The faster cars go, the more cars can travel through a given roadway. Speed increases the road capacity. This was clear when they finally went to 70 from 55. Much less bunching up.
One thing I tried and was interesting, is trying to allow about five car lengths between you and the next car. Hard to do but able to drive at a constant speed instead of braking, speeding up etc. constantly.
Please stay there and never come to my part of the world…
Just because you are thinking/doing something a certain way doesn’t mean it is right for everyone, may be right for you, but NOT right for most…
We will just have to agree to disagree… 
Traffic, by definition is; The passage of people or vehicles along routes of transportation
It is simply a number. Traffic jams are caused by a number of things. But, more residents, and more visitors make more traffic and that results in more traffic jams.
Consider traffic signals. How do you think they decide when to go red or green? Lights can be timed to the speed limit on the road. You drive the limit and you roll through every light. Great in theory but speeders apparently can’t learn that message. They clog up the next light. This is personal experience since I lived in a city that did this.
Red light runners throw a wrench into timed lights because those stopped at the light WAIT to make sure the red light runners are past so they don’t die. THAT screws up the traffic flow. I currently live where that is common.
Slow people (tourists) unfamiliar with the area and the speed limit, drive 10 mph below the limit IN THE LEFT LANE and jam up traffic. Plus they cause 3 car crashes when they hit the brakes to turn into wherever they need to go (always 3 cars… tailgaters!) further mucking things up.
Those lights can be demand only… so you MUST stop to trigger the light.
Or the entire city or county traffic lights can be networked to dynamically time lights to the amount of traffic to help flow. Some cities have this. It can make things run smoother.
But to blame speed on EVERY traffic jam is demonstrably wrong. Come drive in my county at 5 mph under in tourist season if you want clear examples.
I stopped reading your response after you invalidated yourself with the above.
I’ll just leave you in the good hands of Tom Vanderbilt, and his book “Traffic”.
WTF are you talking about, how did I invalidate myself???
And we would all probably be better off if we (I know I would have) stopped reading about your twisted views after the 2nd line in your 1st post about this…
Heh heh. Learned truth versus book truth.
Why would you assume that I “rush up” to a traffic control device? By looking far ahead, I have always coasted toward a traffic light, and even toward stop signs. Now that I have a PHEV, I tend to “coast” even more than I did previously, because that coasting gives my motive battery a mild recharge.
Those who rush up to traffic control devices, and then jam their brakes on at the last minute are not doing any favors for their vehicle’s brakes, or its gas mileage.
By coasting toward traffic control devices, I frequently don’t even have to stop, because the light has already turned green when I get close to it.
+1
I didn’t mention anyone specifically. But while I’m driving, or out for a walk along roads I do use, I am observing things. And unfortunately the majority of drivers do rush from light to light, or stop sign to stop sign. They bunch up at those points, meaning it takes longer for everyone to get a green, or stop sign, then go.
I live currently on U.S. 1, and it takes me 3-5 minutes sometimes to pull out of the driveway to make a right-hand turn, because oncoming drivers are doing 45-50 in a 35mph zone, as opposed to 30-to speed limit, as the road and control devices were engineered for.
Please do not glorify invalidating behaviors.
Please feel free to ignore all of my posts from now on, Chris.
I actually agreed with most of what you said in the first part of you recent comment, about coasting, etc.
But it is unfortunate that you then plus-1 someone else in this conversation telling someone else to stay away and “never come to their part” of the world.
What part of their attitude appeals to you so much?
Sounds to me like you have the problem not me… lol
Now you are acting like my 4 and 6 yo grandkids when they are told something they don’t won’t to hear…
Funny thing is, I am NOT the 1st person to ask you to not come to their area and drive like that on this forum in other threads on a similar subject matter…
You fed into davesmopar’s attitude, not me.
Agree 100 %.
Where I live I see two primary reasons for “traffic” on a day to day basis. (Although there is no working definition of traffic in this discussion so let’s just call it the bunching up of cars close together in space). One primary reason is simply traffic volume.
The second applies only to limited access highways and is called stupidity. There is a design logic to limited access highways, and a central part of that is that we drive on the right and pass on the left. This is the USA, after all. So even without high traffic volumes on the interstates in my area, I regularly see big bunches of cars and it’s virtually always people who “pick a lane” rather than “picking a speed” and staying right except to pass.
I 100% agree with others that the “speeding theory of traffic causation” is 100% absurd, most especially so if one ignores traffic volume. One car on a road can’t make “traffic,” for example.
Sometimes those needless traffic backups I see on interstates are 50% instigated by really slow drivers even in the right lane. The other 50% is just people who can’t anticipate, pass to the left and then just get back over to the right-hand travel lane. So @ChrisTheTireWhisperer whether you know it or not, or want to come to terms with it or not, the driving style you describe using is part of the problem - at the very least on interstates.
My driving technique might be considered a “problem” only because so many others don’t want to try it. It’s difficult to do the right thing in this world, largely because of many other’s attitudes about it.
No. It’s a problem because it helps cause problems. It’s not the “right” thing. It’s actually an obnoxious thing regardless of your (not-well-though-out) attitudes about it.
IMO large commercial trucks are a big part of the problem. Heavy traffic slows them down and then it takes a very long time for them to get back to the speed limit. It’s not that the drivers mean to inhibit traffic movement, just the nature of the vehicles they drive.
Agree that large commercial trucks can be a problem. It can be regional, though.
Around me, surpisingly enough, they seem to accelerate faster than many cars. Truckers need to get places in a hurry. Many drivers around SW Florida seem afraid of the accelerator. They will reach 10 mph over but it can take a loooong time!
I don’t suffer from that problem! 
It’s not all the trailers, just the ones that are heavily loaded. It doesn’t take more than three or four, especially if they are in different lanes, to tie traffic up for hours.
If everyone “drove like a trucker”: taking almost as long as them to accel and decel, imagine how much smoother everyone would flow.
Just because you drive something that can go 0-60mph in 3.5 seconds, or can stop on less than a dime, doesn’t mean that you must always fully utilize those capabilities.
Doing so only puts more wear and tear on your vehicle, consumes resources(fuel, and worn brakes), not to mention your nerves.