Two Sitting Ducks Pining for the days when blogs were cutting edge

Traffic Waves

Like most people I imagine, I hate sitting in traffic jams. Especially here in Perth, drivers are particularly selfish and not that road aware. Peak hour is horrible. Traffic jams caused by too many cars with just one person in them.

Well, I've just come across a site that contains excellent scientific explanations of traffic jams, how they can be seen on a macro level as a scientific phenomenon, but most importantly, how a single person can have a positive effect on the entire flow of traffic.

In a nutshell, the key is to leave plenty of space between you and the car in front of you and actually encourage people to merge or cut in front of you. If that happens, fall back from that car and repeat the process. It will have a positive effect on the whole traffic flow and if you can keep a consistent speed without all the stop-start that so often happens in traffic.

It made for really interesting reading, so check it out [here](http://amasci.com/amateur/traffic/traffic1.html).