Induced Demand
How we pay for our roads will play a big role in what happens to cities when autonomous vehicles become common place in cities.
The Economist
That's how the Los Angeles Times editorial board characterized the $6 billion plan by Los Angeles Metro to widen the 710 freeway. "A waste of money," they assert. Key to the solution is how to deal with goods movement from the seaport complex.
Los Angeles Times
Commuting statistics have held consistent, according to Census data, even as the number of people working from home continues to climb.
Governing
Gov. Larry Hogan (R-Md.) announced last week plans for the largest highway contract awarded to a public-private partnership: adding four express toll lanes to the Capital Beltway and I-270. A third highway widening will be completed internally.
Planetizen
The networked sensors and signals in Ann Arbor give the city a coordinated way to respond to traffic.
Wired
Was the I-405 widening project worth it for Los Angeles? Depends on whom you ask.
Los Angeles Times
Seattle is set to build a nine-lane tunnel on its waterfront, the Urbanist's Ryan Packer is disappointed with its design and the project's stated goals.
The Urbanist
London Mayor, Sidiq Kahn, authorizes two new bridges and a tunnel in eastern part of the city.
City Lab
Streetsblog slams Caltrans for wasting $1.9 billion on futile freeway widening projects.
LA.Streetsblog
The $1.5 billion, 6.6-mile light rail extension from Culver City to Santa Monica is projected to double trips on the line by 2030, giving commuters a viable alternative to driving. Just the same, don't expect the extension to reduce congestion.
Wired
An experiment in Irving on SH 161 is defying the rules of induced demand, but not by building new lanes.
The Dallas Morning News
Pitched as a necessary addition to reduce congestion on interstates 30 and 35E as they pass Downtown Dallas, the Trinity Parkway is likely to induce one million additional vehicle miles traveled a day.
The Dallas Morning News
Connecticut Governor Dan Malloy sees potential benefits in economic development and congestion reduction in a pair of highway widening proposals in his state.
WNPR
Thinking about congestion as an economic problem generates new solutions for the problem as well as a response to accusations of social engineering.
Urban Kchoze
At some point, in places all over the country, freeways stopped working as they were intended. What can be done to improve one of the great frustrations of life with a car?
Pacific Standard
Aaron Renn provides a dissenting argument on the implications of peak car, namely, "if we’ve really reached peak car, maybe we really can build our way out of congestion after all."
New Geography
In case you need an easy link to reference when encountering arguments in favor of widening roads and freeways as a solution for traffic, Adam Mann provides an accessible and clear explainer article that sums up the limitations of such strategies.
Wired
Despite many studies confirming the effect of induced traffic, the effect is often ignored in the transport models used for project appraisal, says a team of Scandanavian researchers creating an extreme bias in the assessment of new projects.
European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research
Eric Jaffe at The Infrastructurist explains the non-intuitive reason why often removing freeways means less traffic.
The Infrastructurist
Dan Bertolet argues that adding expanding car capacity in cities just inspires more people to drive and ruins the qualities that make the city attractive in the first place.
Publicola
