Maximizing Traffic Flow

As much as I hate driving in Michigan (road conditions, number of drivers on the road, etc), I have to hand it to the engineer who decided to make the left turn arrow at the end of the light. In other locations, drivers get a left turn arrow at the beginning of the light, allowing cars to turn unobstructed. But then you get a few cars hanging out in the middle of the intersection waiting to turn who end up going on the yellow or red light to clear the intersection. This not only increases the risk of an accident (misjudging oncoming cars stopping at the yellow light) but can delay traffic from starting to cross once they get the green light. By having the left turn light at the end of the light signal, the entire left lane is moving. This allows the last few cars that in the other sequence would be sitting in the middle of the intersection to safely clear, because they don’t have to wait for oncoming traffic to stop and to get their car moving.

Falling asleep with the TV on will cost you

Ever fall asleep without setting the Sleep option on your TV? I do, a lot. I started to wonder how much not setting the Sleep was costing me. Here’s my calculation for a 19″ color TV. I know, time for an upgrade. (Watt info found here, prices here).

1 Hour of usage = 70 Watts = .07 kilowatts

.07 * 4.5 (average amount of time before I wake up and turn off the TV) = 0.315 kW

Michigan Average price per kWH (1000 watts per hour) = 11.65 cents

$0.1165/kWH * 0.315kW = $0.0367

Yep, that’s right. Every night I leave my TV on for an extra 4.5 hours, I pay another 4 cents. Assuming this happens every night, thats $1.10 per month.

A 25″ LCD takes about double the power, so now you’re talking $2.20 a month in extra charges and wasted electricity.

Michigan Roads, if you can call them that

You would think that the home of the automobile would have nice roads to drive on.  It’s called the motor city for crying out loud.  Hundreds of new cars pour out of the assembly plants every day to find the worst possible roads to drive on.

Michigan roads are terrible.  Pot holes galore, construction non-stop, and they are extra loud.  Why?  Who knows.  Although one reason may be that there is no maximum load that semi trucks can carry.  This means that the roads can take a huge beating from trucks carrying loads that might not be legal in other states (like Ohio who have limits and smooth, quiet roads)  Which brings me to another question.  If there is no maximum, why does Michigan have truck weigh stations?