Data shows Hybrids have no effect on HOV traffic
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Topic: Data shows Hybrids have no effect on HOV traffic
Posted By: Undisclosed
Subject: Data shows Hybrids have no effect on HOV traffic
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 3:09pm
My daughter goes to a school which makes the kids to a senior thesis. After hearing me complain so much about hybrids, she did a study with some classmates. They observed HOV traffic on 33 different days for three hours each day over the course of five months at different locations and calculated the number of HOV's which were using the lanes.
The result? Only 12% of the vehicles were hybrids. While that's not "no effect" on traffic, it is a pretty small effect. Considering how much I have complained about hybrids, I was amazed.
Maybe thinking there are a lot of hybrids is the same as thinking that the lane next to you in stop/go traffic is always moving faster.
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Replies:
Posted By: carleric
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 3:16pm
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Actually, if you told me we could pass a law to eliminate 12% of the traffic on HOV I would be ecstatic. I think 12% is a bigger number than you think.
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Posted By: sluDgE
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 3:39pm
From middle school math class ....
12% of A Lot = Still A Lot
Keep on sluggin'! [:)]
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Posted By: VA4ver
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 4:00pm
Cool project.
Would be interested to see how much traffic has increased OVERALL (in the main lanes and HOV). Then compare the 12% increase to that number.
I think you'll find that the hybrids aren't on the road at the same time (some days/times it feels like that's all you see) and thus are unfairly singled out for tormenting and condemnation.
(People gotta realize that at peak rush hour you aren't going to fly home to Woodridge or the outter realms of the metropolitan universe at 80 mph!)
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Posted By: dickboyd
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 5:48pm
quote:
Originally posted by Undisclosed
[br]My daughter goes to a school which makes the kids to a senior thesis. After hearing me complain so much about hybrids, she did a study with some classmates. They observed HOV traffic on 33 different days for three hours each day over the course of five months at different locations and calculated the number of HOV's which were using the lanes.
The result? Only 12% of the vehicles were hybrids. While that's not "no effect" on traffic, it is a pretty small effect. Considering how much I have complained about hybrids, I was amazed.
Maybe thinking there are a lot of hybrids is the same as thinking that the lane next to you in stop/go traffic is always moving faster.
Pareto's Principle
In 1906, Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto created a mathematical formula to describe the unequal distribution of wealth in his country, observing that twenty percent of the people owned eighty percent of the wealth.
Dr. Joseph Juran, working in the US in the 1930s and 40s recognized a universal principle he called the "vital few and trivial many" and reduced it to writing.
As a result, Dr. Juran's observation of the "vital few and trivial many", the principle that 20 percent of something always are responsible for 80 percent of the results, became known as Pareto's Principle or the 80/20 Rule.
Pareto's Principle, the 80/20 Rule, should serve as a daily reminder to focus 80 percent of your time and energy on the 20 percent of your work that is really important. Don't just "work smart", work smart on the right things.
Applied to traffic, Pareto's Principle says that one percent of the cars cause 99 percent of the congestion. Or as they say on the oasis, that was the straw that broke the camel's back.
Traffic flow is nonlinear. Sprecher's rule is linear. A little is good, more is better. Traffic flow is nonlinear. Politicians think linearly.
Traffic flow, in cars per hour, depends on the speed of individual cars in miles per hour and the density of cars in cars per mile. The product of speed and density is flow. What is tricky is that as density goes up, speed goes down. As cars get closer together, drivers slow down to compensate for the greater work load of scanning and making steering and speed change decisions.
For Shirley's reversible lanes, the target should be about 1,500 cars per lane per hour to maintain posted speeds of 65 MPH safely. That works out to about 220 feet per car, about 200 feet between cars. The road will look empty. Add one more car per lane and the speed slows. Ten miles back in the line, traffic comes to a standstill.
"Capacity", the greatest number of cars per lane per hour would be about 2,400 cars per lane per hour at about 45 MPH. One day in twenty will be breakdown congestion.
Watch the brake lights in the adjoining regular lanes. Do the brake lights come on at the same place, or is there a backward wave of brake lights?
The age of the student was not mentioned, but if they are high school seniors doing field studies, they should be aware of non-linearities and what causes them. Those 140 some drive alone clean fuel vehicles per lane are doing more harm in the reversible lanes than the relief they provide for the regular lanes.
Work it out. You can even use a sly drool, should the mood strike you.
Brought to you by Boyd's Blivets. Motto: We guarantee eight pounds in every five pound bag.
dickboyd@aol.com
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Posted By: sluDgE
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 6:37pm
To paraphrase an old Herman's Hermits hit.....
[:p] "He's a must to a-Boyd!" [:p]
Keep on sluggin'! [:)]
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Posted By: Baz
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 7:15pm
To paraphrase Mick Jagger:
Here comes the writer and his name is Boyd
He's got the script right in his hand
Talkin to the slugs
While he's checking out the band
His name isnt pretty
Not even the boils on his face
I feel like running
But there's no hiding place
Everybody getting high
High high high high high high
Boyds getting high
High high high high high high
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Posted By: MDC
Date Posted: 12 Jul 2005 at 8:51pm
I'm curious to know where she and her classmates did their "observation". If they went to a major commuter lot and counted the cars getting off there, the numbers would be very different than if they went to the Springfield, FSP, Lorton, Rte 1, or Dale City exits..
I suppose that the only "safe" place for students, or anyone, to do observation of traffic exiting HOV would be Horner Rd.
The number of Hybrids in HOV is easily 25%. Amazingly they only account for 5-6% of the people in HOV.
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Posted By: Luddite
Date Posted: 13 Jul 2005 at 8:40am
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What grade did they receive?
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Posted By: gmugrad
Date Posted: 13 Jul 2005 at 9:13am
Actually local studies show the number to be around 25%. This was done with traffic cameras and such.
I think a more interesting study would be how many hybrids are single riders.
Say that of that 25% 1/2 are single riders. That gives you about 12.5% of all hov cars with only one rider. If that was to stop then you could reduce that 12% to where 8% less cars on HOV
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Posted By: SpongeBob
Date Posted: 13 Jul 2005 at 9:14am
Right, MDC. At least one out of every four vehicles I see on HOV is a hybrid, and sometimes more. These results would indicate only one in eight is a hybrid. Anyone believe that?
I frankly do not buy this "study" at all. VDOT's study released last December was done by professionals, not children, and their numbers are published. They said 22% are hybrids.
What we have in the posting above is the unverified and unverifiable claim of an anonymous source, "Undisclosed" who has never posted at Slug-Lines.com before. If one is a skeptic, one would note that urban myths and lies are often sourced to children, who are presumably incorrupt. It deflects criticism.
To make a valid count of northbound traffic, one needs to monitor traffic just before the exit to the Beltway, and then also just north of the Duke St. entrance.
To make a valid count of southbound traffic one would need counters prior to the "open" entrance from the regular lanes and again just between the final entrance south of the Beltway and before the Lorton exit.
I seriously doubt the police would let a bunch of high school kids sit in any of these places day after day for three hours. They'd be arrested on suspicion of terrorism, if nothing else.
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Posted By: shahedC
Date Posted: 13 Jul 2005 at 10:07am
I think that 12% number is too low to be accurate. That 22% seems more like reality. Either way, imagine if you put 3 people (or dare I say it, 4 people?) into each of those cars... you'd be getting so many other cars off the road.
Don't say no to hybrids on HOV, just make them carry more people on board...
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Posted By: AveMaria
Date Posted: 13 Jul 2005 at 12:34pm
As I said alot of you folks are so quick to nibble at the controversial "bait" which is put out before you.
I totally agree with Sponge, as I often do. [8D]
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Posted By: Bob
Date Posted: 14 Jul 2005 at 8:56am
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If I had a son or daughter that wanted to do a paper on hybrids, the central chart in the paper would be a chart with years on the horizontal axis and number of hybrids on the vertical axis. This would show that the explosive growth of the past 3 years could not have been sustained for more than a couple of more years had nothing been done. The pro-hybrids never speak of the future on this. End of debate.
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Posted By: HybridDriver
Date Posted: 14 Jul 2005 at 9:41am
quote:
Originally posted by Bob
[br]If I had a son or daughter that wanted to do a paper on hybrids, the central chart in the paper would be a chart with years on the horizontal axis and number of hybrids on the vertical axis. This would show that the explosive growth of the past 3 years could not have been sustained for more than a couple of more years had nothing been done. The pro-hybrids never speak of the future on this. End of debate.
That's not really the scientific process. My parents never did my paper for me to further an agenda. [:0]
--------
2005 Honda Civic Hybrid
Funny, I've never been in a motorcycle only traffic jam!
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Posted By: NoSUV
Date Posted: 14 Jul 2005 at 2:21pm
Have to admit, if you charted the number of hybrids in the HOV lanes from 4 years to now, of COURSE you will have explosive growth! Same could be said for starting the charts for SUVs from before they were intoduced to 4 years later. Sheesh!
Problem has been and remains getting rid of the traffic jam in the regular lanes. Look to your right as you commute - and on the average, you can see that you are going at least 35 mph faster. In some spots, much faster, in others, barely faster, but the average is about 35 mph. And that's WITH the hybrids sharing the HOV lanes. Without the hybrids in the HOV, the problem is only exasperated. Just shouting that it would be nice if everybody slugged really doesn't solve the overall problem - but tolls will!
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Posted By: MDC
Date Posted: 14 Jul 2005 at 10:36pm
NoSUV,
How is it that the cars in the regular lanes are passing us if we're going 35mph faster? I'm sure you already know that toll lanes will make everyone slower than they are now since the number of carpools/HOV3 will be greatly reduced..
The faster the HOV lanes go, the more incentive for people to ride with others. It's so simple it's stupid, eh?
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Posted By: NoSUV
Date Posted: 15 Jul 2005 at 7:57am
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MDC, the obvious, and I do mean obvious, fault with your logic is the evidence you see every day to your right.
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Posted By: emancilla
Date Posted: 15 Jul 2005 at 10:11am
Just because the majority of people posting in this forum is anti-solo drivers(including Hybrids), and you got irritated by that, you are now a HOT supporter? Sheesh!
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Posted By: MDC
Date Posted: 15 Jul 2005 at 10:43am
NoSUV,
You are entirely wrong in your assessment. Less people carpooling means slower traffic in the non-toll and HOT lanes. Isn't that the simplest thing ever to understand?
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Posted By: 122582
Date Posted: 15 Jul 2005 at 10:53am
I heard the AAA report 17% of HOV traffic is Hybrid traffic. Interesting that the kids' observation is pretty accurate. Good job.
As I see it, driving daily, 15-20% is about right. Also there are probably 10-15% cheaters - you must only get a warning for your first offense.
The problem with traffic is not simply too many people driving on too few roads. There are just too many folks out here heading the same direction at once.
VRE is full, busses are full, van pools are full, metro is packed. Is it a surprise that even HOV is becoming packed?
It's only going to get worse, so instead of worrying about HOV/HOT/SOV/whatever, should we concentrate our energies on our local governments to attract business (real jobs, not retail) to our own little burgs? Stafford is trying.
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Posted By: SpongeBob
Date Posted: 15 Jul 2005 at 12:13pm
Never saw a study by AAA... was it of our HOV lanes? and didn't contaminate the numbers with I66 data? And shows the incredible rise in the number of CF-plated high-breds in Virginia?
VDOT's number was in the low-to-mid 20's as a percent of all traffic on the HOV lanes. That was last Novemberish when they did the tally.
Now, there isn't even a waiting list for high-breds anymore. Not sure why that is. Are people scared of losing the HOV in a year? Or is the number of people interested in them declining? Or have the manufacturers started sending more to the U.S.?
The woman who sits beside me at work walked into a dealership last Saturday and drove out in a new Civic high-bred. The salesman said, "No law for cars has ever been removed from the books," meaning the exemption will stand, in his opinion. She lives in Herndon and uses I66, not I95, so I forgive her (mostly.)
I no longer count high-breds on the HOV lanes, not individually. What I count now are the number of times that my vehicle is surrounded by high-breds.
If people would count bodies instead of vehicles, we'd be dealing with similar facts instead of dissimilar opinions.
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