Paul Salmon, University of the Sunshine Coast e Gemma Read, University of the Sunshine Coast
Collisions at intersections between motor vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians cause many deaths and injuries. Design that considers how each group approaches intersections improves everyone’s safety.
The settings on traffic lights make pedestrians wait longer by giving higher priority to vehicle traffic.
Abaconda Management Group/Wikimedia
Everyone doesn’t simply wait their turn at traffic lights. Signals are set up to enable a ‘green wave’ for cars and adjust to heavy traffic, making walkers wait longer no matter how many there are.
Whether it’s birds in a flock or drivers in traffic, agent-based modelling can describe complex phenomena by applying a simple set of rules to each individual’s behaviour.
Barry Sweet/EPA
Yohan Kim, University of Technology Sydney; Jay Falletta, University of Technology Sydney e Scott Kelly, University of Technology Sydney
By identifying and applying the key rules governing the behaviour of each individual, agent-based modelling offers insights into complex phenomena like traffic jams and flocking.
What algorithm turned these lights red?
monticello/Shutterstock.com
New research has uncovered a previously unknown weakness in smart city systems: devices that trust each other. That could lead to some pretty terrible traffic, among other problems.
Decisions made by engineers today will determine how all cars drive.
Grendelkhan
By expanding our understanding of streets and enhancing their design, every street corner could become a space to socialise, to exercise, to play, or to trade.
The congestion charge has helped to ease traffic and raise funds. But the rise of Uber and other private hire vehicles have raised unforeseen challenges.
Cars sit in flood water from Boston Harbor on Long Wharf during a coastal storm on Jan. 4, 2018.
AP Photo/Michael Dwyer
They don’t all support the same strategies for coping with it, but US mayors increasingly see climate change as a pressing urban challenge.
Much of the traffic using Sydney’s Anzac Bridge and, in the distance, Harbour Bridge is travelling through the city centre, not to it or from it.
Rob Roggema
One potential benefit of WestConnex, which remains untouched, is that it could relieve Sydney’s city centre from cars and make it more pedestrian-friendly.
In cities and countries around the world, drivers use a range of hand signals to communicate with other drivers.
Lightspring/Shutterstock.com
A sociolinguist wonders if they’ll ever be able to interpret the waves, high beams and middle fingers of human drivers.
Reforming how drivers pay for the costs of their road use can help keep traffic flowing, which is just one of the potential benefits.
Holli/Shutterstock
Traffic congestion is the main cost that cars create when they use existing roads. Road use charges are a more efficient and fairer way to cover the cost and help ensure traffic flows.
A trial of 1,400 drivers across Melbourne suggests time-of-use charges can be effective in easing traffic congestion.
AMPG/Shutterstock
A city-wide experiment suggests well-designed road use charges could ease congestion by encouraging people to drive at different times, take other routes or use other transport.
Riders on San Francisco’s Muni light rail system.
David Lytle
Junfeng Jiao, The University of Texas at Austin; Juan Miró, The University of Texas at Austin e Nicole McGrath, The University of Texas at Austin
Millions of Americans rely on public transit to get to school, work or stores, but many can’t get the service they need. ‘Uberizing’ transit by offering more options on demand could fill the gaps.
Under the El tracks, downtown Chicago.
Franck Michel
New research shows that noise pollution in US cities is concentrated in poor and minority communities. Beyond regulating airplane noise, the US has done relatively little to curb noise pollution.
Traffic congestion is concentrated along particular routes, such as the Eastern Freeway/Hoddle Street corridor in Melbourne.
Julian Smith/AAP
As the latest controversy about tunnel exhaust stacks and respiratory health plays out in the media, some community members are proposing solutions that just don’t make sense.
A red fox listening for prey under the snow in Yellowstone National Park. Noise can affect foxes and other animals that rely on their hearing when they hunt.
Neal Herbert/NPS
A recent study finds that noise from human activities is intruding into many parks and other protected areas. Creating quiet zones and noise corridors can help reduce impacts from noise pollution.
Part of a shipment of 33 rhino horns seized by Hong Kong customs, originated from Cape Town, South Africa.
Bobby Yip /Reuters