> The issue is the space that's required by them and building more lanes doesn't really help due to induced demand
No, you're measuring what you care about, not the actual goal.
More lanes helps because now more people are able to get where they want to go! If you have 4 lanes, and 20,000 people can commute to work, and with 8 lanes, 40,000 people can commute to work, that's a huge win for the people who wanted to use the highway! Think about this honestly — if you doubled the capacity of a subway, and twice as many people took it so it was just as crowded, you'd be thrilled.
You're going to be perpetually confused by infrastructure decisions if you measure a goal that nobody else is trying to solve for.
No, you're measuring what you care about, not the actual goal.
More lanes helps because now more people are able to get where they want to go! If you have 4 lanes, and 20,000 people can commute to work, and with 8 lanes, 40,000 people can commute to work, that's a huge win for the people who wanted to use the highway! Think about this honestly — if you doubled the capacity of a subway, and twice as many people took it so it was just as crowded, you'd be thrilled.
You're going to be perpetually confused by infrastructure decisions if you measure a goal that nobody else is trying to solve for.