5 ms·

I really dislike "induced demand" as a reason to maintain a terrible experience of a desired product or service. Increase fuel taxes or even do demand charging,

I really dislike "induced demand" as a reason to maintain a terrible experience of a desired product or service. Increase fuel taxes or even do demand charging, but don't have this thing where you make a car trip take three times longer because it discourages people from using their cars.

randallsquared 11y ago
I think the argument isn't "let's not improve things because people will use things more" but "let's not spend resources for little improvement". The induced demand argument suggests that the pain and utility of traffic are in equilibrium, and that there's so much latent demand that no feasible amount of pavement will reduce the pain appreciably. It seems to me of a similar genre to studies showing that safety equipment increases risky behavior.
awjr 11y ago
That's the point, "induced demand" is simply the fact of making it easier to travel by car, encourages more people to choose to travel by car. It is not that the trip takes three times as long, it's the fact, they built a wider road and the journey took half as long, prior to the road being widened. You cannot solve this by building more roads. You solve it by putting roads on a "road diet" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_diet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_diet enabling modal share https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modal_share https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modal_share . You create segregated space for walking, for cycling. You prioritise public transport. You want more people to choose any other option, other than the car. This, however, is hard when traffic modelling still focuses on traffic flow (maximising car throughput) over modal share. In the UK, it estimated that the school run is 20%-25% of rush hour. Our road design precludes kids cycling to school.
- timthorn 11y ago
  > Our road design precludes kids cycling to school No, there are plenty of children who cycle to school and in safety in the UK. The bigger issue is parents' fears of abduction and/or traffic.
  - awjr 11y ago
    I have to disagree here. Various Council Highways departments are absolutely focused on traffic flow. I would go as far as to say that the two top priorities are traffic flow and not affecting on-street parking. It's changing. This table comes from the Welsh Active Travel Act Design Guidance https://cyclebath.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/screen-shot-2014-12-15-at-09-50-56.png https://cyclebath.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/screen-shot-20... If you have a 30mph road, it needs a protected cycle track. We need space where an 8 year old cycling to school does not have to share road space with HGVs. Where one mistake does not get punished by death.
  - lhopki01 11y ago
    I cycle all over London and I don't feel safe a lot of the time. Big roads have inconsistent cycle lanes that start and stop at random or are ignored by drivers. Side roads have people who think 35mph is a reasonable speed to go on a road that doesn't even have space for two cars to pass side by side. The UK needs a lot more investment in cycle infrastructure before it could be considered safe.
    - awjr 11y ago
      This is the streetview of London Road, Bath. https://goo.gl/maps/BF8dHyqetow https://goo.gl/maps/BF8dHyqetow Local cycling groups campaigned for a 2 way protected track along here, but were over-ruled by a council officer who chose a design, where you can be cycling along with your child on a bike, be overtaken by a bus, that then pulls in forcing you to pull out into 30mph traffic. They chose a design where dead space in the middle of the road was more important than providing a design that encouraged modal shift. This road also breaks the EU legal limits on pollution. They knew this when they put in this design. I wrote about it here http://cyclebath.org.uk/2015/05/23/london-road-an-example-of-bad-banes-management/ http://cyclebath.org.uk/2015/05/23/london-road-an-example-of... however the real issue is that a lot of Highways officers still consider cycling a joke. "Why should we cater for the 2%" is a line I hear a lot. However, you do not build a bridge because of the number of people swimming the river.
      - 11y ago
- Agustus 11y ago
  No, travel demand modeling includes transit shares and modeling. More roads are a fantastic solution for encouraging mobility of individuals. Yes, it is difficult from a group planning point of view, but think about it from the users point of view. There is a single dad who is restricted by her availability of time to a thirty minute commute window. If he has no available car, he is forced to a bus route based job, or bicycle / walking distance job. Locations for bus routes are chosen by top-down planning based on productions and attractions, with a preference for utilization based on larger employers, think hospital and hospitality. The buses drive the single dad to a certain area and precludes him from looking for jobs in non-bus route areas. You are forcing an individual to choose a non-ideal job based on a push for modal share and the "Planners" basis of what is best, not the individual. Road diets are dangerous for the populace. Look at Los Angeles current push for road diets that will decrease the levels of service across the city from 18% failure to 30% failure and the warnings that the emergency services say about the corresponding decrease in response times. The school run in the mornings is a good thing to focus on, here in the United States, we force the kids onto a crazy schedule of arriving in class before 8:00am.
  - awjr 11y ago
    This completely goes against the point the article is making. The premise that building more roads creates more congestion. Road diets enable modal shift. Oslo and Berlin are planning to ban the car from the city centre. It is about recognising that the car is a very bad form of transport for cities. It also has severe negative health effects on the population. Your argument feels like a smoker trying to justify why they should be allowed to smoke wherever they like.

randallsquared 11y ago

I think the argument isn't "let's not improve things because people will use things more" but "let's not spend resources for little improvement". The induced demand argument suggests that the pain and utility of traffic are in equilibrium, and that there's so much latent demand that no feasible amount of pavement will reduce the pain appreciably. It seems to me of a similar genre to studies showing that safety equipment increases risky behavior.

awjr 11y ago

That's the point, "induced demand" is simply the fact of making it easier to travel by car, encourages more people to choose to travel by car. It is not that the trip takes three times as long, it's the fact, they built a wider road and the journey took half as long, prior to the road being widened. You cannot solve this by building more roads. You solve it by putting roads on a "road diet" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_diet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_diet enabling modal share https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modal_share https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modal_share . You create segregated space for walking, for cycling. You prioritise public transport. You want more people to choose any other option, other than the car. This, however, is hard when traffic modelling still focuses on traffic flow (maximising car throughput) over modal share. In the UK, it estimated that the school run is 20%-25% of rush hour. Our road design precludes kids cycling to school.

timthorn 11y ago
> Our road design precludes kids cycling to school No, there are plenty of children who cycle to school and in safety in the UK. The bigger issue is parents' fears of abduction and/or traffic.
- awjr 11y ago
  I have to disagree here. Various Council Highways departments are absolutely focused on traffic flow. I would go as far as to say that the two top priorities are traffic flow and not affecting on-street parking. It's changing. This table comes from the Welsh Active Travel Act Design Guidance https://cyclebath.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/screen-shot-2014-12-15-at-09-50-56.png https://cyclebath.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/screen-shot-20... If you have a 30mph road, it needs a protected cycle track. We need space where an 8 year old cycling to school does not have to share road space with HGVs. Where one mistake does not get punished by death.
- lhopki01 11y ago
  I cycle all over London and I don't feel safe a lot of the time. Big roads have inconsistent cycle lanes that start and stop at random or are ignored by drivers. Side roads have people who think 35mph is a reasonable speed to go on a road that doesn't even have space for two cars to pass side by side. The UK needs a lot more investment in cycle infrastructure before it could be considered safe.
  - awjr 11y ago
    This is the streetview of London Road, Bath. https://goo.gl/maps/BF8dHyqetow https://goo.gl/maps/BF8dHyqetow Local cycling groups campaigned for a 2 way protected track along here, but were over-ruled by a council officer who chose a design, where you can be cycling along with your child on a bike, be overtaken by a bus, that then pulls in forcing you to pull out into 30mph traffic. They chose a design where dead space in the middle of the road was more important than providing a design that encouraged modal shift. This road also breaks the EU legal limits on pollution. They knew this when they put in this design. I wrote about it here http://cyclebath.org.uk/2015/05/23/london-road-an-example-of-bad-banes-management/ http://cyclebath.org.uk/2015/05/23/london-road-an-example-of... however the real issue is that a lot of Highways officers still consider cycling a joke. "Why should we cater for the 2%" is a line I hear a lot. However, you do not build a bridge because of the number of people swimming the river.
    - 11y ago
Agustus 11y ago
No, travel demand modeling includes transit shares and modeling. More roads are a fantastic solution for encouraging mobility of individuals. Yes, it is difficult from a group planning point of view, but think about it from the users point of view. There is a single dad who is restricted by her availability of time to a thirty minute commute window. If he has no available car, he is forced to a bus route based job, or bicycle / walking distance job. Locations for bus routes are chosen by top-down planning based on productions and attractions, with a preference for utilization based on larger employers, think hospital and hospitality. The buses drive the single dad to a certain area and precludes him from looking for jobs in non-bus route areas. You are forcing an individual to choose a non-ideal job based on a push for modal share and the "Planners" basis of what is best, not the individual. Road diets are dangerous for the populace. Look at Los Angeles current push for road diets that will decrease the levels of service across the city from 18% failure to 30% failure and the warnings that the emergency services say about the corresponding decrease in response times. The school run in the mornings is a good thing to focus on, here in the United States, we force the kids onto a crazy schedule of arriving in class before 8:00am.
- awjr 11y ago
  This completely goes against the point the article is making. The premise that building more roads creates more congestion. Road diets enable modal shift. Oslo and Berlin are planning to ban the car from the city centre. It is about recognising that the car is a very bad form of transport for cities. It also has severe negative health effects on the population. Your argument feels like a smoker trying to justify why they should be allowed to smoke wherever they like.