In terms of traffic, what causes the traffic in Los Angeles to be so bad??

Question

I drive a motorcycle and I realize that there is no reason for traffic when there are no accidents or broken cars on the freeway. So really there is no reason why people need to stop on the freeway which is actually illegal.

Answer 1

because people like to gawk at anything, and slow down just because there is something to look at other that the road.

Answer 2

At full speed, a lane can safely carry about 3000 cars past a given spot in an hour. When additional cars try to enter that lane, it causes the car behind it to slow down. The more cars that enter a lane that is over 3000 cars an hour, the slower it gets. Eventually, random statistical distribution will cause the lane to stop and start at random until enough cars get out of that lane to unclog it and let it run smoothly again.

In LA since the 105 and the completion of the 210 and the OC toll roads, there have been no new freeways. Yet in that time the population of LA has almost doubled. Thus you will get stupid stop and go conditions in lanes at times even there appears to be no apparent cause for it.

It is simply a case of too many cars on the road for the size of the road.

Answer 3

Too many people, many of whom do not have drivers licenses and insurance, so they don't know how to drive.

Answer 4

welcome to a nation that has a lot more people that before. and it will not get better.

Answer 5

When the saturation capacity of a freeway is reached, any increase in demand will cause the flow of traffic to break down and speed to drop.  Ramp metering to control entry of traffic from interchanges helps, but only up to a certain point.  In the end, it's a case of demand (traffic volume that wants to use the freeway) versus capacity (the ability of the freeway to handle traffic dependent on number of lanes and other factors).

Answer 6

There are simply too many cars on the road.

We can build more freeways, but it won't help much.  The only way to make a significant improvement is to build a rail/subway system.

And your premise makes no sense.  What is illegal about stopping if there is a car blocking the path in front of you?