Traffic jam strategies?

[jeffandnicole]

Much of driving is physcological.

Two parallel routes - an Interstate & a state route

The Interstate is congested.  Traffic is moving, on average, 30 mph in a 65 mph zone.  Sometimes, traffic comes to a complete standstill for 45 seconds.  Motorists are going ballistic, wondering why so much traffic is on the road.

The State Route has less traffic.  Traffic is moving, on average, 30 mph in a 45 mph zone.  Soemtimes, we hit a red light, and traffic comes to a complete standstill for 45 seconds.  Motorists are calm.

The biggest difference - we are accustomed to stopping at red lights.  They have a calming effect.  And when there's cross traffic, we just sit there, look around, talk, listen to the radio. 

To further prove the point - at a busy intersection controlled by a stop sign, motorists will patiently wait at the stop sign upwards of about 10 or 15 seconds.  After that, they get fidgety, start pulling up, trying to find a gap to enter or cross the road.  They get anxious, wondering if that gap will come (the gap will occur, like it does every day when they cross the intersection).  Eventually, they gun it, even though they really didn't need to.  They probably waited at that stop sign no more than 30 seconds.

The residents complain they want a traffic light.  A traffic light is installed.  Now, a motorist may need to wait upwards of 60 seconds for the light to turn green.  But they don't get upset, because the light is controlling traffic.  They are more patient, and when that light turns green, they go. Nevermind the fact that they waited LONGER than when they were waiting at the stop sign - they remained calm, because of the traffic light!

[PHLBOS]

What's your traffic jam strategy in unfamiliar territory?

I should have mentioned this earlier.  If I know that I will be ventering out to an unfamiliar area, I make it a point to obtain some roadmaps (mostly from AAA) for that area.  If I wind up stopped in traffic, I take one out and quickly scan the map for the nearest exit and possible alternate route(s) to get around such. 

If the congested area in question is located nowhere near my origin/destination area; an alternate route that isn't necessarily parallel to the primary route doesn't bother me too much... especially if traffic on the highway is crawling at 10-20 mph.

[Dr Frankenstein]

If the congested area in question is located nowhere near my origin/destination area; an alternate route that isn't necessarily parallel to the primary route doesn't bother me too much... especially if traffic on the highway is crawling at 10-20 mph.

This.

I once bailed out of the Capital Beltway in Maryland and went all the way across the Chesapeake to reach Delaware via U.S. 301.

[cpzilliacus]

Some people hate Michigan lefts and i kinda have a love/hate relationship with them myself (you find yourself planning routes to avoid left turns).

Avoiding left turns is good route planning practice in general. When running errands I will generally plan my stops in whatever sequence will avoid lefts. UPS famously avoids lefts as much as possible in its driver itineraries, and this is credited with making the operation much more efficient.

Supposedly the late J. Edgar Hoover, longtime director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, forbade his drivers from making left turns.

[NE2]

JFK was killed right after turning left. Coincidence?

[Mergingtraffic]

In my experience, when the expressways are jammed, I look at the side roads via Inrix but there is always that one traffic light or intersection that backs up and ruins the side road detour.
Then, I look for a side road of the side road. 

[agentsteel53]

The biggest difference - we are accustomed to stopping at red lights.  They have a calming effect.  And when there's cross traffic, we just sit there, look around, talk, listen to the radio. 

only up to about the 3rd or 4th one.  if I'm on an arterial with poorly timed lights and I get 16 reds in a row, you bet I'm not gonna be happy with that.

the worst one I've ever encountered is US-441 through Orlando: 120 reds out of 126 in the interval I decided to count.

(and no brown shields either.)

[agentsteel53]

Supposedly the late J. Edgar Hoover, longtime director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, forbade his drivers from making left turns.

that doesn't seem like a particularly viable strategy when following another car during an investigation.

[sipes23]

But its not just about time - I'll often bail out of a traffic jam just because I don't feel like sitting in it, even if the alternate route ends up taking longer. Not all of us plan our trip schedules down to the minute.  In fact I'd wager most people would rather get home a few minutes later if it meant a more enjoyable, lower-stress drive.

I'm with you on that. I hate, hate, hate sitting in traffic in rural areas. There is almost always an alternative that's less stressful. And usually more interesting. Unless of course I'm trying to clinch something, but even then the prospect of lower stress driving can be mighty appealing.

In the city it depends. Time of day can make the situation six of one, half a dozen of the other. Suburban driving on surface roads is frequently worse than the tollway. Gobs of poorly timed lights, lower speed limits, even slower drivers, and so on.

[agentsteel53]

I try to avoid suburbs the best I can.  most of them were built sufficiently recently that there isn't anything interesting there.

[cpzilliacus]

the worst one I've ever encountered is US-441 through Orlando: 120 reds out of 126 in the interval I decided to count.

Try driving across the District of Columbia sometime (and not using I-95, I-395, I-695, D.C. 295 or I-295).

Likely not big enough to have as many as 100 signalized intersections (if you choose a somewhat "straight" path, like U.S. 29 or U.S. 1), but you will be stopping at most signalized intersections, even at 3:00 A.M.

[Divyaya]

One of my recently traffic jam is that I stuck in the California I-80 freeways, the road was clear almost in one hour.
The second one is that I drove along Hana Highway to Kahului in a terrible day,  stuck in traffic for at least 2 hours.
I don't have a solutions at moment .

[OCGuy81]

Quote from: agentsteel53 on December 03, 2013, 06:40:04 PM

in LA, drive the surface streets.  today I cut off a big segment of wedged I-710 by taking Garfield for a little while.  except for the Garfield/Manchester interchange, all the lights were timed very well and I didn't stop for any.



I agree with that strategy - in L.A. The grid of arterials and collector roads (or, as Southern California seems to call them, "surface streets") is sufficiently large that there are almost an infinite number of "bail" routes if there's a severe freeway problem.

Between I-710 in Long Beach and I-10 in Santa Monica, Ca. 1 (PCH/Sepulveda Boulevard/Lincoln Boulevard) is a pretty good "bail" route if I-405 has a melt-down. It works in part because there are several alternates to I-405.

I agree with this in Orange Co. as well.  I'll often opt for surface streets if the freeways are at a standstill, the exception being streets near attractions like Disneyland, where you have too many confused tourists.

I may not make better time, but I just prefer to stay moving, and that's often the case if I exit onto a surface street.

[realjd]

I know this answer is considered heretical here but on long road trips I usually have my GPS on because I like the ETA and POI features. Usually it knows about the traffic and reroutes me before the jam (or warns me that there is a traffic jam but that it's quicker to stay the course), but if I encounter traffic it doesn't know about, it has a handy button that will reroute me without me having to try to look at maps while I'm driving.

[ET21]

My jam is always I-294 at the I-88 ramp. This along with the I-290 on-ramps and the Bensenville curve makes traffic creep from Willow Road all the way to I-55 on some occasions.

Usually my strategies are to take parallel routes mainly (Wolf Road, LaGrange/Mannheim US 12/20/45, IL-83 on a good day, comes to mind in the area)

[GaryV]

We took her advice - but took OH-95 to US-42 to US-23.  US-42 wasn't too bad, but US-23 didn't seem to be worthy of the thick line it had in the map.  Although it was very smooth road, there were quite a few stoplights and I wonder if we shouldn't have taken OH-95 to OH-13. 

Well, you did end up on the busiest and most developed section of US-23.  North of Delaware it's a pretty good road for a non-freeway.

Once when coming home from FL years ago, we got into a tremendous traffic jam just north of Atlanta.  I-75 was not yet complete at Marietta, and you had to take a ramp with a sharp curve to get off.  A semi had tipped, and it was blocked.  People in motor homes had pulled off on to the shoulder and were cooking out.  My dad got off the freeway when he could, and we found an old route through towns.  I don't know if it was US-41 or an Old-41, but we made better time than on the freeway (that we could see several times).  And we got to stop for ice cream.

[Pete from Boston]

It is entirely dependent on familiarity.  When unfamiliar, I assess the way I would with any gamble, then exit because I'd rather have options than be stuck.

Familiar is a different story, and I'll try and refine some very convoluted routes until I know how to skip certain jams.  Each involves an assessment and a choice at various points, taking into account things like rush-hour turn prohibitions (spreading like a disease here), one-ways, bottlenecks that seem bad but turn free-flowing, etc. 

If I'm hopping off on a gamble, I try to pick a couple of distinctive vehicles and remember them.  It can be a useful gauge if the main road remains in sight, or if I can see them ahead or behind when re-entering.  This way I at least have some little bit to distinguish between simply feeling good and getting a worthwhile result.  After a while, I've even used this feedback to gauge how bad the traffic has to be for me to take the alternate, with pretty reliable results (for guessing traffic jams, that is).

[Brian556]

Quote from Agentsteel:

the worst one I've ever encountered is US-441 through Orlando: 120 reds out of 126 in the interval I decided to count.

(and no brown shields either.)

No brown shields? Just ask NE2 to poo on one for you.

[OCGuy81]

Well, when you live in Texas you can opt for the frontage roads, but then about half of the traffic chooses that, too. I've had it work on occasion living in North Dallas.

I remember being in a traffic jam in Houston years ago, on the Katy Freeway, and seeing people off-road across the grassy median to use the frontage road vs. the actual freeway.