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Traffic Waves

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Hypermiling how-to tips

Main site: http://trafficwaves.org/On Seattle I-5, this exit-only left-hand lane is usually backed up a half mile during rush hour. The exit ramp leads into the high speed "Express Lanes" under the city. But if it's jammed, you'll lose more time in the jam than you gain from the express lane. Also, if you miss getting into that lane early, then you're screwed, since nobody in the mile-long row of cars will let you in. Merging drivers coming in from I-90 are blocked by those in the jam. And while stuck in that lane, you have to sit in line for many minutes, driving like 2MPH.BUT ...if I let ten cars merge ahead of me as I approach the jam, like magic the whole thing evaporates, and everyone takes off at high speed. Sometimes. (It doesn't work every time.)Unfortunately this video can't show you the view from above. Also, you can't see behind me, so you can't see that my "hole" is the only one in a very long row of cars. Also you can't see the size of the reliable daily jam that was there on every other day, or the jam that was there ahead of me before I arrived and started letting people merge.Note that letting a few cars ahead of you is NOTHING. It doesn't slow you down. On a 30min congested commute at 65MPH, 2sec between cars, if you instead drove 5MPH slower than the rest, how many other cars would pass you? Seventy five! In other words, you're only a "Slow Driver" when a stunningly huge numbers of cars pass you. On the same commute, letting ten cars ahead of you will slow you down insignificantly: by less than 1MPH. Ten cars one way or another is too small to matter.Conversely, if you want to drive faster than everyone else, then you need to pass fifty or one hundred other drivers. If you only managed to pass a few cars, that's called FAILURE, and your speed wasn't faster enough to matter.Note: Trolls & spammers blocked immediately. Zero tolerance.

Channel: Science & Technology
Uploaded: November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am
Author: wbeaty

Length: 07:02
Rating: 4.872868
Views: 81782

Tags: traffic  waves  amasci  science  physics  chaos  diy  cars  driving  hypermiling  

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Video Comments

BasherCoon (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
Excellent vid. When I commuted an hour and 20 minutes one-way to work I'd do this a lot when there was accidents (frequent, every day either on the way home/to work) and never came to a standstill when I did.Now if we can just get the dopes to stop rubber-necking at every little fender bender on the side of the interstate, we'd have that traffic problem solved. ;)
2008Z0666 (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
Thats what truckers TRY to do,but 4 wheelers always throw a wrench into the plan.
helixscape (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
LOL - dude - this is a fantastic metaphor for LIFE - let alone driving!!! You have total guru potential - turn that marvelous brain to social issues....it would be interesting to see your hypothesis...
wbeaty (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
> letting in slower driversLetting in *merging* drivers.> doesn't workIt works fine, same as regulated on-ramps and variable speed limits. Of course many drivers don't understand these devices, and can't see how they'd work.If you practice "wave smoothing," you're just causing everyone behind you to travel at the existing average highway speed (same as a variable speed limit sign.)If you maintain a gap, you're acting like an on-ramp stoplight which "zippers" the cars at a merge zone.
wbeaty (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
> delay more than 1-2 secondsOf course that's not including jams, where you're sitting at 0 mph.The usual (unsafe) spacing in heavy Seattle commuting is under two seconds between cars. Under those conditions, just set your alarm clock and get up five seconds earlier. Then you can still let five cars merge ahead ...YET NOT BE FIVE SECONDS LATE FOR WORK O GOD THE HUMANITY!
CodeBlue910 (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
Ahhhh... no it doesn't. Letting in slower drivers reduces drivers delay more than 1-2 seconds. Sorry, this practice is ridiculous and doesn't work.
wbeaty (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
> timed it?I drove through a jam which appeared reliably every single day. After several years I suddenly started letting other drivers merge ahead of me. And suddenly that jam started evaporating as I watched. Didn't happen every day, more like once or twice a week. But before then, I never saw it break up, ever.Truckers write to tell me that they've known these tricks for decades. They want to increase the speed of commuter traffic which clogs the highways near cities.
spike6464 (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
He already explained this Belowfor every car you let in, you have to slowWrong, since traffic is not like a line at the grocers. One extra car is TOTALLY INSIGNIFICANT. Letting one car merge ahead of you only adds 1-2sec of delay, while a blocked merge zone adds several minutes of delay (or sometimes half an hour or more, for certain Seattle merging bottlenecks.)
wbeaty (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
> because for every car you let in, you have to slowWrong, since traffic isn't a line at the grocery. One extra car is TOTALLY INSIGNIFICANT; one car only adds 1-2sec of delay, while a blocked merge zone adds several minutes (or sometimes 40min, at certain Seattle bottlenecks.)Cars in merge zones are like angry, very stupid gear teeth who believe that OTHER gear teeth slow things down, so they try to stop all other teeth from meshing. Of course the system grinds to a halt.
wbeaty (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)
> traffic wave thing is an illusionWaves will significantly slow the average flow.Britain built a huge computer-based traffic control system with changing speed limits on M25 London loop. It's main task: calculate the maximum speed limit which won't trigger traffic waves.

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