Like our pet peeves discussion, I have some things where I see that there is a failure of society, but that we could do things better.
I'd love to hear any ideas, but one I have been thinking about lately is traffic.
It seems that we need a smarter traffic grid. Stoplights should be able to talk to each other. People remotely should be able to manually fix stoplights to allow for clearing of accidents etc. We should use traffic data for a smart grid to update on the fly.
Yesterday, a tanker blew up on I-95. It shut the highway down in both direction.
That means that all roads that run parallel to the highway are at about 10X their normal capacity.
A few things need to happen automatically. All of those timed lights need to accommodate for the sudden rush of traffic. Those East/West roads should wait at longer lights to allow for the parallel roads to move traffic off.
And there should be blockages in place to disallow ingress to the highway, where people are going to get turned away.
I feel like we have the technology to do this.
Depending on where you live this is already happening. The same technology that is reading your epass to decipher traffic times and patterns also is helping to manage lights. As well, turn lanes don't come on until someone pulls into lane because the loop sensors haven't been tripped. Each signal has a series of loops as you enter the intersection.These loops tell the signal how many cars are coming over a period of time. These loops can be cut in or under the final lift of asphalt so you may not see them.
In other places signals are on timers. That's why you sit at a red light with no one else coming. Drives me crazy as this is prevalent outside of Florida.
In the end the roads are only built to provide for X number of cars per hour. When that capacity is exceeded it's like a hurricane dumping water into a full pond. It's going to overflow.
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