Introduction
Traffic congestion presents a significant problem currently faced by large and growing cities. According to Ranjan et al. (2020), “with the increase in the economy, rapid urbanization, and desire toward private traveling, the traffic congestion level around the world has increased drastically, directly affecting the cities’ growth, development, and environment” (p. 81606). In addition, it increases both the tendency of road rage and commuting time, contributing to the frequency of car accidents. In this context, the study of traffic management proves to be of high importance. Thankfully, appropriate communication between traffic actors can address the congestion issue from many angles.
Heavy Taxation and Parking Fees
Heavy taxation and parking fees can be a communication service that discourages some road users from using their vehicles daily. It reduces traffic congestion in some places where users prefer public transport to dodge the expenses incurred by using their vehicles. This strategy also helps improve public transport in the cities by generating enough income to advance public transport (Su, 2020).
It is a burden for private car users to carry, but the car users who prefer to use their vehicles daily do not have any other alternative but to pay the taxes. However, according to Abdulrazzaq et al. (2020), it is the increased number of private cars that has contributed significantly to traffic congestion and difficulties in the urban traffic flow organization. Thus, the solution of high taxation for private car owners is essential to improve the traffic congestion problem.
Enforcing the Existing Traffic Rules
Implementing the current traffic rules can be another strategy to solve the road congestion problem, where the rules eliminate reckless drivers on the road. Overcrowding in junctions, indicated by a yellow box, causes jam transversely in an extensive part of the road system and is considered unlawful. Overspeeding, ignoring red lights by drivers, and driving through constrained areas are other prohibited natures by road users. These habits result in injuries, accidents, deaths, and fear of walking in the pathways pedestrians. The government, therefore, intervenes with heavy charges, lawbreakers, or jail sentences to help reduce bad habitual problems. Unfortunately, the authorities have no assets or inducements to impose the policy.
Improving Insights into Public Transport
Since many traffic congestion issues come from the abundance of private transport means, educating perceptions about public transport can be an effective way to reduce road traffic congestion. Petit et al. (2021) state that the service providers dealing with public transportation must satisfy their customers and offer quality services to attract other customers. In this context, many factors play a crucial role in motivating private car users to shift their preference to public means, including the improvement of travel time and service system as well as their accessibility. For instance, reducing total travel time, travel cost, and fares for trains and buses have directly affected shifting (Ranjan et al., 2020). The perspectives that the people have concerning public transport should be reasonably communicated by the authorities to assist in the regulation of road congestion problems.
Optimizing Traffic Lights
Optimizing traffic lights is one of the better infrastructures a government can invest in to reduce road traffic congestion. Linked vehicle expertise offers countless prospects for traffic flow governance approaches to gather actual time vehicle data, create online conclusions, and organize their deeds to create resolutions helpfully (Tajalli et al., 2020). When traffic lights operate and coordinate responsively to the demand in actual time, cases like the vehicles wedged in intersections points which lead to jams, are reduced. The authority can hire traffic planning experts to devise an effective system to cope with precise situations like congestion on major highways.
Network Screening
Another valuable tool in dealing with traffic congestion is network screening. It is defined as the procedure of choosing the places of importance that require security measures to be applied which is often done through the investigation of crash statistics (Tajalli et al., 2020). The network screening approach naturally classifies places with large volumes of traffic congestion, such as cars, the person on foot, and other highway operators. In this context, it allows for predicting accurate short-term traffic information, which serves as a valuable information source for commuters and traffic management agencies (Tajalli et al., 2020). Consequently, they utilize the obtained information to develop favorable solutions for road traffic congestion.
Potential Counter Arguments
Unfortunately, solutions to traffic issues often resemble a double-edged sword due to their peculiarities. In the case of enforcing rules and taxation, there is a notion regarding the concealed nature of seeking profit. According to Su (2020), traffic enforcement discretion, increased taxes, and insufficient institutional constraints on fines and forfeitures make traffic fines a tempting revenue source for governments experiencing fiscal stress. Thankfully, initiatives such as statewide taskforce reevaluation and demands for public display of traffic fines data (Su, 2020). In terms of public transportation, its systematic improvement requires a substantial financial investment to be effective (Petit et al., 2021).
However, rational and strategic planning for resource allocation and consequent use can turn the financial issue into a time issue within reasonable boundaries (Abdulrazzaq et al., 2020). Finally, it is arguable that transportation agencies have sufficient information concerning road safety solutions due to data inconsistency (Tajalli et al., 2020). Nevertheless, recent technological advances in data acquisition and database digitalization can significantly improve statistical data validity (Tajalli et al., 2020). In addition, increasing the communication and cooperation levels between agencies can also prove valuable in information generalization.
Conclusion
Traffic congestion is naturally a multi-faceted issue due to the number of reasons behind its occurrence. Thankfully, this tendency opens up various possibilities for communication and infrastructure development. Firstly, governmental control over private transport is a solid preventive measure against undesirable traffic states. Secondly, providing an alternative to private means of transport can reduce the total number of units involved in the traffic. Finally, traffic optimization and screening can statistically reinforce transportation infrastructure development. Therefore, combining the mentioned measures and timely implementing reasonable solutions has the potential to eventually eliminate traffic congestion.
References
Abdulrazzaq, L. R., Abdulkareem, M. N., Yazid, M. R. M., Borhan, M. N., & Mahdi, M. S. (2020). Traffic congestion: Shift from private car to public transportation. Civil Engineering Journal, 6(8), 1547-1554. Web.
Petit, A., Yildirimoglu, M., Geroliminis, N., & Ouyang, Y. (2021). Dedicated bus lane network design under demand diversion and dynamic traffic congestion: An aggregated network and continuous approximation model approach. Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies, 128. Web.
Ranjan, N., Bhandari, S., Zhao, H. P., Kim, H., & Khan, P. (2020). City-wide traffic congestion prediction based on CNN, LSTM and transpose CNN. IEEE Access, 8, 81606-81620. Web.
Su, M. (2020). Taxation by citation? Exploring local governments’ revenue motive for traffic fines. Public Administration Review, 80(1), 36-45. Web.
Tajalli, Mehrdad, et al. (2020). Network-level coordinated speed optimization and traffic light control for connected and automated vehicles. IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 22(11), 1–12. Web.