8 ms·

In Northern Virginia outside DC, I-66 had been subject to directional rush hour restrictions on single occupancy vehicles. It was illegal to drive a car with ju

In Northern Virginia outside DC, I-66 had been subject to directional rush hour restrictions on single occupancy vehicles. It was illegal to drive a car with just yourself for a few hours every weekday and you risked a ticket if you were caught. People put blow up dolls in their passenger seats. Last year they rolled out automatic congestion pricing for SOVs. All the news stories were about how the toll could hit a ridiculous-seeming price of $40+, but that was usually only for a few minutes in the morning rush. Buried in the articles several paragraphs in would be a note that, oh yeah, it had been illegal to drive alone. Now a year later, peoples’ habits have changed and the toll has done its job. Commuters have effectively time-shifted, alleviating and smoothing congestion. It has been so effective that the length of I-66 subject to this treatment will be extended. I’m a smalltime neighborhood elected official in DC and I really hope I can convince DDOT to roll out bus lanes faster.

hedora 8y ago
In the Bay Area, when they added the ability to pay a toll to use the HOV lane, and also extended the HOV lane hours to end at 10AM instead of 9AM, it immediately added 30-45 minutes to the 880 -> 237 commute from East Bay. Extending congestion hours by lowering road throughput is counterproductive, so saying “it smoothed congestion” is applying the wrong metric. At this point in time, we can measure door-to-door time of commuters, and also the number of trips per hour. Instead traffic engineers use metrics that seem to be designed by NIMBY’s that want to increase the cost of commuting into high property value areas. The bus lanes you propose are likely to have the same problem. Since you have the ability to improve the success criteria for transit projects, please consider using better metrics.
- shereadsthenews 8y ago
  I don't think that is a very good example because that particular "HOV" lane is 100% Teslas with a single occupant, and because the HOV lane ends abruptly in the middle of 237 before anyone exits. The real lesson of these projects is that the EV sticker program was a failure and the cost to drive down 237 at rush hour should have been $50 instead of whatever it is.
  - hedora 8y ago
    It’s not 100% Tesla’s. There are also parents with children and fleet vehicles. Those latter two categories are already as low occupancy as they can be. I suspect they’re representative of HOV users in other states. Simply eliminating that HOV lane would probably improve the commute though. There’s data from a UC Berkeley study that more or less proves it.
    - jedberg 8y ago
      I've been saying for years that only licensed drivers should count for the carpool lane. I have kids, but I'm not eliminating any cars by carpooling with them.
      - Robotbeat 8y ago
        No, but you are reducing the impact on other transportation systems. The killer app for personal cars is families. And families have enormous positive long-term externalities for the human race for obvious reasons. And your proposed system doesn’t make sense. It’d encourage people with no need for driving to get their driver’s license and punish others who couldn’t pass based on age and disability.
- rdiddly 8y ago
  Improving your commute by car isn't the goal. The goal is to get you to stop doing it, or bear your share of the real costs for a change.
  - hedora 8y ago
    If the goal is to prevent people from commuting by car then we should just tear up or barricade all the roads. No need to invest in public transit, since that’s not part of the goal. From what I can tell, this is the actual policy the SF area has been implementing for the last decade. I’d think a better goal is to minimize the average time and environmental impact of commutes, while maximizing the number of people that can use the transit system to commute (including cars, bikes, busses, trains, etc).
    - rdiddly 8y ago
      Wow I never thought of that! Here I thought barricading the roads would solve everything! But you're right, people could actually still get where they're going but use bikes, buses, trains etc.
hedora 8y ago
> Commuters have effectively time-shifted, alleviating and smoothing congestion. It has been so effective that the length of I-66 subject to this treatment will be extended. Also, has anyone computed the cost of the economic externalities here? Time shifting ones commute either has severe financial repercussions for the employer (lost productivity) or the employees (a decrease in effective wages). I suspect those numbers will dwarf the cost of investing in a light rail system or widening the road after a few years. Similarly, if traffic is below about 45mph, then further slowing traffic increases CO2 emissions by lowering fuel efficiency, and the congestion on the road distorts property values, lowering prices in more places than it helps them, which hurts school funding (especially in minority areas), etc, etc. As I said in the other comment, consider raising peak commute throughput instead of devising ways to suppress peak demand.
- nicoburns 8y ago
  > Also, has anyone computed the cost of the economic externalities here? Time shifting ones commute either has severe financial repercussions for the employer (lost productivity) or the employees (a decrease in effective wages). That, or companies implement flexible working hours, which allow time shifting without penalty.
  - hedora 8y ago
    That doesn’t work if you have kids. You miss seeing them in either the morning or evening, and the schools don’t time shift to match your schedule.
    - gnopgnip 8y ago
      If you have kids and work either the kids can get to school without you needing to drive them and pick them up, or you need to have some sort of childcare.
      - briandear 8y ago
        You don’t have kids, I’m willing to bet.
tomohawk 8y ago
An acquaintance of mine was unfamiliar with that area and accidentally drove through there - it's pretty easy to do. Got a $55 toll fee for the single use. Lesson learned - avoid doing any business down there if at all possible. Have to wonder what the cost here is. Acquaintance does lots of business, and now directs it elsewhere to areas that are less hassle.
- frankosaurus 8y ago
  > avoid doing any business down there if at all possible Nobody goes there anymore, the congestion pricing is too high. (With apologies to Yogi Berra)

hedora 8y ago

In the Bay Area, when they added the ability to pay a toll to use the HOV lane, and also extended the HOV lane hours to end at 10AM instead of 9AM, it immediately added 30-45 minutes to the 880 -> 237 commute from East Bay. Extending congestion hours by lowering road throughput is counterproductive, so saying “it smoothed congestion” is applying the wrong metric. At this point in time, we can measure door-to-door time of commuters, and also the number of trips per hour. Instead traffic engineers use metrics that seem to be designed by NIMBY’s that want to increase the cost of commuting into high property value areas. The bus lanes you propose are likely to have the same problem. Since you have the ability to improve the success criteria for transit projects, please consider using better metrics.

shereadsthenews 8y ago
I don't think that is a very good example because that particular "HOV" lane is 100% Teslas with a single occupant, and because the HOV lane ends abruptly in the middle of 237 before anyone exits. The real lesson of these projects is that the EV sticker program was a failure and the cost to drive down 237 at rush hour should have been $50 instead of whatever it is.
- hedora 8y ago
  It’s not 100% Tesla’s. There are also parents with children and fleet vehicles. Those latter two categories are already as low occupancy as they can be. I suspect they’re representative of HOV users in other states. Simply eliminating that HOV lane would probably improve the commute though. There’s data from a UC Berkeley study that more or less proves it.
  - jedberg 8y ago
    I've been saying for years that only licensed drivers should count for the carpool lane. I have kids, but I'm not eliminating any cars by carpooling with them.
    - Robotbeat 8y ago
      No, but you are reducing the impact on other transportation systems. The killer app for personal cars is families. And families have enormous positive long-term externalities for the human race for obvious reasons. And your proposed system doesn’t make sense. It’d encourage people with no need for driving to get their driver’s license and punish others who couldn’t pass based on age and disability.
rdiddly 8y ago
Improving your commute by car isn't the goal. The goal is to get you to stop doing it, or bear your share of the real costs for a change.
- hedora 8y ago
  If the goal is to prevent people from commuting by car then we should just tear up or barricade all the roads. No need to invest in public transit, since that’s not part of the goal. From what I can tell, this is the actual policy the SF area has been implementing for the last decade. I’d think a better goal is to minimize the average time and environmental impact of commutes, while maximizing the number of people that can use the transit system to commute (including cars, bikes, busses, trains, etc).
  - rdiddly 8y ago
    Wow I never thought of that! Here I thought barricading the roads would solve everything! But you're right, people could actually still get where they're going but use bikes, buses, trains etc.

hedora 8y ago

> Commuters have effectively time-shifted, alleviating and smoothing congestion. It has been so effective that the length of I-66 subject to this treatment will be extended. Also, has anyone computed the cost of the economic externalities here? Time shifting ones commute either has severe financial repercussions for the employer (lost productivity) or the employees (a decrease in effective wages). I suspect those numbers will dwarf the cost of investing in a light rail system or widening the road after a few years. Similarly, if traffic is below about 45mph, then further slowing traffic increases CO2 emissions by lowering fuel efficiency, and the congestion on the road distorts property values, lowering prices in more places than it helps them, which hurts school funding (especially in minority areas), etc, etc. As I said in the other comment, consider raising peak commute throughput instead of devising ways to suppress peak demand.

nicoburns 8y ago
> Also, has anyone computed the cost of the economic externalities here? Time shifting ones commute either has severe financial repercussions for the employer (lost productivity) or the employees (a decrease in effective wages). That, or companies implement flexible working hours, which allow time shifting without penalty.
- hedora 8y ago
  That doesn’t work if you have kids. You miss seeing them in either the morning or evening, and the schools don’t time shift to match your schedule.
  - gnopgnip 8y ago
    If you have kids and work either the kids can get to school without you needing to drive them and pick them up, or you need to have some sort of childcare.
    - briandear 8y ago
      You don’t have kids, I’m willing to bet.

tomohawk 8y ago

An acquaintance of mine was unfamiliar with that area and accidentally drove through there - it's pretty easy to do. Got a $55 toll fee for the single use. Lesson learned - avoid doing any business down there if at all possible. Have to wonder what the cost here is. Acquaintance does lots of business, and now directs it elsewhere to areas that are less hassle.

frankosaurus 8y ago
> avoid doing any business down there if at all possible Nobody goes there anymore, the congestion pricing is too high. (With apologies to Yogi Berra)