The simplest hack for the traffic issue I've heard is to just change work schedules. Either run cities in 2 general shifts, or do several days of longer hours and then take a day off.
Certainly in London there seems to be a slip towards more of the working from home 1 day a week. It definitely feels like there are more working parents doing flexible hours out of necessity but there's a a fair amount of bias in that I've seen a lot more of that struggle from living it myself for the last 5 years.
I take the train from a commuter area and there's no real financial incentive to do 4 days commuting with 1 day off. Which I find sad - I think Train lines should _have_ to include discounted 4 day per week season tickets. Then again, I'm in a southern trains area so the trains aren't running half the time anyway....
For businesses, you start getting synchronization issues that cause inefficiencies. "Oh I can't talk to that department because they are on shift 2" and instead of a quick back and forth you get day long response times over email. Or you have to wait half a day if the shifts overlap a bit. It's like having a remote office across the world, locally.
That doesn't matter if two groups have to have a conversation about something over a period of time so they can come to agreement about something.
Usually this happens during that 'advance planning' stage. It adds an unavoidable lag time to come to some sort of decision or plan, especially when there is a conflict.
And if people have to wait on a decision to get started on something, that adds more inefficiency.
Another solution is to live close to work, build high-rises and subways, or you have 'core meeting hours' and people come in from 9am-noon.
Asynchronous communication is made easier by raising multiple points at once, rather than sending one-line responses. It also helps to have multiple directions of work available, so progress can still be made in one area while blocked in another. Both of these strategies can carry a political/negotiating/leverage cost (all cards on the table at once), but I consider that a good thing :).
Core hours: have some consideration for late risers and people with DSPS. Early birds have enough control already.
It sounds like, if building a remote team from scratch, it would be good to try to create isolated clusters of decision-making power on a shared schedule per cluster.
I personally would like to see a "mandatory non-car-transportation day" here in the US. Office workers and the like would have to travel to work without a car one day per week/month. Work from home, bicycle, carpool, public transportation, whatever.
I suspect the SF Bay Area is now well past the point where flexible work schedules helps with traffic. AM rush hour starts at 7am and runs through 10am; the PM rush hour starts at 3pm and runs through 7pm.
Certainly in London there seems to be a slip towards more of the working from home 1 day a week. It definitely feels like there are more working parents doing flexible hours out of necessity but there's a a fair amount of bias in that I've seen a lot more of that struggle from living it myself for the last 5 years.
I take the train from a commuter area and there's no real financial incentive to do 4 days commuting with 1 day off. Which I find sad - I think Train lines should _have_ to include discounted 4 day per week season tickets. Then again, I'm in a southern trains area so the trains aren't running half the time anyway....