Telematics may help push more vehicles through the system, but it will not make the congestion go away.
If there are some ideas that never seem to go away — congestion pricing anyone?
Last week, however, the cars, trucks and buses that are the city's new source of congestion were cleared away to make room for cyclists.
"It's unrealistic to think that congestion will go away," said Mr. Blankenhorn, the former bureau chief of urban project planning at the Illinois Department of Transportation.
Traffic congestion would fall away, as cars drive closely to one another without danger of colliding, circulate smoothly without aid of traffic lights and signs, and carry the number of passengers that matches their size.
The knee injury that followed is in some ways the classic Goodesian football tale; never again would he contest centre bounces but through it he still strung together 204 consecutive games, reinventing himself as a midfield general who'd crash into congestion and swoop away with the ball or head forward and kick goals, 464 of them all told.
Move at least one avenue away from congestion.
But now, "all the things that you're trying to get away from — congestion, suburbs, shopping malls," she said, have forced the early utopia seekers out.
Leslie Kramer and her husband moved into a big Victorian house in this rural township five years ago to get away from congestion in Westchester County.
The strongest case for self-driving cars is safety, its logical, programmed movement also means vehicles can be centrally controlled, rerouting traffic away from congestion.
