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The Bus That Rides Above Traffic
An anonymous reader writes "China is the new tech king. They're developing a new, two-lane bus system that travels over traffic below. It's claimed to cost 10% of a subway system and use 30% less energy than current bus technologies." This one has been boggling my brain. I can't see how this is a good idea or safe. But it sure is awesome.
Someone should send them pics of the Oakland freeway that collapsed in an earthquake - back in the 90's, was it? During a World Series. Isn't much of China an earthquake zone?
Countries can still one-up China by designing a bus that can leverage existing roads.
Boredom is bliss.
From the sketches it appears the buses use a rail on one side to help guide them, this is probably the biggest failure point. All it will take is someone crashing into the rail to cause a delay for the bus until it can be repaired. Seems like they would be better off just building an elevated road for buses only. My first though was that the buses would just use rails like a train that were set to be flush with the road so cars could easily change lanes. Only problem there would be debris de-railing them. The best solution would be to let everyone telecommute and invest in laying fiber for greater bandwidth. ;)
Do they have trucks in that area? Wouldn't that pose a minor issue?
No smoking sigs indoors.
Couldn't you get trapped under a bus when there's congestion and end up missing your destination?
Very cool, and while the video seems to touch on it and explain the system (don't understand Chinese), I'm still worried about the whole cars passing underneath it and tall trucks getting told to move to the side. The buses would need to be super communicative to avoid any kind of collisions.
Also not sure how much infrastructure would need to be modified to accommodate the buses, apparently they need two lanes and quite a bit of clearance that might currently be blocked by power lines and the like. I'd love to see it in action though, hope this actually materializes.
Reviewing just the first hour of video games.
If it breaks down, your whole mass transit route comes to a standstill until it's repaired.
Color me skeptical.
I just saw the concept, and I must say. "DO NOT WANT!"
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." Proverbs 16:25 (NKJV)
This looks cool, but I have to wonder how practical it is. First, you'd have to design all your roads and bridges to accommodate it, but second, you'd have issues with things like turning traffic (don't forget to look for a giant bus over your head or coming from behind before you make that turn!) and possibly even pedestrians, although I'm sure they'll have a clever solution like not putting it right next to the sidewalk.
Just thinking of how things are on my bike sometimes, though, the turning traffic was the first thing that came to my mind.
R.Mo
Ok, I've got a couple problems with this... First, if that bus wants to turn left/right, then I'd feel bad for anyone who's underneath that bus at the time. (Or likewise, if it's going straight, and you want to turn left/right while underneath.) Second, people drive like idiots. I can't imagine how much damage a car accident with this thing would do. Third, maintaining the tracks that these things run on has got to be expensive and/or difficult. I can imagine the amount of loose change, or little kid shoes being dropped in those tracks.
Now, don't get me wrong, I'm glad they're thinking outside the box to deal with congestion problems, but I don't think this will work...
Yeah I'm not sure how this will interact with the way the Chinese drive. My wife has been there for business before, and she says that while Chinese people are generally better drivers than people here in the states, they have to be because the streets are like a giant game of no-contact bumper cars. People basically just do whatever the hell they want.
Seems like a good idea until you start imagining rush hour traffic.
You're the driver of this "bus" and someone is stopped in between lanes as he's trying to merge/switch. But there is a long line of traffic and a bunch of people are switching. Now the "bus" is stopped waiting for the cars to clear the track. And the cars underneath it are unable to switch as well. Imagine a stalled vehicle or accident and now all cars underneath are now, stuck.
If everything works flawlessly, great, but it seems it would get very problematic very quickly once you put real traffic into the scenario.
According to that poorly photoshopped publicity image in the article, this system will only work if everyone owns an SUV or a supercar.
Do they have trucks in that area? Wouldn't that pose a minor issue?
I don't speak Chinese but from watching the video it appears that there is a warning signal when a truck is detected as approaching from behind or in front of the bus. In addition to this there are black and yellow poles that apparently act as truck detractors like the upside down U-shaped hoops in lawn croquet. The bus would fit over these perfectly but a truck in this same section of traffic would hit one of these before endangering the bus. It appears that this would designate which lanes are okay for trucks (however they then also pose a bit of a traffic obstacle where they come down in between lanes).
My bigger concern is turning and how the sections bend and twist between themselves (as seen at around 5:30 in the video). Is this on a rail or not? Because I could see that being potentially problematic and accident prone if drivers fail to yield to you. I'm interested that they're already planning on deploying this as I think there are things to iron out yet.
My work here is dung.
Terrorists will like the convenient packaging.
The best solution would be to let everyone telecommute and invest in laying fiber for greater bandwidth.
That would be a wonderful solution if nobody MADE any thing.
you know those nasty, dirty people who produce everything you own.
I have not been able to find a way to run my cabinet shop from my desk. I'll be damned if I don't have to keep traveling to the shop to cut things and assemble things and those darned customers think that we should deliver and install too.
please crawl back under your bridge now.
-- Sig under construction...
or they could use the space that is consumed by trees in the mocup to put a bus lane there, its not like china is going to have green anything within the next few years, why bother pretending
According to TFA, it does indeed run on rails.
Runs on rails - it is not a bus. More of a giant tram.
http://www.acetonestudio.com
That was an awesome parody.
"Dan's a good man, and he's never eaten a whole person in his entire life. "
the 70's. it was truly a different time.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Seems like any accident could leave debris in the tracks. I can't imagine that would end well. It would also be very easy to sabotage.
Remember to maintain your supply of
It's pretty amazing that they are going through some very similar issues, thinking they can engineer around things in a way only America had the audacity to try "back then".
"Is this on a rail or not?"
Yes. At least, from what I understand through the translated text, the bus could run both on a rail (for maximum energy efficiency) and also like a bus, using video tracking technology to follow white lines on the pavement. Although, I think I'd prefer a human driver instead.
Well, I for one like the the Beijing Subway. Line 10 goes between my house and my workplace, it is two yuan (US$0.30) to go anywhere on the extensive network, trains are clean and frequent and best of all: when you change lanes, you don't have to worry about it being on top of you with its support struts engulfing you from all sides like some monster, ready to shear you in half if you, um, well, behave like a Chinese driver.
By definition a subway is under ground where you can just ignore it when you are not riding it. You can't merge into it, you can't cut in front of it, you can't run in front of it, with screen doors you cannot even fall in front of it. You don't have to listen to it, you don't have to look at it, you can ride it if you want and if you don't want to, you never have to think about it. This is what a subway can provide. If this bus is a tenth of what a subway costs, then that shows that you get what you pay for. It is so lucky that there is absolutely nothing that I or anyone else remotely cares about in Mentougou district and I can pretend that this does not exist, just as if it were underground.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
I remember such things being proposed in the US before. They were always rejected as "unsightly". Stupid NIMBY retards getting int he way of progress.
If 90% of the office workers could telecommute and you removed them from the roads, wouldn't that alleviate much of the congestion in the first place? Assuming a mixed load of white and blue collar commuters, of course?
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
You've got the same problem with streetcars and trolleys. Never seems to slow them down much.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Chinese driving is not compatible with this idea. Chinese cities have some terrifying traffic behavior. Not that I think such a system would even be safe in the nicest town.
Seems like any accident could leave debris in the tracks. I can't imagine that would end well. It would also be very easy to sabotage.
Light rail systems have been around in various forms for over a century now. I'm sure they're aware of the potential issues of them. I'm curious what would happen if a vehicle under the bus were to veer into the the side. How strong is the support structure, and could it withstand multiple vehicle impacts if there were to be a serious accident under it. I could see the thing freaking out some drivers.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
You mean like ... china, paper, woodblock printing, gunpowder, compass, the fork, fireworks, go, maglev wind power generators, negative numbers, menus, tea, toilet paper or the toothbrush?
I mean, granted, not all of these are new things - in fact most of them are all fairly old (the maglev being the exception), but I really doubt any of us would want to go without them.
sure, a country should make things and the people who do can commute to work. But that's still would leave a huge chunk of the population who could work from anywhere. we're wasting time and fuel being on the roads, only 5% of days at most would I physically need to be present at work or at client.
From the sketches it appears the buses use a rail on one side to help guide them, this is probably the biggest failure point. All it will take is someone crashing into the rail to cause a delay for the bus until it can be repaired. Seems like they would be better off just building an elevated road for buses only. My first though was that the buses would just use rails like a train that were set to be flush with the road so cars could easily change lanes. Only problem there would be debris de-railing them. The best solution would be to let everyone telecommute and invest in laying fiber for greater bandwidth. ;)
Building elevated roads seems like it would cost many many times what building elevated buses and street-level rails would cost. That said, I'm all in favor of telecommuting as much as possible.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Some of us like the social interaction - thankyouverymuch.
That's what I thought when I read the title.. Oh well, I guess I'll keep waiting.
It is still a wonderful solution since many (if not most) people don't actually make anything. Please crawl back into your cabinet now.
The design obviously requires at least 3 lane roads - two lanes for cars and small trucks where the bus goes, and one lane for taller vehicles. So many large cities are also old cities, with many narrow streets; certainly digging subway tunnels and establishing infrastructure is expensive, but employing this solution basically requires a pre-planned city with huge thoroughfares. The larger the street infrastructure, though, the less need you have for a bus that allows traffic to go underneath it.
All this is before a host of other concerns people have mentioned: turning requires huge intersections and, to reduce stopping, pre-specified traffic light timing. You also need significant above ground space to build the loading (and charging?) platforms shown.
Nonetheless, it's truly something very different for urban transportation. The fact that it's getting deployed means this isn't just some crazy idea but that we'll get to see how well it works.
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
One way to improve things would be to have staggered shifts. Having everyone arrive at the same time along with everyone leaving at the same time creates traffic jams.
Now in a place that makes things that gets difficult, but not impossible. You just need a reasonable amount of shift overlap with different departments starting/ending their shift at different times than other departments.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
How can they telecommute to a job for creating cadmium and lead laced toys for happy meals?
OM NOM NOM NOM.... I'd paint a big toothy mouth up front :)
My first though was that the buses would just use rails like a train that were set to be flush with the road so cars could easily change lanes.
That's called a tramline/tramway, and the vehicles trams. (In the US I think they call them streetcars.) I assume they keep the gap for the wheel flange clean, but I don't know how.
However, if cars can drive over the rails you aren't going to avoid severe congestion -- someone will always be stopped in the tram's path.
For 0.01% of the cost I suggest the Chinese paint one lane of the road red and mark it "Buses Only".
If 90% of the office workers could telecommute and you removed them from the roads, wouldn't that alleviate much of the congestion in the first place? Assuming a mixed load of white and blue collar commuters, of course?
They've already moved to India, but there's still congestion. Next step, this train thing?
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
With state of the art video systems to record the most horrific wrecks in the world.
There's more to technology than "high tech." Anything that applies practical science to industry or commerce is technology. The wheel is technology. The automobile is technology, and yes a bus is a piece of technology. Really, you should be complaining about all the computer geeks trying to hijack the term "technology" and narrow its definition down to just high tech computers and robotics.
and hilarity ensues.
Since it rides on tracks in the street it's more like a trolly car (or LRV) on stilts than a bus. And because of the tracks drivers in cars on the street will know how to get of it's way, since the 'bus' has to follow the tracks.
Guaranteed easy kill for any wannabe terrorists who drive a loaded truck or car bomb underneath this bus. Stupid idea.
The advantages of el trains and monorail systems is that they don't compete with street traffic. The advantage of buses is that they can pass each other -- one stalled car doesn't take the whole line down as currently happens with light rail. Elevated bus lanes seems to me the best of both worlds.
Regarding earthquakes, elevated roadways are a mature technology. Nothing is 100% safe -- if you're looking for absolute safety we'd never build anything -- but built to today's standards, elevated roadways shouldn't be any less safe than any of the other tall structures hanging over you -- overpasses, skyscrapers, bridges, etc.
Parenthetically, light rail on the street is the worst of both worlds. The disadvantages of light rail (the system moves as a whole or not at all) with the disadvantages of buses (the system competes with street traffic). When I was living in San Jose, cars being t-boned by light rail in low speed collisions was so common that people started scrawling under the ubiquitous "Taking 217 cars off the road" the addition "One car at a time".
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
... but I think whomever came up with the idea needs to come up with a short version.
That is a problem with the driver attitude. Replace him with an automatic system (it is driving a guided vehicle in a dark tunnel, what benefit is a human anyway?).
Most of that stuff was invented independently in Europe, so even if China never existed, we'd still have those items.
Plus you gave credit for some things that were actually invented by the Arabs or the Romans/Greeks. Like the compass.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
mmm at least in the UK trams don't tend to share the road with cars. Sure they cross roads and sometimes run along them for short sections but for the most part they run along dedicated routes.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
That's a fascinating idea. Some postings claim that construction will start this year, but it seems unlikely. They'd have to build a prototype and a test track first, and if they had that, there would be pictures.
The thing runs on road wheels, not tracks. Steering is at least semi-automated, to keep it properly positioned. It's electrically powered, with recharging as it passes through stations. The electrical contact mechanism for recharging, as drawn, is wildly optimistic about the difficulties of making contact with a moving vehicle. The illustrations show solar cells atop buses and stations, but no way can those yield enough power for this thing.
They're vague about how the articulated bus corners. The trick with articulated buses is avoiding crush points. Real articulated buses have turntables and bellows at the joints, and they narrow at the join region. That's going to be tough with a vehicle this wide. Also, it's not at all clear how transitions to hills are handled. Does it articulate in pitch, too? All that can be made to work; San Francisco, of all places, has large articulated buses. The joints were troublesome at first, but the second generation of joints seems to work adequately.
Also, on sharp turns, there had better not be cars underneath.
The emergency evacuation slide system is a bit much, as is the roof entry stair system.
Hard to say. Some of the renderings of the buses seem to show some sort of 'arms' sticking up out of the top of the buses, similar to some electric train designs I've seen which use such arms to get power from overhead wires/bars, so it might be powered that way. Alternatively, it looks like the 'buses' ride on some sort of rails, so they could possibly electrify the rails the way some electric passenger train systems are designed.
I was with you until you said "no-contact". Now I don't believe your wife has ever been to China.
1. Foundations under the roads would have to be completely redone to support the extra weight, trains have large supports under the rails to support the weight of the trains, so its not just a simple cut holes put in rails, and drive.
Looks like the rails steer it and regular tires support the weight.
I imagine old fashioned cable cars (frisco?) work the same way, in that the cable provides the "pull" but the cable cars do not by any means hang from the cable. (an Aerial Tramway is a totally different concept and does in fact hang from the cable)
The vehicles have a small surface area that contacts the ground
I would not worry so much about tire friction as about wind surface area. Coasties are supposed to know all about hurricanes, but even Chicago "the windy city" can't use these. The center of gravity being extremely high, I'd think the odds of overturning in a breeze would be high. In addition to the dynamic stability issues of basically being a ten foot tall upside down pendulum even under ideal conditions.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
It's not using the guard rail. They're on tracks. It's basically light rail that uses existing roadways instead of requiring a widening of the roadway. They use signal lights inside to indicate turns and radar to sense when you're too close to the supports and make an announcement to the driver. At turns, the signal lights would stop all the cars and only the train would go, just as with any other light rail system. Debris that might derail this train would derail any other light rail train as well. It's much cheaper than building a subway and they're going to commence building 186 km of track by years end.
I can't see how this solution could possibly work as well as a small footprint elevated train similar to Bangkok's Skytrain. For this you need a 3m median for support pillars, and a slightly wider (4m?) median to support stations. Entrances and exits are stairways to the sidewalks.
Skytrain type solutions have zero probability of having to stop for gridlocked cross traffic.
I've not researched it, but I'm guessing that the only advantages of the megabus are lower upfront capital outlays (not TCO), and that some highly politically connected group will become extremely wealthy.
__ Someday, but not this morning, I'll finally learn to use the preview button.
A half century old London Routemaster bus manages 4mpg (UK gallon), so that would get better per passenger mileage than you suggest if it only had an average of 7 passengers. It can carry 64 seated passengers. Modern buses manage 6mpg and a lot of them have more room for more passengers.
Wow, your car increases its fuel efficiency by 100% for each passenger you add, but the bus decreases fuel efficiency for each passenger? You should get all those people from the bus to join your carpool and you'll never have to fill up again.
Popisms.com - Connecting pop culture
It also seems like having a giant structure zoom across/around your car could be rather distracting. Not to the level that every time it occurs there will be a pile up, but I'd wager that there will be a significant increase in accidents with that cause. And given your example of accident debris getting on the tracks, you have a bad little cycle.
Overall, while it might be only a fraction of the cost of a subway system, I don't think this idea will stand the test of time nearly as well.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
check it out on jalopnik
http://jalopnik.com/5602570/chinese-to-revolutionize-cities-with-traffic+straddling-bus
My abilities are only limited by my imagination
This is weird. I swear I heard him say "E-bay" toward the end.
No - it's a ground level rail system. The elevated part is the cabin of the bus.
The ones in the UK made of reclaimed railway line have much less street-running than normal, but most others (worldwide) are on-road most of the time. Of course, when there's space the trams have their own bit of land not shared with cars -- often in the median.
(If you're not running at street level for most of the time it's more light rail than tram, IMO.)
What whitewashed history book did you read? Even http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compass says that the compass was invented in China.
This is the original article: http://www.chinahush.com/2010/07/31/straddling-bus-a-cheaper-greener-and-faster-alternative-to-commute/
Unlike the one posted on the story, that adds nothing (except for stealing ads money from the actual source).
It also includes a translation of the video.
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
We already have something quite similar in Chicago. It's called an elevated train, or "The L."
Sheesh.
Slashdot: you'll not find a more wretched collection of villainy and disreputable types...
I can't see how this is a good idea or safe. But it sure is awesome.
It's a good idea because it has huge capacity, causes minimal extra congestion, and the infrastructure is no more expensive than a tram system.
As for safety, it doesn't seem substantially less safe than a double decker bus, and certainly safer than several dozen cars.
That's what the pub is for... thankyouvery....BUGGER OFF!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
If anything, the places I've worked building things are a lot better at that than the office jobs I've had. My first blue-collar job would let people work basically any hours they liked. One guy would come in at 2am, then leave at 10am. Another guy would get in at 4pm and stay until midnight. Some people would work night shift (and be a pain in the ass when we went out on the weekends.)
Is 1563649 a prime number?
Not at all. Many jobs will still be location-specific, and many will still drive - but it could be far less than now.
There is not only many jobs that actually don't need physical presence at all, such as most forms of banking transactions and many services.
We also gave the opportunity to serve more people with the same car at the same time for many common tasks, especially shopping. Let us think of a food store. Food can be delivered once or twice a day from the warehouse, to the whole street and surrounding streets, instead of everyone getting into a car and fetching their own. This not avoids a real lot of smaller cars in traffic between the shop and homes by simply having a larger one there (of which far less is space that is being used rather than empty), but also may avoid many cars that first travel to an additional point of sales, sometimes maybe not even fully loaded in order to restock things that ran out. And there can be a further reduction of surprises in logistics not only by having a larger volume of sales, but by delivering only once a day, and the next day at the earliest - a thing possible even with perishables that require refrigeration/cooling these days, as well-insulated containers with dry ice or frozen water or outdoor fridges can keep things frozen/cold enough until people are home.
And this became only feasible because only the internet makes it somewhat adequate to shop online. It gives a well-verifiable, fast, and safe way to buy or sell things right down to payment, with many perks for either buyer and seller.
I'll stick with the flexibility of my bicycle, thank you. At least I can ride around accidents, construction, and gridlick - can't do that with 6 foot wide 3000 pound cars.
Oh and by the way my bicycle uses no gas at all.
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
Not sure that's correct.
Nottingham tram is dedicated only at the ends / outskirts - all the central part is on road and shared with cars.
Sheffield I don't know as well, but it definitely has some long stretches along shared roads.
Manchester I believe runs on roads in the centre (but has converted old rail lines - on the outskirts).
Edinburgh has definitely dug up a road, but whether it will ever get trams running on it is anyones guess.
What other major ones are there ?
Why stop with just one layer of buses. Why not create even larger "hyper-buses" that can travel over the smaller buses? Imagine the layers of buses you could create!
Correction, your car gets 80MPG regardless of how many passengers are in it (Even less than 80 if it's more than two).
However, your PERSON-Miles per gallon (pm/g) increases with every passenger because you're transporting 2 passengers at 80mpg efficiency, therefore your car is getting 160 person-miles per gallon.
Units are fun!
ehhh... Toothbrush was invented in Arkansas, otherwise it would be called teethbrush.
*Ducks*
I've been to China many times and this idea will be a disaster (especially Beijing and Xi'an). They drive recklessly with a blatant disregard to safety for themselves and others. This bus idea will either slice through cars on a daily basis as the cars weave around the bus' struts or be stuck in traffic with the rest of the cars since the drivers in China don't really obey lane lines.
A police car does this in Patlabor 2 - it zooms over the traffic on long wheels, blaring (rather hopefully) "Please keep your doors closed".
This doesn't look nearly as dangerous, since it appears to be built into the rail guards, rather than relying on the happy circumstance of all the cars being aligned.
All right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?
Give me 5 minutes and that will say it was invented by me
The bus featured in the article runs on solar power. So it gets infinity miles per galon.
3D Printing, my friend. Go to IKEA's Web site, download the plans to your 3D printer, and print.
"The world is a construct of forceful imagination. Those who don't know walk around in the reailties of those who do"
> People basically just do whatever the hell they want.
:).
Therefore they're not better drivers. And I think the statistics do indicate that drivers in China are worse than those in the US.
As for anecdotal evidence:
1) A friend of mine has a chinese wife. When he was visiting her relatives in China, he had the opportunity to get into the driver's seat and started adjusting the rearview mirror. His wife's relatives at the back asked what he was doing, and it seems they were unclear on the concept of the rear view mirror, and they used it more as a vanity mirror
2) Another friend of mine visited China and his taxi driver drove the wrong way around the roundabout just because it was a shorter distance.
3) When my brother went to China, his van driver drove on the wrong side of the road for a significant period till oncoming traffic almost hit them - then the van driver swerved to the correct side. What bothered my brother a lot was that the driver actually looked scared by the incident.
4) I personally know people who have gone to china and not come back alive because of traffic accidents.
In contrast I do not hear of such problems from friends or relatives going to USA, UK or Australia. I have had friends who had problems with "black ice" in the UK, fortunately nonfatal, but that's a different thing.
There's a big problem with that: people can't collaborate when they're not all at the office at the same time. Now, if you spend most of your day working alone, that doesn't matter; management only cares about collaboration and teamwork, so that's why most workplaces are moving away from cubicles and towards open work areas or bullpens, so that everyone can hear everyone else's conversations and join in, instead of getting their work done.
Living in Jersey I wouldn't give one of those things 10 minutes before someone slams into it if they tried it here...
But, according to the summary (and I don't disagree), ten times as expensive.
You can make the front and back of the thing very strong indeed - just as trucks round here have bars protecting their rear axles.. Which only leaves people going astray inside, which will probably be less violent but might be the weak link in the scheme
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
You're on the wrong website. This is Slashdot, for geeks and nerds, not people who like to socialize in person. Go visit a sports forum or something.
Several European capitals have trams which seem not to suffer too many problems. I don't think that is likely to be a killer. This is essentially the upper deck only of a 2-wide 2-decker tram.
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
And understand this, Americans are good drivers compared to the rest of the world. (I'm not american). But I live in the capital city of my country and I see a lot of accidents all the time, from minor fender-benders to cars wrapping around concrete poles.
WTF?
I am American, and I've never thought of my countrymen as "good drivers". Not as bad as Italians perhaps, but not great either. Are you Italian, by chance?
You surely can't be German. Everything I've heard about them is that they're excellent drivers, and take it far more seriously than we do: no yakking on cellphones, texting while driving, etc.
BTW, I live in Phoenix, Arizona, and we recently got a light-rail system here. There's accidents with that thing every week or so with some dumb driver hitting it, getting hit by it (by turning in front of it), getting squashed between the train and a pole, etc. IMO, having any kind of mass-transit system that shares space with cars is a disaster. They should be on totally separate grades, either subway, elevated monorail, or best of all, SkyTran.
Having used used streetcars/trams for a long time now, delays due to accidents are very rare. It's not really an issue. The situation might be different in other cities and countries, though, since the layout of the roads and other traffic conditions certainly play a role. I'm don't doubt the delay due to accidents is much higher for cars than for streetcars, though. (For overall delays I'm not ready to make such a bold statement.)
Comparing the efficiency of different modes of transportation is really difficult; and it's a bit odd (though not unusual) to use miles per gallon when trains and streetcars in western countries usually run on electricity. Finding emission equivalent information for public transport is hard because while passenger numbers are readily available, the average travelled distance isn't. The only solid information I could find in a couple of minutes is that the Berlin S-Bahn (urban light rail) has emissions of 72g CO2(equiv) per person and kilometre. The Berlin S-Bahn never struck me as particularly modern. The 2010 Prius (low emissions variant) allegedly emits 89g CO2 per kilometre, previous models emit 104g. Oh and I just found another reference, the German railway claims an average of 2.6l gasoline/100km per person for a half-filled long distance train, which translates to 58g CO2 per person and kilometre. (The typical average utilisation of long distance trains here seems to hover around 45%.)
References (two thirds German, I'm afraid):
Emissions in Berlin public transport: http://www.benjamin-hoff.de/article/3140.energieverbrauch-und-co2-emissionen-im-verkehr.html
Deutsche Bahn AG: http://www.s-bahn-berlin.de/aktuell/2010/024_klimaschutz.htm
Prius: http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii-2010-prius-main-forum/54240-2010-prius-92g-km-low-emissions-89g-km-version.html
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You mean like ... china, paper, woodblock printing, gunpowder, compass, the fork, fireworks, go, maglev wind power generators, negative numbers, menus, tea, toilet paper or the toothbrush?
I mean, granted, not all of these are new things - in fact most of them are all fairly old (the maglev being the exception), but I really doubt any of us would want to go without them.
You mean the maglev that was designed and built by Germans?
4) I personally know people who have gone to china and not come back alive because of traffic accidents.
I think you knew them if they didn't come back.
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, though I'm not yet sure about the universe. - A Einstein
mmm at least in the UK trams don't tend to share the road with cars. Sure they cross roads and sometimes run along them for short sections but for the most part they run along dedicated routes.
Not the same in the US. We stick tracks on regular streets all the time. The local one here is http://www.seattlestreetcar.org/
I love the gratuitous boob shot at 3:27 in the video. It makes it difficult to take this seriously.
Also, when I first saw the first picture, I thought, Hey, what are these giant humanoid robots for ?
Hum. I guess it is time for my midazolam shot.
If you're in a car under the "bus," wouldn't you get a sense of vertigo from the bus frame moving slower or faster than the road surface and surrounding scenery? That seems like the *biggest* problem to me.
Some people do work in silos; however, most office workers will not be as productive if they're not in close proximity to their team. Hell, I'm a programmer -- one of the most notoriously telecommuteable jobs -- and on almost every project I see huge productivity gains from being on site. Whether you need help or advice from peers, to corner a business user who doesn't want to make time for you and force them to talk you a business case, to see an end user reproduce a bug you can't, or whatever.
On one project I was working remotely as the sole developer on it -- pretty much the ideal telecommute case -- I probably got more done in the three days in which I flew out to the client site and worked closely with them than in the three weeks before it. Being able to so easily demo things, talk out problems, grab a whiteboard for five minutes to diagram something, and generally have a very tight and lossless feedback loop is a huge help.
Social and communication norms may reach a point in which that's less true, but we're not there yet if we'll ever be. You can get a lot farther today offsite than you could've a generation ago, because e-mail, IM, WebEx, and a whole slew of other technologies are big helps, but having close physical proximity to the various people your work depends on or whose work depends on you is still huge.
I know! It's like you could get infinite MPG if you stacked enough people on the car so it was too heavy to move.
this is my sig
I'll stick with the flexibility of my bicycle, thank you. At least I can ride around accidents, construction, and gridlick - can't do that with 6 foot wide 3000 pound cars.
Oh and by the way my bicycle uses no gas at all.
I don't think that's necessarily true.
Bypassing Roadblocks:
- When you reach a street festival, you usually have to walk your bike.
- You can get around gridlock on a highway, but mostly because you don't have anychoice being on a bike and all. So, what happens when there is major traffic on the regular roads? You'll be in the same situation as the cars, trying to find empty spots to move forward, switching lanes, etc etc etc
- Montreal has the most bike lanes in North America and strongly encourages biking. Well, the result of that is, CONGESTED BIKE LANES.
Energy Usage:
- You'll consume more calories biking. You'll eat more food, that food has to be delivered to its point of purchase, and possibly your own front door. It has to be produced on farms as well.
- You'll consume more water, which needs to be pumped, consuming more energy.
Conclusion:
I love biking, but it's far from perfect, and not necessarily the most efficient method of travel.
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
Horse. Shit.
And I have proof.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QESfEd180rQ
What car do you have that gets 80 miles per gallon? The most efficient production vehicles I've seen get low 50s.
>>>Never seems to slow them down much.
Yes actually it does
Completely different topic. The OP was talking about "Seems like any accident could leave debris in the tracks", i.e. how debris from some accident could somehow be a problem. Which it is not.
Remember, China is a communist state. The state can impose a 1 year hard labor for each violation. Fixes the problem really easily.
In the video, they talked about it taking 3 years to put in a Subway, and how it takes too long.
In the US, it takes 3 years before the first public vote, and then 6 mores years for the EIS. Probably followed by a number of votes and politicians squabbling. We'll be lucky if the ground is broken in 15 years....
New Orleans has them run on the median ("Neutral Ground" in the local parlance), but is fairly unique among large metro areas in the US for having so much median space throughout the city. I know that in San Fransisco they run on the roads. New York has mostly subways and elevated trains, and I believe the same is mostly true for the other large East Coast cities, but I have only small experience of most of them. St. Louis run on either reclaimed rail track or specially built rail track that parallels the roads. Those are the only large US cities I have direct familiarity with, but as you can see it varies pretty extensively.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
Only problem there would be debris de-railing them.
Debris don't seem to be a proble with trolly buses or light rail. I'm not sure this will be an issue.
Americans are good drivers compared with a lot of the world. Not the best certainly (Germans are indeed far better), but good. Much more of the world is like Italy than Germany, or at least the bits I've seen or heard of. I've personally observed a fair chunk of Europe and the Middle East; and while northern Europeans are generally as good or better drivers than Americans, most of southern Europe is kind a scary. The Middle East is freaking frightening, and I say that as someone who did most of his driving there in an armored vehicle. Asia in general doesn't look any better in the footage I've seen, though there are definite exceptions (Japan comes to mind immediately). From first hand accounts of friends, Africa is one giant game of bumper cars in most countries.
If you listed every country on Earth in order of driving safety, I'd be willing to bet the US would be in the top 15 or 20 percent. And yes, that does scare the Hell out of me now that I think of it.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
Great. You can take the night shift then.
"Government is like fire; a handy servant, but a dangerous master." -- George Washington
Maye you got modded down because of your selective quoting. The parent to your post was talking about streetcars and trolleys, not the DC Metro system, which is trains on dedicated tracks.
And also maybe because you used your tangential complaint to segue into your personal desire to use a car, based on fallacies in your post, which no one really gives a flying fuck about.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
NOTHING, I own that I have bought in the last twenty years is/was/has been made wholly or mostly in the USA, with the exception of service, food and desktop support almost everybody in the USA could telecommute at least several times a week.
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
Look at it, it's one long piece, half the length of a city block, even if the freeway has gradual curves it's gonna intrude into the lane it straddles when it goes round a bend.
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
Pretty sure Chicago's elevated trains were considered efficient and innovative when they were built too.
Why does that design or metropolitan monorail concepts need to THIS drastically "re-imagined"?
Designs like this are where art meets engineering in a head on collision.
The only advantage I see to this design over elevated trains like Chicago's, Taipae's, and Bangkok's is that it does not require the permanent structures to hold the tracks and platforms throughout the city. Perhaps that would make maintenance on the rails easier.
Pedestrians can still walk in front of the moving supports though so I see that as that a serious disadvantage and fails to eliminate a physical barrier within the city.
I also really like the old German Wuppertal Schwebebahn
This idea is particularly weird for me, because I had the exact same idea but with trains about 5 years ago. In a dream.
In the dream, there were these giant monster trains that hogged many tracks and therefore had not just one tunnel underneath, but several, so that smaller trains could go *through* the larger trains, even the opposite way. You could go fractal and also have even larger trains where even the large trains go through a giant behometh train that hogs yet more train tracks.
To get even weirder still, you could have trains which move *on* giant massive things (trains or tracks) which also move.
Yes, my imagination can be weird sometimes.
Why OpalCalc is the best Windows calc
They should do speed 3 with a bus like this! and then you can see how many cars that you can hit.
I've been dreaming of this since I was ten years old. Of course, remember, a ten year old designed it.
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
Wow, that is scary. That makes me want to never ride in a car any place except northern Europe.
I wonder what the traffic injury and fatality statistics are like in all these other places. We already have way too many people dying every year in car crashes in the USA, and newer, larger vehicles with lots of airbags is the norm here, unlike Africa for instance. Of course, we might also have higher typical speeds due to our roads, compared with any third-world country, and energy goes up with the square of velocity.
And to think I'm talking to the inventor of the compass right here on /.!
The enemies of Democracy are
Comparing with above ground subway (i.e. sky-train) I think it's the infrastructure cost and build time.
Oh and by the way my car if a hybrid that gets 80 miles per gallon (160 if I carry a friend). The typical bus or train averages only 25mpg each passenger.
Ah! That bus is electric, so it gets an infinite number of miles per gallon.
that's nonsense, even when in the building with the "team" most communication is done via phone extensions and email. and two-thirds of the scheduled meetings are two-thirds time wasting bullshit.
we're wasting billions of dollars in energy and time with this "have to be physically present" mentality. we could cut the energy consumption of this country 15% at least
A low visibility intersection without any sorta stop sign or traffic circle... what do you expect?
"It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations..." -Winston Churchill
You are welcome to your opinion, but I don't think it reflects reality. There's a lot that's done with physical proximity that doesn't have a thing to do with scheduled meetings. If this isn't true for someone, in most lines of work, it means they either have terrible social skills or their value to the team is incredibly low to begin with.
And you know, maybe companies decide that it's cost effective to hire people to be 60% efficient as long as they also pay 0% of the office costs, but that still wouldn't mean that there isn't a huge value to having people be able to stand up and talk to each other face to face.
I'm not saying its impossible, just that its really, really unlikely.
Ever seen a traffic jam in almost any city in China? (Or anywhere else for that matter.)
The average driver doesn't pay any attention to anything that is happening in his lane, never mind the other lanes. (I'd hate to be a claims adjuster in China. Overwork or what? :-)
Forget about this concept of a bus going overhead, Even on a single unwavering track. There would be collisions a plenty.
You'll never get people used to thinking in three dimensions without special intensive training. Think of how often you look up when you're walking around, then riding a bike, then riding in a car or bus, and then driving a vehicle.
Its going to require very strict licensing after some intensive training and the ability to FAIL drivers (all of whom, specially in America, regard getting a driver's license as a rite of passage.)
You'd have as many people qualified to drive on a road as there are qualified to be pilots.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Do the ones in Europe have cars riding UNDER them?
Remember to maintain your supply of
That's a train on stilts (which is a hilarious idea, but I hope they can make it work)
I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
Don't they have stop signs or traffic lights in China? I just can't believe what I just saw.
Looks like a bitchin turning radius.
From what I've seen, many North-American drivers do not consume less food than the average biker. Much more, it would seem, actually.
Free Manning, jail Obama.
No, they still live there. Got jobs as traffic wardens and never looked back.
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
You can tell your children about this amazing brush with fame!
The original Honda Insight got 70 mpg (EPA estimate of course) http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/27/automobiles/27HONDA.html, and hypermilers could get higher than those estimates.
You both seem to be taking this to extremes. There's no good reason to have people come in every single day when they're working on a project. But that doesn't mean that it's sane to have no personal contact either.
I know I get very little done being in the office all of the time, and generally if I work from home for a few days I usually get a hell of a lot done. That doesn't mean I think it'd help anyone for me to just work at home all the time, as I can't see how staying out of the loop would help anyone.
We need employers to be more flexible (which actually probably requires insurance reform, funnily enough.) If someone doesn't need to be on-site all of the time, let them work from home, but not to the detriment of team working. Yes, this will cut down on congestion, and oil dependence, and our balance of payments. We should do it.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I probably was going to an extreme, yes. I do that sometimes. :)
My experience is that when this:
I know I get very little done being in the office all of the time, and generally if I work from home for a few days I usually get a hell of a lot done.
is true, usually it's because you have a lot of knowledge (platform/institutional/architecture/whatever) and the reason you get a lot more done out of the office is because other people interrupt you a lot with questions or for help. In other words, if you're home, you may be a lot more productive, but it's very possible that other people are a lot less productive.
So there's a balancing act there. How valuable is it to the team to have you able to bust something out uninterrupted? How valuable to the team is it for other people to not spin their wheels uselessly because they can't as easily/effectively get your help?
notice the yellow lines along the buried rail under the road surface.
that ain't gonna work where it rains, then snows, then freezes.
sure hope they aren't going to electrify the rails, too.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
So instead of a monorail system, they simply built the rail(s) into the vehicle itself. What could possibly go wrong?
You didn't mention south america! or, well.. mexico. once you go south of texas, driving safety goes out the window.
i've heard spain is about as fun as italy.
i couldn't possibly imagine how bad it is in africa...
yeah, it's actually really funny/scary. americans have more good sense than most people in the world in MANY things. not the most, not all the time, but so far as "realizing when shit is unsafe and may harm others and *giving a fuck*" we get high marks.
i've heard stories from people who've traveled through africa and asia about the firearm safety exhibited there... that is, none. now, do realize that african hunting guides and game wardens have a pretty strong european-ish history (especially the guides; the ones that aren't white tend to have learned under white guides, meaning european, meaning they're probably english or dutch and so are really good with their guns), but the common people not so much. read an account of afghanis who didn't even understand why the writer was uncomfortable; they were standing around wantonly pointing their guns at eachother, fingers resting on the trigger. they didn't even realize how unsafe that is.
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.
You'll find in most real businesses the telephone is the most important piece of equipment. If you have to be physically present to talk to your coworkers I would think it is you with the lack of communication skills. One might wonder what sort of GW Bush chimp faces and gestures you need seen to make to be understood.
You are right, of course. I was just commenting on the part of the story:
This one has been boggling my brain. I can't see how this is a good idea or safe. But it sure is awesome
One reason this neighborhood delivery system doesn't currently exist is the impulse buy. Another is that for it to be as efficient as possible, everyone in the neighborhood would have to sign up. Another is that a lot of people are picky about their meats/produce and want to select it themselves.
A similar process exists in grocery co-ops. A group of people get together and plan for a month's dry goods. The co-op manager then bulk-buys these items and delivers the individual shares. People still need to go buy their own fresh or frozen items, but this method avoids many drawbacks of the neighborhood delivery system. One drawback to this method is that you actually need proper meal planning or very good organizational skills to pull it off.
As an alternative, a weekly delivery of nonperishable goods, cleaning supplies, and select frozen items (ice cream, veggies, microwave meals, etc.) would be much easier to arrange. It would largely negate the fuel savings under the original proposal because people would still be shopping once a week or more. More people would sign up for it because it is easier to do than a monthly or quarterly co-op. Grocery stores would still get their impulse buys and frequent buys of fresh items. Stores with membership cards like Rogers or Safeway could easily use their habit tracking data to send proposals to their customers to participate. The store would benefit from more predictable inventory demands, the members would get a small price break and not have to pick it up themselves, and it would make a small dent in traffic/fuel consumption. I believe it would also cause a small improvement in the planning skills of participants and cut down slightly on unnecessary buys. Paradoxically, the stores would see a slightly higher frequency of impulse buys since the people physically there have less in their cart.
This is a stepping stone to larger projects that could be successful today without substantial changes to our lifestyles. If it was offered in my area, I would do it in a heartbeat. Of course, I have a general menu ready to go for at least a month in advance (not set in stone, but shopping lists are a lot easier). I would be able to take advantage of this in a big way and make much smaller shopping trips once a week for fresh produce. Most people can put together a decent list for the next week. Plus, this would be a huge benefit for many elderly people to not have to carry all that heavy bulky stuff. They would only drive or catch a ride to get perishables, which are a lot easier to carry (other than milk).
Over time, this would lead to more corner stores selling perishables other than milk (since most of them have milk and bread anyway). People wouldn't have to drive as far to get the items not provided by their neighborhood system.
-1 raving lunatic; +6 subGenius... Things even out...
Presumably this would just be a tramline. Flush with the roadway so won't get hit. No idea how to deal with debris but trams manage so this will as well.
I'd expect people to notice there's not a lot of visibility or any form of road marking or traffic control and so take extra care.
Just use double-decker buses instead, you can fit more passengers into the same volume and it doesn't require digging up half the road system and shutting it off to high vehicles.
This looks more like a way to enforce human behaviour through a batshit insane design threatening to cut your car in half than anything practical.
4) I personally know people who have gone to china and not come back alive because of traffic accidents.
I think you knew them if they didn't come back.
You obviously haven't considered what he is doing with their corpses each evening after work, have you?
No. You can't look at my Sig; it's mine, and I'm not showing you.
Low visibility? It's perfectly clear and open.
And how do you explain this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QESfEd180rQ#t=2m02s
Was in Barbados a few weeks ago. Talk about some seriously balls-out drivers. The roads are terrible, and their "highway" is the width of a normal single-lane road in the US, so many of the drivers have to stop and let others pass, etc. Many times we were scraping through foliage on the sides of the road, or a mere inch from a drop-off, building/wall, or 2 foot deep draining ditch. I have to admit, I was very impressed, but it was a bit scary at high speeds. Those guys are damn good!
Midland Metro - between Birmingham and Wolverhampton. Mostly ex-railway lines, but I believe it runs on the streets in Birmingham. However I've never seen it, so I may be wrong.
Croydon - I've only ever seen it when passing through Wimbledon station on a train. There it is obviously running on a railway line. Elsewhere, I don't know.
You surely can't be German. Everything I've heard about them is that they're excellent drivers, and take it far more seriously than we do: no yakking on cellphones, texting while driving, etc.
Well, having no speed limit on freeways surely helps taking driving seriosly. And the driver educations is a lot better (and a lot more expensive, too). Also I believe it is a good thing that people here are allowed to drink beer with 16, and only start driving with 17/18. So they already know the effects of alcohol and tend to be more responsible with drinking and (not) driving.
we recently got a light-rail system here. There's accidents with that thing every week or so with some dumb driver hitting it, getting hit by it (by turning in front of it), getting squashed between the train and a pole, etc. IMO, having any kind of mass-transit system that shares space with cars is a disaster.
I've been to lots of towns with light rails systems, and I'm currently living in one, but I've never seen many accidents. In fact, I remember exactly two of them. I guess a reason for that is that in Germany, drivers are much more used to random stuff on the road (pedestrians, light trains, bicycles) than in the US.
Also it should be fun in intersections if the driver under the bus likes to go straight on and the bus takes a turn (or vice versa)
Who would want to get into a vehicle with a driver that drove on the wrong side of the road and didn't even seem to think it was a problem?
I think the idea there is that the driver does it so often that he feels in control of the situation and has successfully avoided many potential accidents in the past. If he looks scared then he clearly doesn't have any idea what he's doing, but goes ahead and does it anyway.
Breakfast served all day!
Horse. Shit.
And I have proof. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QESfEd180rQ
I hate to say it, but I definitely woulda considered hitting the idiots standing in the middle of the road at roughly 2 minutes and at roughly 2m12s.
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
And the driver educations is a lot better (and a lot more expensive, too).
We don't have driver education in the US. Well, we do, but it's a complete joke. Any calls for improved driver education are met with allegations of "elitism".
Also I believe it is a good thing that people here are allowed to drink beer with 16, and only start driving with 17/18. So they already know the effects of alcohol and tend to be more responsible with drinking and (not) driving.
That certainly helps with DUI, but many/most of our accidents are not caused by DUI these days. They're from just plain stupidity and bad driving. Our DUI laws here in Arizona, for instance, are very strict, and offenders have to spend time in Tent City, which is pretty miserable in the summertime when the temperature is over 110F. Cops are pretty active in catching DUI offenders too; they like to hang out around bars on weekend nights.
I've been to lots of towns with light rails systems, and I'm currently living in one, but I've never seen many accidents. In fact, I remember exactly two of them. I guess a reason for that is that in Germany, drivers are much more used to random stuff on the road (pedestrians, light trains, bicycles) than in the US.
That could be, but I wonder if part of it is how the system is designed. Here in Phoenix, the light rail runs between the two directions of travel on a main road, and has to follow all the same traffic signals (red lights, etc.). So usually, someone turns left in front of an oncoming train, not looking for it behind them. This just seems like bad design to me; normally when someone turns left, they're looking ahead to make sure there's no oncoming traffic; they're not expecting something approaching from behind on their left.
This isn't that big of a deal.
But my question is, how do the people fit into the bus? They are like towering over it.
Be seeing you...
most office workers will not be as productive if they're not in close proximity to their team.
this is an artifact of the cultural environment you live in. See Geert Hofstede's 5 dimensions of cultural comparison - here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geert_Hofstede
and here: http://www.geert-hofstede.com/
the point you are speaking towards is #1 on the list from wikipedia
thats a wonderful bit of conjecture (but to be fair to you, its appreciated that you qualified your commentary)
what about lumber? or a car? check your facts
you all seem to be forgetting the thousands of industries that require you to actually be there. like construction, manufacturing, the laying of pipes, cable, fiber, etc. farming, mining, utility repair, utility instillation, etc etc etc. Additionally, the day its possible for me to telecommute my construction job, is the day i kill myself, as humans have become superfluous to there own existence.
I've decided to Diversify my Holdings. I've divided my cash between my left and right pockets, instead of all in one.
opps supposed to link to the CIA's The World Factbook
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/us.html
Right from your link, the original Honda Insight got high 40s to low 50s using normal driving habits. Pre-charging your batteries, drafting excessively close, over-inflating your tires, swapping your tires for spares, disengaging the transmission and costing for extended periods - none of these or other methods used by 'hypermilers' count when you're measuring fuel economy.
>>>>>Seems like any accident could leave debris in the tracks. I can't imagine that would end well. It would also be very easy to sabotage.
>>
>>You've got the same problem with streetcars and trolleys. Never seems to slow them down much.
You're right that generalized debris (leaves/branches) doesn't slow down railed vehicles, but major accidents like metal shrapnel thrown across the tracks WILL stop the railed vehicle. We had a train driver texting in DC, he wrecked, and then the whole northwestern quarter of Greater Washington Metro could no longer move. That left millions of workers unable to get home. Just a few weeks ago a truck in Maryland hopped off the interstate, blocked the MTA line, and once again nobody moved for several hours.
I'll stick with the flexibility of my car, thank you. At least I can drive around the accident - can't do that with streetcars/trolleys/metros that are tied to a fixed path. Oh and by the way my car is a hybrid that gets 80 people-miles per gallon (160 p-mpg if I carry a friend). The typical bus, trolley, streetcar, or metro averages only 25 p-mpg (or gallon-equivalent if its electric powered).
Overall this rail-based Chinese "bus" just seems like a bad idea.
Like the flying cars they used to show at 1920s-era World Fairs.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Oh, sure I was making broad generalizations. Plenty of Americans are terrible drivers; and I'm sure you wouldn't have to look long to find an individual Japanese or German driver that ought to be banned from the road (probably because of some habit they picked up in Italy:-)). Hell, look long enough and you may even find an Iraqi driver who doesn't turn every trip into the latest episode of his (or her) own personal production of Death Race. In general though, you can pick up a pretty good idea of driving habits in a given area fairly quickly. If you felt in immanent danger of death more times than you've driven miles, you're in one of *those* countries :-)
Of course American driving habit vary pretty strongly by region too; the band is narrower, and tends toward the "good" side, but New Yorkers do not drive like people from Montana.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
Well, I think when people ask about milage, they usually are talking about the EPA estimates, which I clearly was talking about. That's what I think the original message I responded to was about.
No, not a MagLev train (I'm not a complete idiot). The idea is apparently to utilise the same principles for reduction in friction in order to cut down on maintenance and start-up speed (i.e. getting the wings to start moving and thus produce electricity at a lower wind-speed).
Unfortunately it may have been a bit early to put it down as a functional invention at the time, at least according to the Wikipedia entry, though it does come with a "citation needed" for the claim of a hoax.
How long before anyone attempts to get a free ride hooking up to the bus passing above a la Skywaker vs AT-AT in TESB?
After a few months of killing stupid pedestrians, bikers, and some major car accidents, the remaining Chinese will learn not to cross the street when huge bus passes by
That carelessness is staggering! It's just un-fucking-believable how little forethought everyone is showing in that vid be they drivers, bikers, or pedestrians.
I mean, yeah, compare that to this video from India: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8Doy_7sOoM
I would consider that reckless but... but they don't go plowing into ANYONE. They brake, they wait, they time their dashes through traffic. Waaaaaaaayyyy more situational awareness.
How does it maneuver around these? http://www.chinaperformancegroup.com/image.axd?picture=2009%2F9%2Fchina-traffic-j01.jpg
I can see one tiny problem (among many). What if you're inside or outside one of those and you want to make a turn?
You want make left turn?
NO, WE GO RIGHT NOW! WE GO RIGHT NOW!
NO LEFT TURN FOR YOU!
You come with me now!
Liberty.
There is actually a very simple and universally understood rule that everyone there understands: the bigger vehicle has the right of way. So, buses do whatever the hell they want, cars speed up as they come up to groups of bikes, and pedestrians cross the road very carefully. When I was in China last year, I noticed the bus drivers have a fun habit of driving down the middle of a two lane highway, ignoring other traffic. A bus I was on took out a small car, grinding it between the bus and a median. The driver didn't stop, claiming he didn't feel anything. I will never get into a vehicle without a seatbelt on again.
Chinese are crazy drivers. I've seen someone drive between two buses. As they got real close to each other, the moped rider slapped the side of the bus real hard to get the attention of the driver. Common sense would tell you that wedging between vehicles is a bad idea to begin with.
While taking a trip through the Sichuan province, I took a bus through its mountainous region. Generally one side of the road is at the edge of a cliff. Yet, the bus drivers will often change lanes into on-coming traffic while going around a bend. They often play a game of chicken with each-other too. Just another day driving up the mountain side right? WTF!
Life is not for the lazy.
> If he looks scared then he clearly doesn't have any idea what he's doing, but goes ahead and does it anyway.
Exactly. If they're doing crazy/stupid things and hitting their own terror levels, it means they're not doing things within their own safety margins, much less yours.
An experienced rally driver might drive at 150kph close to cliff edges or walls with no problems. So if after a few turns, he looks like he knows what he's doing, you just shut up and hope he's not overconfident...
But if your driver drives fast then gets rather close to a cliff edge and looks terrified, you should be scared too.
You're right that generalized debris (leaves/branches) doesn't slow down railed vehicles, but major accidents like metal shrapnel thrown across the tracks WILL stop the railed vehicle.
But that's not a new problem. Accidents and major debris blocks all kinds of traffic, especially trams and similar vehicles that are stuck using one specific lane. Clean up the debris and traffic continues. This new Chinese "bus" (it sounds more like a kind of train) is no different there. But unlike trams and buses, it can go its own speed without blocking traffic.
- When you reach a street festival, you usually have to walk your bike.
But who ever does that? Well, when there's a big crowd, obviously, but at least you can walk your bike. Can;t do that with a car.
- You can get around gridlock on a highway, but mostly because you don't have anychoice being on a bike and all. So, what happens when there is major traffic on the regular roads? You'll be in the same situation as the cars, trying to find empty spots to move forward, switching lanes, etc etc etc
Isn't a highway like a motorway? What the hell are you doing with your bike in (potentially) highspeed traffic like that. (If a highway is not at all like a motorway, then I retract this comment.)
In any case, bikes are especially good at slipping through major traffic jams on regular (city) roads. Through the center of Amsterdam, bikes are way faster than cars.
- Montreal has the most bike lanes in North America and strongly encourages biking. Well, the result of that is, CONGESTED BIKE LANES.
Amsterdam has more bikes than people, and at traffic lights it can get pretty crowded on bike lanes. Still, it's not hard to slip around slower bikers and get out of the crowd. Can't do that with a car.
- You'll consume more calories biking
This is an advantage to anyone not living in a famine-stricken country.
I could see the thing freaking out some drivers.
This is by far the biggest issue I see with it. If you're not used to it, I bet it can be quite startling when this thing overtakes you on all sides. And startling is never good in traffic.
In the Amsterdam city center there's not enough room for dedicated lanes. Trams and cars share the same lane.
That's just mind-boggling. I love how they're all going at the breakneck speed of 30 km/h and *still* manage not to brake, or even see what's right in front of them.
Look closely at the pictures on the cited (and very thin) article and you'll see that the road-side wheels and legs of the device are on the non-road side of a crash barrier. Therefore the machine is constrained from moving more than a few metres from that crash barrier.
I deduce, though the article doesn't mention it, that the vehicle is actually constrained to run on rails (or on some special, reserved-for-bigbus-and-not-available-for-any-other-sort-of-vehicle piece of road surface, which might as well be considered a tarmac rail).
So, depending on your local terminology, it's a tram or trolley-bus or S-bahn or [whatever], albeit one which can pass over traffic jams. The traffic jams explain why there are crash barriers between the general traffic and the "legs" of this system : if a general-purpose vehicle can cross the area the legs use, then eventually someone will be trying to change lane late, or dodge a crash, or something. Cue crash barriers.
The crash barriers also put their constraints on the system : for something like links between normal bus terminal, railway terminal and airport, this would be fine : lots of predictable people moving between A and B ; any intersections in the road network would involve either tunnels, flyovers, or something horribly complex involving crash barriers, gates and I-dread-to-think mechanisms to deal with vehicles stopped across the gates.
Limited usefulness, but ingenious.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
Not possible. See my other post for why this thing runs - to all intents and purposes - on rails. And yes, intersections would be a problem, so this system is essentially intended for roads without (or with very few) intersections.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
If the track should have a reasonable length, there will have to be intersections. And those will either allow the cars to drive over the tracks (creating the problem above), or will have to include some ramp or tunnel design, which would make things pretty complicated. Not impossible, but negating lots of the gains/cost advantages over a classical subway.
That is why we need virtual reality! At home, you would plug into an office simulation on a server, with your co-workers in cubes or offices around you. It would be the least fun MMORPG ever, but it would allow for interpersonal interaction while allowing team members to get some space when they need it.
Space Shuttle was a program that strapped humans to an explosion and tried to stab through the sky with fire and math
Watch the video again. There are several different intersections, and some of them do, indeed have stop signs, they're just off-camera. Watch for the white lines going across the road...there's usually a pole next to them. That'll be where the stop sign is. One intersection even had a speed bump. Most people were also going way too fast for the little narrow streets.
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These should be done this way as in new york subway system riding over the traffic....all of it should be above ground out of traffic, too bad we can't also induct a special highway for cars underneath it with few stops or lights to get through downtown quickly, like a mini highway...
Amazing! - The most suicidal people in the world. Nobody, and I mean nobody, seems to look where they're going. They enter intersections like they own the road and when two such people meet at an intersection, it has go bad.
A simple "yield to traffic from the right" would have prevented most of the accidents shown in the video.
But these guys just go, stopping for nothing. It's not like they go very fast - most of these happen at fairly low speed, evident from the victims (on bikes or on foot) being able to get up right away, so the brake distance would be fairly short, which makes it obvious that these drivers simply don't look or if they do either fail to recognize the danger or simply fail to hit the brake.
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
It runs on roads in the end of town nearest East Croydon station.
One reason this neighborhood delivery system doesn't currently exist is the impulse buy.
The current US companies doing this service are too small to really offer an alternative, they don't carry enough goods and do not present them well.
But this type of thing does exist, including competition (not english). All the things that made these stores work, such as being able to piggy-back on the national postal services for rapid and efficient delivery (warehouse to any home), being able to process electronic payments, and home broadband connectivity to serve a web page with many images, can be just as easily met in the US as they were met in Switzerland.
If you look at other online stores, for instance Newegg (and the Swiss pendants) is exactly the same, rapid growth due to increasing demand. Plenty of people don't want to try out electronic parts first, they just to get them cheaply and with minimum effort and be quite generously treated if there are complaints.
Another is that for it to be as efficient as possible, everyone in the neighborhood would have to sign up. Another is that a lot of people are picky about their meats/produce and want to select it themselves.
Valid points, but the system does not fail if some don't sign up or don't participate immediately. Of course no one will get rid of many of the physical shops until demand for them is low and until then these still need to be supplied, but it still saves nearly exactly a car for each person that orders and lives nearby.
Have you ever actually looked into where your "American" car was made?
At best it was "Assembled" in the US, from parts made largely in Asia.
At worst it was assembled in Mexico from parts made wholly in Asia.
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd