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Induced demand at the core isn't simply new freeways lead to congestion - it is the union of two ideas:

- The previously congested freeway made people avoid certain trips or take less desirable routes; with the addition of the new capacity on the freeway those trips can now be taken using that freeway

 

For example, people who were taking a parallel street to I-10 would move their trip on to I-10 to save 5 minutes.  Another example of this is someone who was shopping at a suburban mall because going to the Galleria took to long; with the increased capacity they feel like going to the Galleria is closer in time so they go there instead.

 

- The new capacity of the freeway attracts people to move along it, adding to the growth of the area in a different pattern than before the freeway.

 

This one is more for bypass loops that become congested (think West beltway) but can also hold for expanding radial freeways.  Because you can go faster on the road, the 30-40 minute commute distance becomes a longer mileage, encouraging more sprawling development.  An example of this would be a new development built BECAUSE of the grand parkway or the Westpark tollway - before they were built the areas made no sense to live in (too far away) but now with the new road development makes sense.

 

the tl;dr is mainly its a complicated theory, but that at it's core expanding a freeway to accommodate growth will often accelerate the growth of the traffic, and can outpace the additional capacity.

 

 

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Induced demand at the core isn't simply new freeways lead to congestion - it is the union of two ideas:

- The previously congested freeway made people avoid certain trips or take less desirable routes; with the addition of the new capacity on the freeway those trips can now be taken using that freeway

 

For example, people who were taking a parallel street to I-10 would move their trip on to I-10 to save 5 minutes.  Another example of this is someone who was shopping at a suburban mall because going to the Galleria took to long; with the increased capacity they feel like going to the Galleria is closer in time so they go there instead.

 

- The new capacity of the freeway attracts people to move along it, adding to the growth of the area in a different pattern than before the freeway.

 

This one is more for bypass loops that become congested (think West beltway) but can also hold for expanding radial freeways.  Because you can go faster on the road, the 30-40 minute commute distance becomes a longer mileage, encouraging more sprawling development.  An example of this would be a new development built BECAUSE of the grand parkway or the Westpark tollway - before they were built the areas made no sense to live in (too far away) but now with the new road development makes sense.

 

the tl;dr is mainly its a complicated theory, but that at it's core expanding a freeway to accommodate growth will often accelerate the growth of the traffic, and can outpace the additional capacity.

I agree--it's not total fiction dreamed up by anti-freeway activists but it's far from the simplistic "more capacity = more congestion" tale that people like Slick like to peddle.

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Induced demand at the core isn't simply new freeways lead to congestion - it is the union of two ideas:

- The previously congested freeway made people avoid certain trips or take less desirable routes; with the addition of the new capacity on the freeway those trips can now be taken using that freeway

 

For example, people who were taking a parallel street to I-10 would move their trip on to I-10 to save 5 minutes.  Another example of this is someone who was shopping at a suburban mall because going to the Galleria took to long; with the increased capacity they feel like going to the Galleria is closer in time so they go there instead.

 

- The new capacity of the freeway attracts people to move along it, adding to the growth of the area in a different pattern than before the freeway.

 

This one is more for bypass loops that become congested (think West beltway) but can also hold for expanding radial freeways.  Because you can go faster on the road, the 30-40 minute commute distance becomes a longer mileage, encouraging more sprawling development.  An example of this would be a new development built BECAUSE of the grand parkway or the Westpark tollway - before they were built the areas made no sense to live in (too far away) but now with the new road development makes sense.

 

the tl;dr is mainly its a complicated theory, but that at it's core expanding a freeway to accommodate growth will often accelerate the growth of the traffic, and can outpace the additional capacity.

 

So...  for the first part, the improved or new freeway reduces congestion on the alternative routes and increases traffic on the new/widened freeway.  Yeah, that's pretty much why we build new freeways and widen freeways.  Seems like an unalloyed good result.  Improved mobility.

 

For the second part, sure, new freeways will alter development patterns compared to if there were no freeways.  So what?  The same can be said for any infrastructure development. And without economic and population growth, there will not be traffic growth and there will not be congestion on the new/expanded freeways.

 

 

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So...  for the first part, the improved or new freeway reduces congestion on the alternative routes and increases traffic on the new/widened freeway.  Yeah, that's pretty much why we build new freeways and widen freeways.  Seems like an unalloyed good result.  Improved mobility.

 

For the second part, sure, new freeways will alter development patterns compared to if there were no freeways.  So what?  The same can be said for any infrastructure development. And without economic and population growth, there will not be traffic growth and there will not be congestion on the new/expanded freeways.

 

That is why if a freeway is congested, it is a good thing to widen freeways.  However, the growth curve is steeper than what you can do for freeway widening (its just a geometry thing - a freeway is a long line, while it serves an area) so alternates to freeway travel (car pooling, park & ride buses, and commuter rail) help to slow down the traffic growth while keeping or further accelerating the development growth.

 

Once a freeway is congested again, adding alternatives doesn't relieve traffic any - it just encourages more (though slower) growth.  

 

The main issue is planners need to look at traffic growth, development growth, widening roads, and mass transit options when planning out growth and fixing congestion issues.  Focussing only traffic growth and widening roads is where you get into an issue of continuing to need to widen freeways.

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False. Anyone who says that the widening of the Katy Freeway did not do anything to alleviate congestion, or more to the point, provide improved mobility for thousands of people every day is either flat-out lying or utterly ignorant. It did not become re-congested because thousands of people every day decided, "oh, hey, there's a nice wide freeway out there, let's go for a drive." It became re-congested mostly because we've added another 2 million or more people since the project started.

Using the logic of the "induced demand" theory, -- we should not have added additional rail cars to serve the redline when the original cars became overcrowded at certain times of day. If we add more rail cars, more people will just use the rail line and it might become crowded again. Maybe we should remove some cars and force people to take alternative forms of transportation or ride on the bus -- We should not add gates at Bush Intercontinental. In fact, I guess we should eliminate some gates and force people to take alternative forms of transportation. More airport capacity encourages more people to fly, thus zero effect on congestion. -- We should not expand the container port at the port of Houston; that will just encourage more people to ship things and the container facilities will just get congested again.

There are many examples of freeway segments closing and no real effects on traffic, (pierce elevated) people simply take alternative routes. And comparing the red line is hilarious. A lot more people fit into one rail car than any automobile. Unfortunately wider freeways simply encourage more driving, especially in a town where for the most part the field is rigged to make driving the only option. You're seeing things from a Houston only perspective.

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How do I have an improper understanding of the induced demand theory? (I disagree that adding rail cars is not a proper comparison, but for argument's sake leave that example aside.)

I just think you weren't using the theorem correctly, which is why I used the second example. Your first example would be a solution to the issue of increased demand right? Combining multiple automobiles together into one SuperCar would take off some cars and would add one bigger car, that would allow multiple passengers to occupy one singular car.

Now, why does that sound so familiar... ;)

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Freeways are not a panacea, ever bigger freeways even less so.  There are a number of examples where getting rid of a freeway entirely actually improved accessibility.  (link)

 

There was a rebuttal on the now-defunct Keep Houston Houston that almost all "freeway removal projects", at least in the United States were at least one of the following:

 

A) Partially built highways that ended up being underused spurs (or at least the underused spur part)

B) Pre-Interstate parkways functionally replaced years prior

C) Pre-Interstate highways replaced with a newer, modern counterpart

 

That covers ALL of the United States "freeways" listed. The discussion was in reference to the Alaskan Way Viaduct which would be dealt with as "C". Any comparisons to Houston won't work, especially not South Korea, because the things we don't know about the freeway (Google Earth seems to indicate traffic already favored surface streets, unknown integrity, etc. etc.)

 

The South Korea example just gives anti-freeway activists ammunition to advocate similar ideas in the United States even if it's in completely different situations. I bet that after a year of open carry in Texas, there's going to be a certain group of people that are going to latch onto a disparate piece of data and claim that it's proof positive that open carry lowers crime, and keep insisting on that after people poke holes in the theory. 

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The Embarcadero Freeway was hardly a little used spur.  Sure, it never got built all the way around to the Golden Gate (Lord knows what a sclerotic cluster* it would have been if it had), but from the Bay Bridge to Chinatown it carried 100,000 cars a day.  Ditto Central (the remainder of which is still pretty crowded). Having not sat on the others, I can't speak to them from my own knowledge.

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The Embarcadero Freeway was hardly a little used spur.  Sure, it never got built all the way around to the Golden Gate (Lord knows what a sclerotic cluster* it would have been if it had), but from the Bay Bridge to Chinatown it carried 100,000 cars a day.  Ditto Central (the remainder of which is still pretty crowded). Having not sat on the others, I can't speak to them from my own knowledge.

 

Ah yes, another thing I didn't mention was that both of those freeways were heavily damaged in the 1989 earthquake. Their particular construction made them very susceptible to earthquake-prone California, and the emergency repairs afterward made them partially unusable (they couldn't carry as much traffic as they used to). It was the earthquake that really caused CalTrans to lean (pun not intended) to tear the freeways down rather than repair or replace them. The part of Central that WASN'T torn down was completely rebuilt anyway to modern standards (as Google Earth images show).

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The Embarcadero Freeway was hardly a little used spur.  Sure, it never got built all the way around to the Golden Gate (Lord knows what a sclerotic cluster* it would have been if it had), but from the Bay Bridge to Chinatown it carried 100,000 cars a day.  Ditto Central (the remainder of which is still pretty crowded). Having not sat on the others, I can't speak to them from my own knowledge.

 

that's as may be, but it wasn't an interstate highway intended to not just get people to a specific local location, but as a bypass of the local locations.

 

It would be like getting rid of spur 527.

 

Or once they realign 45 along 59/10 not building the spur for getting people from 10 and 45 to the south of the bayou on the west side of town (whatever they call that spur, just not make it).

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(***sigh...***) I suppose that begs the question "when is a divided multi lane limited access and perhaps even grade separated road designed with the intention to move a bunch of vehicles at high speed" not a freeway...

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I'm not taking a side here, I just see a difference between a freeway that is intended as a way to pass through a destination area, and a freeway that is a way to get to destinations.

 

i45 (no matter the alignment, current, or future) is a way to bypass downtown.

 

527 as a spur is a way to get into downtown from a freeway that bypasses downtown.

 

they're both part of the freeway system in that they bypass intersections and street lights.

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I'm actually fine with this.  Getting better lighting underneath and putting some lipstick on that pig is likely to give at least the perception of greater safety.  Plants and screens can help with noise abatement.  And why should it be a given that if we're going to have a freeway in some place that it has to be ugly?

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Terrible article but no surprise coming from someone known as anti-rail

Houston needs to get past the driving only mentality but it won't as long as powerful lobbies have the ears of local politicians

Beyond that the article is full of lies. Los Angeles, Denver, and Phoenix are actually investing more in rail expansions and LA actually wants to accelerate the process and convert BRT to rail as well.

Saying autonomous taxi will replace public transit is laughable and the biggest irony is the quote that says vehicles that carry more people take vehicles off the road. That's pretty much the definition of rail transit.

Edited by Slick Vik
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A regular taxi can be manky enough even with a driver.  Has anyone come up with an idea for how to make the self driving car self cleaning as well?  Until that happens, taxis with someone on board to notice when a passenger has been... (**ahem**) untidy are going to have their place.

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Terrible article but no surprise coming from someone known as anti-rail

Houston needs to get past the driving only mentality but it won't as long as powerful lobbies have the ears of local politicians

Beyond that the article is full of lies. Los Angeles, Denver, and Phoenix are actually investing more in rail expansions and LA actually wants to accelerate the process and convert BRT to rail as well.

Saying autonomous taxi will replace public transit is laughable and the biggest irony is the quote that says vehicles that carry more people take vehicles off the road. That's pretty much the definition of rail transit.

 

It's a bit optimistic, but the article's not full of lies (uh, Citylab, on the other hand has lots of inaccuracies). Of course L.A., Denver, and the rest are investing in rail. That doesn't mean that it's a good idea or it will pay off the long run, and that's true for just about anything, I don't know, a movie with a $100 million budget and one of the most bankable stars at the time? What could go wrong?

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A regular taxi can be manky enough even with a driver.  Has anyone come up with an idea for how to make the self driving car self cleaning as well?  Until that happens, taxis with someone on board to notice when a passenger has been... (**ahem**) untidy are going to have their place.

 

yeah, and not to mention, when I sign up to have the car service come pick me up, I am not signing up to go stop at 3 other people's houses and pick them up as well. 4-letter-word-starting-with-F that.

 

or maybe I'm not the first person being picked up, but the last one, so now 3 other people are pulling up to my driveway, they see when I leave for work every day, and they see how nice I dress. F that too.

 

obviously, the solution is for people to go to a central location to get in this 4 person conveyance. that's not convenient, so F that.

 

So much headache for this driverless customized SUV, I'm just going to drive my car.

 

Personally, my money is on the driverless taxi for one person being used for short distances. say to get someone from their house to a train station. and then from the train station to their office, maybe a bus to within a block or two of the office.

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I accidentally did an uber ride share when I landed at SFO. It added 40 minutes to the drive, as the person I shared it with was staying on the west side of town and I was Downtown.

Cut the ride cost in half but I made sure to check what I was requesting the next time. I don't think they've added that feature to the Houston market yet. Would be nice if you were sharing the ride with someone you know, with multiple pick-up locations (let's go to the club).

Wasn't a bad experience, just added time.

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I accidentally did an uber ride share when I landed at SFO. It added 40 minutes to the drive, as the person I shared it with was staying on the west side of town and I was Downtown.

Cut the ride cost in half but I made sure to check what I was requesting the next time. I don't think they've added that feature to the Houston market yet. Would be nice if you were sharing the ride with someone you know, with multiple pick-up locations (let's go to the club).

Wasn't a bad experience, just added time.

 

You can split fares really easily with uber...

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I hope this is a good spot for this. Just wanted to pass this along to those who might be interested in seeing this.

 
 
 
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