Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us)

Author delves into how we behave as we motor on down the highway

By Dan Danbom, Special to the Rocky

Published August 14, 2008 at 7 p.m.

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Photo by The Rocky © 2002

Author Tom Vanderbilt says traffic is a living laboratory of human interaction, "a place thriving with subtle displays of implied power."

You probably have your own name for the drivers who ignore the merge signs - those who race up the lane that will end and rely on the kindness of those in the adjacent lane to allow them in. My name for these drivers is "morons."

But in the argot of the traffic engineer, they are "late mergers" (you, on the other hand, are an "early merger"), and their impact on overall traffic flow will surprise you: They're good for it.

But then, surprise is what Traffic is all about. It's a fascinating exploration of what happens not only when we drive - and driving is for the vast majority of us the most complicated and dangerous thing we do - but also how traffic engineers, physicists, psychologists, crash reconstructionists, statisticians and others try to understand what makes us do what we do in order to develop ways to improve it.

"Traffic is . . . a living laboratory of human interaction," writes author Tom Vanderbilt, "a place thriving with subtle displays of implied power."

For example, the mere fact that drivers know their cars have more safety features seems to make them take more risks. The anonymity of being encased in a car is a breeding ground for rudeness (lack of eye contact makes pedestrians more vulnerable to drivers). The demands that driving puts on our ability to pay attention and to make rational judgments are at the root of tens of thousands of deaths per year.

One of Vanderbilt's recurring themes is risk and how drivers calculate it. The people who study risk say that it isn't rocket science - it's far more complicated. How else to explain why we willingly accept daily the risk of an activity that costs the U.S. 40,000 lives a year, yet we completely changed our habits because of terrorist attacks that killed 3,000?

"We think large trucks are dangerous, but then we drive unsafely around them . . . We use hands-free cell phones to avoid risky dialing and then spend more time on risky calls . . . We buy SUVs because we think they're safer and then drive them in more dangerous ways."

Why do we take such risks? Vanderbilt cites English expert John Adams, who says our feelings about what risks we should fear are colored by several factors: Is something voluntary or not? Do we feel that something is in our control or beyond our control? What is the potential reward?

This explains the lack of outrage over highway carnage: Driving is voluntary, it's in our control, and there's a reward. "If we wanted dramatically safer roads overnight - virtually fatality- free - it wouldn't be that difficult. We could simply lower the speed limit to twenty miles per hour." More likely is the possibility that aliens will remotely rewire our brains.

As for traffic congestion, Vanderbilt shows how we could deal with that, too: Make parking more expensive. "Parking is the innocuous gateway drug to a full-blown traffic-abuse problem. One survey found that a third of cars entering lower Manhattan were headed to free or subsidized parking spots. If those spots were not free or subsidized, there would be fewer drivers during the morning rush hour," Vanderbilt writes.

The great thing about Traffic is that Vanderbilt assaults our assumptions and preconceptions at every, uh, turn. For example, he writes that:

* In study after study throughout the world, the majority of drivers say they are better than the average driver. That's a statistical impossibility known as "optimistic bias." No one knows why, although Vanderbilt speculates that such an attitude "might be the psychic crutch we need . . . (to do) the most dangerous thing most of us will ever do."

* If you drive a newer car, you have a better chance of damage and injury than if you drive an older car. Why? Because when people buy new cars, they drive them more than their old cars.

* Traffic reports are a waste of time because by the time drivers get the information, it's too late to do anything about it. This has to do with something called "latent demand," which describes traffic's ability to fill any alternative automatically in response to the first-choice route already being congested.

* Removing road signs makes roads safer than putting them up. Lack of road signs makes drivers warier and, therefore, more careful.

* Highways can handle more cars at 55 mph than 80 mph. Cars travel closer at 55, thereby filling up more of the road and making it more efficient (which explains why traffic engineers like "late mergers").

* Confusing roundabouts are safer than traditional intersections. It's that wariness again.

* Despite the fact that we're always coming up with new safety technologies (most notably the seat belt), the roads are no safer. One reason: We find new ways to distract ourselves - thank you, cell phones.

* Riding a bicycle on the sidewalk is more dangerous than riding it on the street because drivers don't expect a bicycle to appear on a sidewalk.

* And "When a situation feels dangerous to you, it's probably safer than you know; when a situation feels safe, that's precisely when you should feel on guard," Vanderbilt writes.

Traffic isn't perfect. Vanderbilt sometimes veers into the realm of the geeky, but just as you think he might lose you, he comes up with something else interesting or surprising.

Traffic changes the way you think about driving. For that reason alone, it deserves your attention.

Dan Danbom is a freelance writer living in Denver.

Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us)

* By Tom Vanderbilt. Alfred A. Knopf, $24.95.

* Grade: A-

Driven to get info

If you're looking for another route to this information, Vanderbilt also offers a blog about traffic at howwedrive.com.

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