Centralized routing scheme could relieve traffic congestion

IEEE Spectrum : Sometimes the road less traveled is the best way to go—even if it takes a little longer. That is the finding of a recent study that analyzed rush-hour traffic in five major cities: Boston, San Francisco, Rio de Janeiro, and the Portuguese cities of Lisbon and Porto. Major traffic jams, the researchers found, occur because most people, and most GPS units, generally choose the shortest, fastest route to a given destination. That congestion can be relieved, they say, by drivers choosing alternate routes, which may add a few minutes to their own travel times but reduce collective travel times overall. Because such an optimized routing system would require a great deal of coordination and willingness on the part of some drivers to slightly inconvenience themselves for the benefit of others, it is unlikely to be implemented any time soon. However, it could work well for a fleet of autonomous cars connected to a central routing network.