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Re:Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock by lmm on Thursday February 16, 2017 @09:57AM (#13660301)
Right, so what we need to do is take into account value of space that roads will take up (that could otherwise be used for houses, businesses, parks...), and only build more roads if the value they produce outweighs the value they consume. That's not an induced demand issue though.
Re:Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock by Brakenshire on Thursday February 16, 2017 @10:51AM (#13660848)
I would say that's a pretty clear example of induced demand and the problems arising from it. You build the motorway, people build low density suburbs outside the city to drive and take the motorway to commute into the centre, that delivers hundreds of thousands of cars into the centre which crashes the road-space efficiency of the central area, which damages not just the people driving into the centre, but also the people who live close in, who are using much more efficient and scalable forms of transport. If the motorway was never built, people would live in apartments instead, they'd use buses or trains, and walk, and you could have more people working and living in the city while maintaining a functional transport system, and higher utility as a result.

It's not just a question of the motorway filling up, and maxing out an increase in utility, the motorway filling up means that more efficient uses of the roads in the centre are prevented. There is benefit balanced against detriment, and it's perfectly possible (depending on the exact circumstances) that the detriment will be higher than the benefit.

Re:Elon Musk is boring a tunnel to skirt gridlock by lmm on Thursday February 16, 2017 @12:07PM (#13661559)
> which crashes the road-space efficiency of the central area, which damages not just the people driving into the centre, but also the people who live close in, who are using much more efficient and scalable forms of transport.

More traffic on the central roads is induced demand, but as jessriedel said, that's likely a sign of added value. Cars from outside displacing cars from the centre should only happen when it's a net gain - the limited road space is being used by those who gain the most value from it. People who live nearby and use trains etc. are unaffected by traffic on the central roads and can live exactly as they would if the motorway hadn't been built. Cars displacing more efficient buses is a real issue, but a general one not really related to building motorways (an increase in local car traffic would cause the same issue), and can be solved with e.g. bus lanes, congestion charges...