Traffic experiments: a cure for waves and jams (improves other people's MPG too)
 

This isn't specifically about fuel economy, but it applies.

This guy has written about "standing waves" in traffic, and how a driver either contributes to them, or (as he suggests) can help reduce them.

First off: here's a standing traffic wave, nicely illustrated (You should see an animated gif). We see this all the time:

http://amasci.com/amateur/traffic/swave1.gif

Now his interest is generally about smoothing things out, but removing this wave (if you could) would also have the effect of collectively saving a lot of fuel by reducing herd mentality braking/accelerating around the wave.

He suggests, when you spot a standing wave ahead of you (well ahead), opening up a large gap in front by reducing your speed. When the leading edge of your gap reaches the last car in the standing wave, the wave begins to shrink (cars are still accelerating away from the front of the wave). Ideally, your car reaches the wave area just as the last car accelerates away, and you didn't have to brake to a stop (neither did anyone behind you).

Lots more: http://amasci.com/amateur/traffic/trafexp.html

I do this already, as part of hypermiling techniques.

The first initial acceleration I do is usually quick, then I coast. I try and time it so that I should still have some forward velocity by the time the next car starts accelerating, or if the next car will be stopped, by reaching zero velocity by the time I reach that car.

Sometimes I feel like making a flashing red LED sign saying "Red Light/Stopped Traffic Ahead!" to put on the back of my car for the people who insist on honking or extreme tailgating.

I know what you're saying.

The angriest driver I've ever seen was a guy behind me in a truck while I was coasting up to a red light. He was literally screaming at me and gesticulating through his windshield - yet there was nowhere else he could have gone, except to this red light.

Fortunately that's only happened once to me - oh, and it was in Toronto (I generally don't see road rage around here).

Crazy torontulas!

Like newton, I do this already, as part of my ecodriving routine. Really helpful in ~30mph traffic on the highway.

Great site.... I actually had a somewhat lengthy discussion with my roommate last week about simulating traffic... Traffic is a chaotic system (small input changes yield large output changes) - and is rather difficult to model solely because it's chaotic..... It will likely never happen - it was just fun to brainstorm :) If anyone wants to -do let me know :D

Have you seen the site that has the adjustable traffic flow simulation? I'm thinking it's a Java app. Oval track. (If you have, you'll know what I'm talking about.)

I love that site. They should do PSA on this traffic stuff. Here's some more applett that are good.

That's the one! Thanks for posting the link.

I often do this flattening out the wave when I'm on my way home from work. Its difficult in the heavier traffic near the plant. So many people especially in automatic cars see the guy in front move forward slightly and then they let off the brakes too and nudge forward usually 5 feet and then put on their brakes again. These annoying mini waves drive me nuts because I refuse to put my car in gear to move forward a couple feet. Sometimes then when the person in front of me actually starts moving and I start to move, if I don't gun it someone from the next lane jumps in. Sometimes its just not worth the bother. What do you guys generally do in heavier traffic?

Luckily, I don't drive in heavy traffic all that often. But driving a manual shift in genuine stop, wait & crawl situations, where even the "accordion method" can't work, I also won't move the car every time the guy in front of me moves a few feet. But I won't gun it to prevent someone from sneaking in front of me either, despite the reptilian part of my brain screaming at me to stand on the go pedal.

Is this a daily experience for you? If it were for me, I'd be wondering about shifting the departure time a little bit. Sometimes just a short delay can make a big difference if you can avoid the volume peak.

Thanks. I suppose I could wait a say 10 minutes. However if I do, I will still have to go through a succession of 5 stoplights to get to the highway. I do stay once in a while, I'm just in too much of a hurry to get home to wait around. It seems if I get on the road as early as possible I'm not bad off but if I'm in the middle or near the end I might as well just wait. I'd guess that there's 350+ cars at my plant, and there's another plant just up the road thats larger. Sometimes I really hate working in a factory.
I guess I'm doing the best I can at this point in traffic. Not much else I can do.

Yep, this will happen. On any given run, there will be numerous cars zipping in front of me during the bumper-to-bumper sections, just as there will be numerous cars passing me on the highway.

That's where I'd really love the "Why race to red lights?" bumper sticker. I'll have to get some made up. I know when I used to do this (back before I made the logical connection between heating up brake pads and lack of fuel economy), I'd feel really stupid and guilty when they'd pull up behind me at a red light.

The thing is, in bumper-to-bumper, the gain you get by driving like a 17 year old male is minimal. Literally, every car that passes you is only 15 feet in front of you, max. If they make it through a red light and you don't, you usually end up just behind them while they are waiting at the next red light.

On the highway, going 80kph or so does result in reaching the destination appreciably slower. However, we must remember that we are saving after-tax money, so a comparison with what your wage is will require adjustment. Depending on how much you are earning and what you are driving, driving slower has the very real possibility of approaching your pay rate. Think of it as a form of overtime.

But yes, driving slower than traffic does take some getting used to, but after a while you can get so obsessed with not wasting fuel that your priorities change. Especially after you start pulse and gliding, and seeing how much longer the glides go at lower speeds.

Your lucky! The one I remember best is when I was braking for a light about to go red, the yellow was very stale and I knew it was about to change, when I heard the screeching of tires behind me. This idiot, no kinder way to to put it, changed lanes into the left turn lane and blew through what was then a red light.:eek::confused: As this was the morning commute it could hardly be blamed on work stress or rushing home, so could only be some form of lunacy.

Many years ago I had to take a drivers re-training course in order to keep my license.
One thing the instructor said that I have carried with me for these 17 odd years.
"Why race to be last in line at the next stoplight, when you can be first in line at this one?"
Just thought I'd throw that in the mix.
S.