LOS ANGELES - Councilmember Paul Krekorian introduced a City Council motion to expand the city's partnership with mobile app Waze.
The traffic management app, which reroutes drivers from high-traffic routes to more open ones-to take, announced a partnership with the City of Los Angeles last week to share up-to-the-minute city traffic data. But concerns about Waze increasing congestion in residential neighborhoods was absent from the discussion.
Krekorian's motion seeks to leverage the city's new partnership with the tech company to reduce the impact of cut-through traffic that results from use of Waze and similar traffic apps.
"Residents in my district and throughout the city have experienced a major uptick in cut-through traffic over the past few years," said Krekorian. "Many blame Waze and other mobile apps because they divert drivers from major avenues onto small residential streets that aren't designed to accommodate them, resulting in far greater congestion and traffic for residential neighborhoods without considering public safety or quality of life issues. The city's unprecedented partnership with Waze is a good step forward. We should use it to try to resolve residents' concerns about Waze and traffic congestion in our neighborhoods."
The City Council's Transportation Committee will discuss the motion in the coming weeks.
Read more about common neighborhood complaints about Waze in this Los Angeles Times article: http://lat.ms/1IkSQcW. Watch neighborhood reaction to Krekorian's motion here.