ATL has only 21st worst traffic in USA...LA first, Austin 4th (Atlanta: buy, schools)

[ElleKaye]

Originally Posted by J2rescue

It only assumes free flowing traffic is... well free flowing i.e. NOT congested. These are measured travel speeds, not assumptions and the baseline or "normal" is how long does it take to travel the I-285 corridor absent congestion. Anything above that normal is considered a delay.

Free flowing could only be considered typical if it was the normal commute flow. Free flowing is not typical here; congested is. How can you not understand that?

[erick295]

LOL! How has no one pointed this out?



What would happen to the cappuccino table setting and your spine if there was a terrible accident

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by ElleKaye

Free flowing could only be considered typical if it was the normal commute flow. Free flowing is not typical here; congested is. How can you not understand that?

No, you're confusing yourself. You should be asking... "how do I not understand that?"


You're making the false assumption they can't get their "reference speeds," because the highway never flows freely at all.

They can get free flowing data from any time.

At this moment...11pm on a Thur night... everything but Buford Highway seems to be free flowing:



So for example... Right now would be a good time to measure a baseline for free flowing traffic to compare congestion off of.... with the exception of Buford Highway.

So if a travel time is 10 minutes now and 25 minutes during the peak hour, then the delay is 15 minutes.

If you're argument was true... free flowing baseline can only come from a peak hour, that would cause problems with statistics in every city. Their measurement wouldn't be of intensity, but of consistency. That is not the case.

Now if your argument is traffic is -always- bad... that simply isn't true.

Our freeways are like road races during the off hours. Things seem to be moving well now.

Also, their morning peak hours are between 0600 and 1000. Our highways are not congested all 4 hours every day. They have the ability to become congested...yes, but they are not reliably congested all 4 hours every day of the week. There should be no problem getting a reference speed looking at large amounts of data.

[ElleKaye]

Erick295, what exactly made you think that typical commute meant free flowing? I think it would have been a much better baseline although I stated it differently, but I am also stating that is not what was used in the study.

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by ElleKaye

Erick295, what exactly made you think that typical commute meant free flowing? I think it would have been a much better baseline although I stated it differently, but I am also stating that is not what was used in the study.

I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you were referring to me and not erick

ummm... because I actually read the link you were referring to ?


This is a quote from the methodology page you posted.

"Road Segment Data

There are two key building blocks for the different analyses included in this report:

• Reference Speed (RS): An uncongested “free flow” speed is determined for each road segment using the INRIX Traffic Archive.
• Calculated Speed (CS): All archived speeds for each 15 minute period each day for each road segment is calculated for each month (e.g. Monday from 06:00 to 06:15 for April 2012) and a “calculated speed” for each time slot is established for each road segment. Thus, each segment has 672 corresponding calculated speed values – representing four 15 minute time windows for all 24 hours of each day times the seven days in a week.

"

It then goes on to say later

"INRIX Index (II): The INRIX Index represents the barometer of congestion intensity. For a road segment with no congestion, the INRIX Index would be zero. Each additional point in the INRIX Index represents a percentage point increase in the average travel time of a commute above free-flow conditions during peak hours"

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by erick295

LOL! How has no one pointed this out?



What would happen to the cappuccino table setting and your spine if there was a terrible accident

So I'm just thinking about this image....

You could actually put your office in your car and if you get stuck in traffic too long... you can still get all of your work done.

Maybe fold down the back seat to reveal a printer?

[ElleKaye]

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you were referring to me and not erick

ummm... because I actually read the link you were referring to ?


This is a quote from the methodology page you posted.

"Road Segment Data

There are two key building blocks for the different analyses included in this report:

• Reference Speed (RS): An uncongested “free flow” speed is determined for each road segment using the INRIX Traffic Archive.
• Calculated Speed (CS): All archived speeds for each 15 minute period each day for each road segment is calculated for each month (e.g. Monday from 06:00 to 06:15 for April 2012) and a “calculated speed” for each time slot is established for each road segment. Thus, each segment has 672 corresponding calculated speed values – representing four 15 minute time windows for all 24 hours of each day times the seven days in a week.

"

It then goes on to say later

"INRIX Index (II): The INRIX Index represents the barometer of congestion intensity. For a road segment with no congestion, the INRIX Index would be zero. Each additional point in the INRIX Index represents a percentage point increase in the average travel time of a commute above free-flow conditions during peak hours"

My bad on using the wrong name, but yes, I meant you.

To try to break it down in the least amount of words possible, INRIX conducts multiple analyses in which multiple factors are taken into account. Stating there are two does not make it so The ratings are based on typical traffic.

Does that mean they don't use the best case, free flow criteria for some? No. It also doesn't mean that they use the free flow for typical unless free flow is typical. Click a few more links on the site.

Even given these different analyses, the ranking was based on hours wasted in traffic, nothing you've posted indicates that free flow is typical or the baseline. for the hours wasted ranking system or one specific analysis.

While I posted only one link, I didn't start at that one because I needed further clarification since the explanations didn't make good sense. I wanted to find out more about how they came to the conclusions.

[jsvh]

Key things from this study and it's methodology:

The Atlanta traffic is not that bad, it is just that people are making the choice to live so far from their job in Atlanta.

I.E. Not that much time is not spent sitting in traffic. Time is spent because people are living so frickin' far away. It is their own fault.

[Parsec]

Originally Posted by ElleKaye

Aside from vacations and traveling for work, I don't have much experience with eaily NYC and Boston traffic. I do know that I find both less stressful than Atlanta, and I agree in that I think the congestion lasts longer. I'm not saying the rush hours may not be worse by whatever criteria in other areas, but that skews the results because the normal commute time is already a month of Sundays.

Ah, true. I just meant to compare the # of white collar desk jobs vs. jobs which require night shifts. Another thing I was thinking, Boston only has a couple major business districts: Boston-Cambridge-Waltham (all are same general area), so everyone has to travel in the same direction to get to work, either from the North, South or West. Also our highways are generally only 3 lanes each way with no room for expansion. I'm certain Atlanta has more cars as evidenced by the 7-digit license plates (MA is still hasn't run out of 6-digit plates) and wide highways.

[AnsleyPark]

Originally Posted by jsvh

Key things from this study and it's methodology:

The Atlanta traffic is not that bad, it is just that people are making the choice to live so far from their job in Atlanta.

I.E. Not that much time is not spent sitting in traffic. Time is spent because people are living so frickin' far away. It is their own fault.

My 40 minute drive from Midtown to Buckhead a few days ago at 1:30 would leave me to believe otherwise.