The advent of the motor car and the airplane has given the individual a new relation to his environment by establishing new and infinitely more profitable standards of time and distance. The motor car has changed man's radius of action from 30 to 300 miles a day, while the airplane has increased it to a thousand miles or more. These are substantial contributions to American life.

Unfortunately the changes wrought by the motor car in particular have brought in their wake not only benefits but serious and aggravated problems. Street congestion and accidents have assumed alarming proportions in all of the larger effetely, while even in the smaller communities the steadily increasing volume of traffic has created grave difficulties.

Harvard University is taking an active part in the study and relief of these special problems through the Albert Russel Erakine Bureau for Street Traffic Research. The Burean, which bears the name of the president of the Studebaker Corporation of America, was created in 1926 by the President and Fellows of the University as a result of a grant made by the Studebaker Corporation through the interest of Paul G. Hoffman, its vice-president.

Two Albert Russel Erskine Fellowships in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences were established in connection with the Bureau. These fellowships pay a stipend of $1,000 each per year, and are designed to encourage research and a professional interest in traffic engineering.

The keynote of the Bureau's work was sounded in a statement made by Mr. Erskine at the time of its creation "Much of the failure of American cities to deal more effectively with street traffic may be attributed to a lack of techni. cal information. Traffic is an engineering problem. It can be controlled satisfactorily only through sound engineering methods."

It can hardly be said that Harvard has discovered through these surveys and studies any simple, practical, and economically possible solution for the traffic problem. There is no such "solution". Surveys have shown, however, that few cities even when suffering from the most acute congestion use their existing street area to more than fifty or seventy-five per cent of their potential capacity and efficiency.

It has been repeatedly demonstrated that material improvements in traffic conditions can be brought about. Traffic control plans drafted by the Bureau have saved millions of dollars a year to street users through increased efficiency in the operation of all forms of street traffic, and have reduced accidents in spite of normal increases in motor vehicle registrations.

First Survey in Los Angeles

The Bureau's first survey was undertaken in Los Angeles, which was suffering from an acute attack of hardening of the traffic arteries as a result of the exceptional density of its motor vehicle population. While most cities have from four to ten persons per automobile, the ratio in Los Angeles is just a fraction over two persons per car. As might have been expected, the city also suffered from an abnormally high number of motor vehicle accidents and fatalities.

Acting as consultant to the Los Angeles Traffic Commission, the Bureau directed a detailed traffic survey of the metropolitan area. On the basis of this thorough inventory of the traffic situation a new traffic code was prepared and put into effect, with the assistance of an intensive educational campaign to familiarize street users with its provisions and relative advantages.

Briefly summarized, the effect of the new code was a substantial reduction in the accident record, coupled with a marked increase in the facility of traffic movement.

Chicago, with its extreme concentration of business activity and business population in the "loop' 'area, offered the next detailed traffic survey undertaken by the Bureau. Congestion in the "loop" area was fostering an abnormally rapid decentralization of business activity. During the twelve-hour period of the average business day over a million and a half people entered and left this small area. The movement was complicated by the movement of more than 300,000 street vehicles.

As a result of the conflicts and delays occasioned by this tremendous traffic load, the commercial efficiency of the city was seriously threatened by the congestion of its principal business district. The situation obviously called for an inventory an which to base relief measures.

At the request of the Street Traffic Committee of the Chicago Association of Commerce, the Bureau undertook the organization and direction of a year's survey of the metropolitan area.

The most sensational single development of the Chicago survey was the elimination of all parking in the congested "loop" area. It was obvious to the survey engineers that the lanes of parked cars along the curb were a serious obstruction to all traffic movement. But there is no more delicate question in the whole traffic problem than parking. Merchants look on the parked car as a source of much business. Motorists resent any attempt to curtail parking as an abrogation of personal privilege.