traffic
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Since the 1950s, California has been a global leader in efforts to limit and then eliminate emissions from motor vehicles. But with hazardous and choking air pollution in its major cities, not to mention traffic jams to rival any in the world, China may prove to be the Golden State's equal—and perhaps even surpass it in regulating vehicles and their operation. The latest foray is a long-term plan to impose a congestion charge on all vehicles entering the capital city of Beijing, possibly including a lottery to determine when those vehicles could legally be driven within the city. DON'T...
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Traffic Noise May Reduce Life Expectancy, Increase Strokes
A U.K. study suggests a connection between traffic noise and health issues.
Stephen Edelstein -
German State To Test City 'Eco Lane' For Cleanest Cars, Carpools
Carpool lanes have been an accepted part of the landscape in California for more than 40 years now. But they're less well-known in Europe, where bus lanes have taken priority instead--largely due to pervasive and well-accepted mass transit systems. But now Germany is planning to test the concept of...
John Voelcker -
Milan Pays Drivers To Leave Cars At Home, Take Public Transit
Traffic often finds its own balance: Cars will flow onto less-crowded roads, while drivers will avoid congested routes or--to some degree--change their driving habits and times. But there's a limit to this flexibility, given how many people now drive to their jobs or other commitments. That means...
John Voelcker -
How Do You Cut City Traffic, Pollution? Move Cars Underground
Figures vary year-by-year, but London constantly hovers near the top of Europe's most polluted cities. Like many of its European counterparts, it sprang up long before the car was invented, leaving little space for roads and the growing number of cars owned by its 8.3 million inhabitants. Pollution...
Antony Ingram -
Growth In Mass-Transit Usage Outpaces Increase In Miles Driven In U.S.
U.S. mass transit usage continues to grow, while car usage remains stagnant.
Stephen Edelstein -
The International Energy Agency's report "A Tale of Renewed Cities" predicts that global vehicle usage will increase sharply by 2050, with China leading the way.
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Best Time To Drive A Hybrid? When The Traffic Is Really Bad
Show us someone who actively enjoys getting stuck in heavy traffic and we'll show you someone with nothing better to do. But if you have little choice but to sit in that traffic on your way to work, a new study shows you'd be best off with a hybrid vehicle. You probably didn't need a study to tell...
Antony Ingram -
Parking Apps Proliferate, But Can They Solve The Problem Of Traffic Congestion?
Yesterday, we received a press release from a company called Pango, which makes an app that allows motorists to pay for on-street parking. (The company's demo video is embedded above.) If you live in a city of any size, this isn't especially newsworthy. Products like Pango have been rolling out for...
Richard Read -
Would You Pay $10 A Day To Cut Your Commute By 35 Minutes?
How much is your time worth? If you live in southern California and drive to work, the answer for some of you seems to be more than $17 an hour. That conclusion is drawn from data contained in an Infrastrurist interview with Jack Finn, the head of toll services for HTNB, an infrastructure firm that...
John Voelcker -
Video: Really Bad Prius Driver Slams Police Car, Then Tree
For all the grief Toyota Prius hybrid drivers get, you'd think they were some deranged combination of green storm troopers and mentally defective traffic impediments. But every now and then, a Prius driver does do something jaw-droppingly idiotic. Take, for instance, the unidentified (and possibly...
John Voelcker -
Can Smarter Red Lights Let Cars Drive Greener And Save Gas?
We've all driven through--or waited a long time at--intersections that have car-sensing traffic lights. Now Denso has modeled the next iterations of a "smart traffic light" system. It would use messaging between vehicles and the traffic-light controller to let the light make better decisions about...
John Voelcker -
Most automakers are focusing their efforts solely on reducing tailpipe emissions of their vehicle lineups through conventional methods such as more efficient engines, advanced catalysts and lighter cars. Attacking vehicle emissions from a different angle, Audi is developing a new traffic management system it has designed with several partners to its arsenal. Called Travolution, the system promises to improve traffic flow and thereby reduce time spent idling uselessly, improving emissions. Using modeling and optimization in the network-wide control of traffic lights, as well as an advanced...
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Saturday Selection: Stuff Sort-of-Relevant To Green Cars
We read a lot of stuff here to cover the world of green cars. No surprise there. But there's a lot we see that doesn't lend itself to a full article, though we hate to let it pass by altogether. So this is a new type of piece, one that brings together stuff that's sort-of-relevant to green cars...
John Voelcker -
Netherlands To Tax Miles Traveled, As Well As Gasoline
One problem with raising fuel efficiency is that unless total miles driven rises radically, receipts from gasoline taxes will fall over time. And that poses a major problem for the steady stream of revenue needed for road construction and repairs. Taxing vehicle miles traveled has been one proposed...
John Voelcker