In a road network, increasing delay locally can reduce delay globally

Abstract

The object of this paper is to show how, in a particular simple case, total journey time varies with the travel time along an uncongested link. I show that for certain values of relevant parameters a reduction in total journey time may be achieved by increasing the travel time along the uncongested link. This result is of particular relevance to towns with a good bypass or, better, a good outer ring road.