Quote:
Originally Posted by jmecklenborg
It would just induce demand. As soon as, say, 10% of New England-bound traffic is pulled off the Throgs Neck Bridge, people who currently hesitate to use that route for non-critical local travel will start using it. It'll go right back to how it was.
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I would like to see a study figure out exactly how much traffic was induced that created demand that never existed prior to the freeway being widened. I suspect such a study would reveal that the numbers are insignificant. If someone wanted to eat and chose to travel somewhere because that freeway was recently widened, is that induced demand or latent demand? The demand already existed as the person needed to eat. That person is now given more options and the business that saw his money now profits from it as a result of a widened freeway. Convince me and many others as to why that is a bad thing.
Almost every study I've seen that screams "induce demand" only looks at the exact project area where the freeway was widened, doesn't take into account traffic that shifted from surface streets to the freeway, doesn't take into account commuters that shifted from other corridors that were longer and indirect to the newly widened corridor, and doesn't take into account latent demand.