[asdff]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Suugn-p5C1M

This is the natural response of tapping the brakes for any slowdown: people naturally over compensating and chain reactions happening behind them. This video shows how stop and go traffic forms and snowballs with no real impetus beyond mis estimated follow distance.

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What this video also shows is that if people pull off more or less at the same time and speed of the car in front then this is a complete non issue. Unfortunately most people are unable to watch a few cars ahead and be ready to pull of when the car in front does, and so we have this situation where each car takes around 5-10 seconds to pull away. multiply this by hundreds or thousands of cars and you end up with a phantom traffic jam.

I always pull away at the same speed as the car in front of me and maintain the same distance as when we were stopped. It is very easy to do and completely eliminates traffic build up if multiple people do it at the same time.

This is the same reason that we have amber lights on traffic lights, so that the drivers have time to get into gear and start pulling away so that when the light goes green they are imediately travelling through it, causing no excess traffic build up at the lights. Again unfortunately people dont concentrate when they are stopped at lights and so you have the situation where they see the light go green and then proceed to start changing into gear and remove the handbrake. By the time they are moving through the green light, they have already taken 10-20 seconds of green light time, eating well into the time alotted for cars to be travelling across the junction.

The only thing which will solve this is driverless cars, meaning that the cars can all talk to each other and move at the same time like a chain. I welcome this advancement to elimante human error in driving and get rid of traffic jams for good.