Braess's paradox
Sign in to saveproposed explanation for how trying to improve traffic flow actually has the reverse effect
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- paradox
- Named after
- Dietrich Braess
- Has use
- flow network
Show 2 more facts
- Commons category
- Braess's paradox
- discoverer or inventor
- Dietrich Braess
Sources (1)
via Wikidata · CC0
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Encyclopedic overview
Braess's paradox is the observation that adding one or more roads to a road network can slow down overall traffic flow through it. The paradox was first discovered by Arthur Pigou in 1920, and later named after the German mathematician Dietrich Braess in 1968.
The paradox may have analogies in electrical power grids and biological systems. It has been suggested that, in theory, the improvement of a malfunctioning network could be accomplished by removing certain parts of it. The paradox has been used to explain instances of improved traffic flow when existing major roads are closed.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Braess's paradox” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.