Crafting Green Waves - Radical, efficient, cheap, effective ways to prevent congestion and reduce trip time.
Preventing congestion permits free flow for all, allows signal linking that reduces delay for the bus, is better than a bus lane, and the alternative of a bus lane seriously congests all other traffic without reason.
Having turn arrows at intersections wastes time for all traffic, creates unsafe driver challenges, and is better replaced by cross-overs before the intersection, that move the turns to service roads.
Free entry to congested roads manages demand by queue delay, yet does not prevent giving all traffic the choice of jumping the queue for a toll. Getting most people to jump the queue saves time and keeps the toll as low as possible. Traffic must be metered to remove congestion. A green wave will then travel at the speed limit.
A worked example shows massive increases in traffic capacity and trip speed, and increased safety.
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Aerial Podcars - Profitable, 4x faster, reliable, cheap urban transport, better service than cars.
Existing transport performance is insipid. Peak hour trips for cars only average 15kph, 23kph and 38kph, for the inner, middle and outer Melbourne areas. Delay cost is $22B. Externalities of transport systems are very serious. Attempts to improve existing transport systems are expensive but not effective.
Aerial podcars are the only mode with reasonable prospects of providing good urban transport and of seriously reducing the subsidies, the road toll, assaults, degraded amenity and emissions. They are four times faster than cars, pleasant, private, with personal seamless routes, extremely reliable, of high capacity, and profitable, yet priced less than other options.
