improve traffic flow by eliminating weaving at this location, which was about 600 feet long.

For whatever reason, the change had the exact opposite effect.  Traffic backups on both the northbound Central Artery/Southeast Expressway and eastbound Storrow Drive actually increased.  After two days, the change was eliminated and the roadway restored to its previous configuration.

[jeffandnicole]

Of course, anti-car people don't want to hear about it. If they see traffic slowing down, it's immediately a failure.

I thought anti-car advocates wanted slower traffic.  The slower the traffic; the more advantageous are the alternative modes.

Anti-car folks will say that continued congestion means the project was a failure...the project should have eliminated congestion completely.

Since congestion wasn't eliminated entirely, the project should not have been accomplished whatsoever, and the money would have been better spent on mass transit.

[jakeroot]

Of course, anti-car people don't want to hear about it. If they see traffic slowing down, it's immediately a failure.

I thought anti-car advocates wanted slower traffic.  The slower the traffic; the more advantageous are the alternative modes.

Anti-car folks will say that continued congestion means the project was a failure...the project should have eliminated congestion completely.

Since congestion wasn't eliminated entirely, the project should not have been accomplished whatsoever, and the money would have been better spent on mass transit.

Goes both ways. Anti-transit folks whine that, unless a transit project has a remarkable affect on traffic, it isn't worth the investment. Source: https://goo.gl/3ZM7Yp (last section).

The fact is that any increase in capacity will, in some way, prove beneficial. But these improvements aren't noticeable because the congestion doesn't go away. It just doesn't get worse. Although the Katy Fwy expansion is proof that, even after investing billions in freeway widening, traffic can still get worse. Anti-car people wouldn't be all over the Katy Fwy if traffic volumes leveled out.

[epzik8]

Route 24/924/Tollgate Road in Abingdon, Maryland could be one.

[sparker]

Of course, anti-car people don't want to hear about it. If they see traffic slowing down, it's immediately a failure.

I thought anti-car advocates wanted slower traffic.  The slower the traffic; the more advantageous are the alternative modes.

Anti-car folks will say that continued congestion means the project was a failure...the project should have eliminated congestion completely.

Since congestion wasn't eliminated entirely, the project should not have been accomplished whatsoever, and the money would have been better spent on mass transit.

For better or worse, one of the more pointed arguments for the anti-car contingent is I-10/San Bernardino Freeway from I-710 to El Monte, about 10 miles -- where both 3-occupant HOV/bus lanes are located inside the 4 + 4 main lanes -- and Metrolink's San Bernardino line is located in the freeway median.  This freeway is directionally congested during commute hours (usually 5-9:30 mornings, 2:30-7 evenings); buses and trains regularly zip past traffic maintaining a maximum 10 mph. 

However, ridership on both public-transit modes has either plateaued or slightly decreased, while congestion remains.  So even an abject visual hasn't prompted a sea change in commuter attitude -- but it does illustrate that other factors (the ability to trip-chain or change one's plans mid-journey likely being some of these) may be as compelling as simple elapsed time or average speed. 

[mrsman]

Of course, anti-car people don't want to hear about it. If they see traffic slowing down, it's immediately a failure.

I thought anti-car advocates wanted slower traffic.  The slower the traffic; the more advantageous are the alternative modes.

Anti-car folks will say that continued congestion means the project was a failure...the project should have eliminated congestion completely.

Since congestion wasn't eliminated entirely, the project should not have been accomplished whatsoever, and the money would have been better spent on mass transit.

For better or worse, one of the more pointed arguments for the anti-car contingent is I-10/San Bernardino Freeway from I-710 to El Monte, about 10 miles -- where both 3-occupant HOV/bus lanes are located inside the 4 + 4 main lanes -- and Metrolink's San Bernardino line is located in the freeway median.  This freeway is directionally congested during commute hours (usually 5-9:30 mornings, 2:30-7 evenings); buses and trains regularly zip past traffic maintaining a maximum 10 mph. 

However, ridership on both public-transit modes has either plateaued or slightly decreased, while congestion remains.  So even an abject visual hasn't prompted a sea change in commuter attitude -- but it does illustrate that other factors (the ability to trip-chain or change one's plans mid-journey likely being some of these) may be as compelling as simple elapsed time or average speed.

And more to the point, transit on the freeway may be able to serve the freeway portion of your trip faster than you can by driving, but does it mean that your entire trip from home to work (or other places) is less?  Does this also apply if you drive one of your legs in the off-peak or even the near off peak.  The freeway transit is great if you can consistently work a regular rush hour schedule (starting work from 8-9 and leaving work from 4:30-6), and you never run even a minute late,  and your office is in Downtown near a bus stop without the need for a transfer and that there is sufficient parking at your local park and ride. If any one of those factors do not work out and you may need to leave early or work late the buses are not frequent enough to accommodate you and your trip by car would be faster despite the traffic.

And the people out there in the SG VAlley and Inland Empire know this and so they are unwilling to pay the big bucks for an express transit pass, especially if the parking at work is covered by their employer.

[sparker]

........transit on the freeway may be able to serve the freeway portion of your trip faster than you can by driving, but does it mean that your entire trip from home to work (or other places) is less?  Does this also apply if you drive one of your legs in the off-peak or even the near off peak.  The freeway transit is great if you can consistently work a regular rush hour schedule (starting work from 8-9 and leaving work from 4:30-6), and you never run even a minute late,  and your office is in Downtown near a bus stop without the need for a transfer and that there is sufficient parking at your local park and ride. If any one of those factors do not work out and you may need to leave early or work late the buses are not frequent enough to accommodate you and your trip by car would be faster despite the traffic.

And the people out there in the SG VAlley and Inland Empire know this and so they are unwilling to pay the big bucks for an express transit pass, especially if the parking at work is covered by their employer.

All public transit service -- and subsequent usage -- is predicated upon the demand being equally inflexible to the generally inflexible supply.  Whole segments of the economy (child care being the most visible and pertinent of these) are geared toward predictable commute behavior; while corporate "flex time" looks good on paper, those employees who can actually take advantage of such has always been limited by circumstance involving coordination with the other actors in one's life.  If you're a working mother who needs to pick up her child from daycare no later than, say, 6:30 p.m. (and I'm being generous here!), that means that the chances are you're going to be commuting at peak times unless you can leave work in mid-afternoon.  Commuting is what I'd term an "idiom with teeth"; unless your needs are quite flexible (which often means you're more or less on your own), you'll likely find yourself a prisoner of that great work-to-home bell curve that starts as early as 2:30 p.m. (shift change for most warehousing operations -- particularly in the Inland Empire) and persists until about 7:15-7:30 (depending upon how many traffic incidents have occurred).  Another consideration is the type of employer one has; most corporate entities tend to be vertically structured and relatively rigid as to schedule; the "campus" atmosphere touted by more than a few tech companies, with employee-friendly scheduling and the ability to work from home (particularly if you're an IT or coder type), usually lasts until the company is bought out or goes public, at which point traditional vertical structure more often than not becomes S.O.P.   True corporate flexibility is fleeting almost to the point of being mythical!

All the above, in aggregate, dovetails into the commute idiom -- particularly after the inevitable scheduling miscalculations by the commuter that results in conflict with those with whom one must transactionally deal -- that renders subjecting one's self to the rigid parameters of public transit unacceptably problematic.  So it's back to the personal vehicle, where at least one can often find an alternative solution a block or two away.  And so it goes -- the overall problem persists because of life foiling any attempt to fashion a consistent bounded rationality that would allow one to effectually utilize public transit.