Have you noticed increased traffic through your neighborhood? Starting to notice a lot more cars on streets that were once not used very much? The culprit is Traffic apps. These apps are being created to show drivers alternate routes. One such app is the Waze app. Waze looks at all roads the same whether they are designed to accommodate large amounts of traffic or not. It is a community based app that works by tracking all drivers who have the app activated. It then uses real time data to tell drivers the fastest or shortest route. It looks at the time it took all drivers to get to an area then analyzes what route got them there in the shortest amount of time. This has become a big problem for a lot of communities that are now experiencing a large influx of traffic cutting through their neighborhoods. If you live on a quiet street that happens to connect major roads together, you now may have I-25 in your front yard. Below are two very interesting articles on how Traffic apps works and what type of issues they are causing in the community. How Waze works: https://support.google.com/waze/answer/6078702?hl=en How traffic apps are counterproductive for Community Planners: http://www.9news.com/ext/news/nation-now/waze-and-other-traffic-dodging-apps-prompt-cities-to-game-the-algorithms/73/nationnow/1acLsU98bEiUyaQWYgaaEa -Andrew Doll
Andrew Doll