I’ve spent much of the long weekend finally making some progress into getting through the big pile of books that currently sits on my bedside table. Getting out of Auckland for a couple of days and not taking your computer is a pretty good way to make that happen! I managed to finish off “Still Stuck in Traffic” by Anthony Downs (I will post more on that rather interesting book in the future) and I have also managed to read most of the excellent “Green Metropolis: Why Living Smaller, Living Closer, and Driving Less are the Keys to Sustainability” by David Owen.
The main argument of Green Metropolis is that the most environmentally friendly urban environment in the USA is Manhattan, because of its exceptionally high population densities – which means that people live in small houses, don’t own cars and simply don’t buy as much crap as people elsewhere – even though it is one of the more well-off parts of the whole USA. The book is very interesting in turning around the idea that to be green you should go and live on a lifestyle block, have a big vegetable garden and a few animals that give you milk, eggs and so forth.
In terms of talking about traffic congestion, the book makes some interesting points:
To most people, traffic congestion looks like an ecological disaster. And it is one, but not for the reasons that people assume. Here’s why: Traffic jams are not an environmental problem; they are a driving problem. If reducing congestion merely makes life easier for those who drive, then the improved traffic flow actually increases the environmental damage done by cars by raising overall traffic, encouraging sprawl and long car commuters, and reducing the disincentives that make driver think twice about getting into their cars. Traffic jams are actually beneficial, environmentally, if they reduce the willingness of drivers to driver and, in doing so, turn car pools, buses, trains, bicycles, walking, and urban apartments into attractive options. Treating congestion, rather than driving, as an environmental issue often leads to transportation policies that, from an environmental point of view, are flawed. Almost always, when traffic engineers and other talk about reducing congestion what they are really talking about is making traffic flow more efficiently, and that means increasing the overall volume of cars – an obvious environmental negative.
I am always extremely sceptical when I see environmental benefits being “sold” as a reason to build a particular motorway, or widen a particular road. While an ‘improved’ road might make one particular vehicle emit less per kilometre it travels (because the engine isn’t stop-starting all the time), roads with less congestion encourage people to drive further, more often and – in the longer term – encourage more sprawled and unsustainable land-use patterns.
If we couple this idea, that reducing congestion may actually be bad for the environment, with my recent post which asked whether we can actually fix congestion, it really reconfirms to me that when we’re looking at “the transport problem” we really need to think carefully about how we define that problem – so that we ask the right questions. If “how do we fix congestion?” isn’t the question, then what is? Is the question: “how can we improve accessibility, so people can move around the city easier?” or is it “what kind of transport system would help create a more sustainable city?”, or is it “what kind of transport system will help make the city operate most effectively and efficiently?” We probably do want to ask all those different questions, rather than just assuming that “fixing congestion” will actually help achieve those goals – when in actual fact it might do the opposite, or at the very least be nigh on impossible to achieve.
Ultimately, as both Anthony Downs and David Owen explain (and they come at the issue from very very different perspectives) congestion isn’t necessarily a sign of the transport system failing, but rather it’s a message that you really shouldn’t be driving at this time, on this road. In many ways, it’s a very useful incentive for people to utilise the transport system more efficiently, by switching route, time of travel or mode of travel – and in the longer run a very useful tool in encouraging more sustainable land-use patterns.
Name me one single city, anywhere in the world, that doesn’t suffer from congestion.
Just one!
Congestion is absolutely 100 % an inevitable feature of cities. We can never, ever ‘fix’ it other than by removing the desire/need to travel. By trying to build our way out of it all we do is re-distribute our traffic jams. Temporarily. Perhaps the best we can hope for is to find a more favourable distribution of traffic jams (whatever that is!).
Is “suffer” the right word though? Should we be more neutral and say “experience”, or even “enjoy” if we’re being a bit cheeky. The point being that congestion has some benefits, as long as alternatives exist.
Fixing congestion by just building more road capacity alone has always been a futile exercise in major urban areas. Frankly it almost seems like a cargo cult. If we just build a bit more, and a bit more, we will reach congestion free roading nirvana…
Zurich I understand did phase its traffic signals so they distribute traffic congestion evenly, rather than bunch it all up at specific bottle necks. In combination with good dedicated PT corridors, and traffic priority, that appears to support some of the highest PT usage stats in the world.
Of course playing devils advocate, saying that traffic congestion alone is good for managing demand is like saying the Soviet system of allowing people to queue for loo rolls was a good way of saving trees by reducing toilet paper usage.
It might achieve the desired end but you will never sell it as a good thing to the poor schmuck stuck in that queue.
And as long as there is a significant number of people stuck in traffic congestion feeling they have no alternative there is a political base for every crazy call to spend yet more billions on more roads without addressing the underlying drivers of that travel demand.
Imagine someone saying it is ok to wait for an allowance of electricity, or to be on hold waiting for a phone line, or that it is a good thing for shops to be empty of food and you need to arrive for a short window to get what you want? How about if a train or bus comes along but people queue up to get on it, and have to wait for the second or third one? (yes that happens in some cities).
Congestion is not a good thing, it is a grossly inefficient use of an asset. A road exists to enable transport to operate at speeds higher than can be achieved by pedestrians or cyclists otherwise it shouldn’t be there.
There is no excuse for regular chronic traffic congestion in the 21st century, the reason it exists is political, not technological.