Originally Posted by BCPhil
The problem with this article is it's also bullshit.
It's just a scattershot of ideas being fired at the target to see what sticks. He rants about traffic decreasing, then worries about traffic increasing. How it benefits no one, yet benefits the port.
He's treating it like he is a defense attorney and all he has to do to win is produce reasonable doubt, and to do that you attack it from many, even contradictory angles, because maybe one is just true enough to instill doubt.
I also question his facts he brings up. Right off the bat he cherry picks an article (from the Straight no less) that focuses on traffic change in 2008. You know, the 2008 during which the worst financial crisis since the great depression hit. It claims a 7.5% drop from 2004 to 2008. Yeah, no shit, I would wager that unemployment went up by a similar amount. Canadian GDP drop by 11%
Then he brings up the The Fundamental Law of Road Congestion. So, which is it: is traffic going to decrease or increase? The data he picks shows a decrease, but then he quotes a work that pretty much guarantees an increase.
And that increase is misleading. The Fundamental Law of Road Congestion, boiled down, says that average travel speed will stay fairly constant. Increasing road capacity allows more people to use it. People have a set tolerance for congestion. Increased capacity encourages more use, thus more immigration and economic growth.
Think of a grocery store. A huge one. It only has 1 checkout. How long will you wait in line before you shop somewhere else? 10 minutes? So that's the average wait, 10 minutes. Now the store puts in 3 extra checkouts. So is your checkout shorter? At first, then more people realize they can now check out in under 10 minutes. So the store gets more busy until people start having to wait 11 minutes, then levels off because no one wants to wait 11 minutes. Is the store a failure? Hell no, it just quadrupled its business!!! Your life is the same, but now more people can enjoy doing what you do.
So, according to The Fundamental Law of Road Congestion, if your goal is to eliminate congestion, forever, it's probably impossible. Does that mean doing nothing is the better choice? If commutes today are an hour, and commutes 30 years after building a new bridge are an hour, individually not much happened, but collectively, at least 3 times as many people can commute to work. The economy is larger and can support more growth.
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