Subject: Re: 30 Years-No Speed Improvement

From: [email-masked] (Balaji Ramanathan)
Date: 29 Jun 1995 23:25:54 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (Michael Adams) writes:
|> Can anyone think of a technical field that has not improved its efficiency
|> in 30 years?  The only one I can think of is our highway system.  It is
|> hard to believe that in 1965 I could get from point A to point B as fast
|> or faster than today. 

	Your next sentence gives you the reason for the whole thing:  our
highway system is not a technical field anymore, it is more of an emotional
and political battlefield.

|> 
|> While the debate rages in Washington over raising the speed limit on
|> emotional issues, the question is what to do about a highway system that
|> has not improved at getting people more quickly to their destination in 30
|> years.

|> Michael Adams
|> -- 
|>                                              [email-masked]

-- 
----------------->8      Cut here for Signature!       8<---------------------
Balaji Ramanathan,                   | 
Institute of Transportation Studies, |         I don't believe in luck!
University of California, Irvine.    |              I RELY on it!!

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From: [email-masked] (Michael Adams)
Date: Thu, 29 Jun 1995 03:05:54 GMT

Can anyone think of a technical field that has not improved its efficiency
in 30 years?  The only one I can think of is our highway system.  It is
hard to believe that in 1965 I could get from point A to point B as fast
or faster than today. 

While the debate rages in Washington over raising the speed limit on
emotional issues, the question is what to do about a highway system that
has not improved at getting people more quickly to their destination in 30
years.  We need to improve highway speeds!  If that means doing more
research on highway or automobile design, then it should be done. 

We should set a national goal of improving highway speeds and developing 
technogies to keep safety high.

Michael Adams
-- 
                                             [email-masked]

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From: [email-masked] (Jason O'Rourke)
Date: 30 Jun 1995 00:05:19 GMT

>in 30 years?  The only one I can think of is our highway system.  It is

Hard to say if even that is true.  Hell of a lot more cars in California 
now.  So what's your point?

Jason O'Rourke

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From: [email-masked] (Thomas A. Russ)
Date: 30 Jun 95 09:38:28

In article <...> [email-masked] (Jason O'Rourke) writes:
 > now.

This is, in fact, an interesting point.  Part of the problem is in what
measure of "efficiency" one is interested in.  I would imagine that the
Michael Adams prefers to measure the transportation efficiency in terms
of the amount of time it takes for one completed trip.  I would imagine
that traffic engineers concentrate more on throughput, ie, the number of
vehicles carried per unit time.  Although these two measures can be
correlated, they are not necessarily so.

For example, if it were possible to double the number of cars carried
past a single point on the freeway by reducing the average travel speed
from 60 to 40mph, then you would be able to increase throughput while
also increasing average trip length.  By one measure this would be a
loss of "efficiency", but by the other it would be a gain.

Disclaimer:  I am not suggesting that such a scenario is reasonable from
a physics or traffic engineering point of view, I am just inventing a
scenario to illustrate that overall system efficiency and individual
efficiency are not necessarily the same.

--
Thomas A. Russ,  USC/Information Sciences Institute          [email-masked]

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From: [email-masked] (Richard Ottolini)
Date: 2 Jul 1995 15:45:36 GMT

Really?
There are many more cars than 30 years and the roads seem to work some
of the time.
In may places there networks of computerized sensors to tell the media
and the public the road conditions.  I can call up the current So CA
conditions on my screen now.
One of the more useful improvements about five years ago were tow vehicles
dedicated to So CA freeways.  Seems to clear up accidents faster.