Liberty is in “near” anarchy, : as related to traffic.
Liberty is in “near” anarchy, part 1 : as related to traffic.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=removing-roads-and-traffic-lights
The price of anarchy is a measure of the inefficiency caused by selfish drivers. Analyzing a commute from Harvard Square to Boston Common, the researchers found that the price can be high—selfish drivers typically waste 30 percent more time than they would under socially optimal conditions.
The solution hinges on Braesss paradox, Gastner says. Because selfish drivers optimize a wrong function, they can be led to a better solution if you remove some of the network links, he explains. Why? In part because closing roads makes it more difficult for individual drivers to choose the best (and most selfish) route. In the Boston example, Gastners team found that six possible road closures, including parts of Charles and Main streets, would reduce the delay under the selfish-driving scenario. (The street closures would not slow drivers if they were behaving unselfishly.)
Another kind of anarchy could actually speed travel as well—namely, a counterintuitive traffic design strategy known as shared streets. The practice encourages driver anarchy by removing traffic lights, street markings, and boundaries between the street and sidewalk. Studies conducted in northern Europe, where shared streets are common, point to improved safety and traffic flow.
The idea is that the absence of traffic regulation forces drivers to take more responsibility for their actions.
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The more uncomfortable the driver feels, the more he is forced to make eye contact on the street with pedestrians, other drivers and to intuitively go slower, explains Chris Conway, a city engineer with Montgomery, Ala. Last April the city converted a signalized downtown intersection into a European-style cobblestone plaza shared by cars, bikes and pedestrians—one of a handful of such projects that are springing up around the country.
Although encouraging vehicular chaos seems at odds with the ideas presented in the price of anarchy study, both strategies downplay the role of the individual driver in favor of improved outcomes for everyone. They also suggest a larger transportation niche for bicycles and pedestrians. As the Obama administration prepares to invest in the biggest public works project since the construction of the interstate highway system, the notion that fewer, more inclusive roads yield better results is especially timely.
Faster Streets with Less Parking
New strategies in parking management could also improve urban traffic flow, remarks Patrick Siegman, a principal with Nelson/Nygaard Consulting Associates in San Francisco, a transportation-planning firm. In a misguided effort to reduce congestion, planners in the 1950s required developers to provide a minimum number of free parking spaces—a strategy that completely ignored basic economics, Siegman says, referring to how lower prices
increase demand.
