Traffic Snarl

            I was in Atlanta, Georgia, the last few days, visiting family. The traffic, noticeably worse than it was a year ago, is absolutely insane, as observed in: (1) an unceasing stream of traffic on the five-mile trip from my sister Laura’s to my sister Linda’s; (2) a Monday-morning drive to Laura’s lake house an hour north of Atlanta, when traffic on all four lanes of the south-bound freeway stretched unmoving as far as I could see; (3) an attempted drive to the airport Monday afternoon, when traffic was supposedly light, but the line of cars stopped even on the arterial street waiting to get onto the freeway caused an abrupt change of plans – Laura would take me to the MARTA station, instead.

            The train, which is safe, clean, fast, and easy, should be a good alternative to driving, but it doesn’t seem to be lessening traffic. Laura’s husband, for instance, still drives through heavy traffic every morning to his office in north Atlanta, even though he lives a mile from a MARTA station. MARTA isn’t convenient for getting to my sister Linda’s, a distance also too far to walk and a route suicidal on a bicycle. In many cases, no good alternatives to driving are apparent. In other cases, habit or a false idea of convenience deters their use.

            Still, Atlanta continues to build more townhouses and more apartments, bringing more cars to the road. This is madness! The only solution I can see is congestion pricing: having to pay to use the most congested roads during peak traffic hours. It works in London and in Stockholm, but the idea died in Congress in New York, and I don’t know if it’s ever even been broached in Atlanta.

            It can’t continue like this. If we can’t find solutions, the problem will be its own solution because if the traffic is as much worse next year as it was this year, nobody will be able to go anywhere.