Slashdot Mirror
German Railways To Test Anti-Graffiti Drones
garymortimer writes "Germany's national railway company, Deutsche Bahn, plans to test small drones to try to reduce the amount of graffiti being sprayed on its property. The idea is to use airborne infra-red cameras to collect evidence, which could then be used to prosecute vandals who deface property at night. A company spokesman said drones would be tested at rail depots soon."
At first glance I was extremely excited to hear about anti-gravity trains, but then my joy was quickly destroyed by graffiti.
"Germany's national railway company, Deutsche Bahn, plans to test small drones to try to reduce the theft of small drones introduced earlier. The idea is to use airborne infra-red cameras to collect evidence, which could then be used to prosecute vandals who steal property at night. A company spokesman said drones would be tested at rail depots soon."
Raise your hand if you read that too.
Paint me disappointed :(
We can stop essentially all crime, or at least prosecute it after it happens by installing surveillance everywhere. We need to decide where we are willing to use this technology. This particular application seems pretty harmless - as long as the railway companies don't decide that now that they have the drones they might as well monitor employee efficiency.....
and give the vandals a taste of their own medicine.
Or hire human guards. You know. Employing a few people to politely escort the kids out of the train station. I would do that job. Would have no problem detaining the ones that would not politely leave.
It doesn't happen in the train station.
Its actually when the trains are parked that they get spray painted. Some of this Graffiti are elaborate works of (misplaced) art, that take hours to apply.
Railroads are starting to fence off their switch and storage yards, and put cameras high up on polls, which makes far more sense than a drone. One guy can watch 50 cameras, but each drone takes a separate operator to fly and monitor.
Drones are a stupid idea.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Read AC's post.
Trains are fuel efficient. Right here in the US, it's been demonstrated that a train can move freight for a small fraction of the cost that trucks can move freight. The only problem with trains here, is that they are never on time. You can't send a refrigerated car filled with vegetables from Yuma to Philadelphia, because you never know when it will arrive. An 18-wheeler gets it there reliably, in 4 days with a solo driver, 2 days with team drivers. But - the COST is ridiculous.
If the idiots who manage the trains could just figure out how to SCHEDULE the damned things, we could save tons of money on everything.
Including passenger service.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
I visited Germany recently and enjoyed the graffiti tremendously. While there's some utter crap, I found the graffiti to be of significantly higher quality than what I typically encounter in my home country.
Less graffiti probably means more tourists (...)
I highly doubt that - possibly even on the contrary. Graffiti is an important part of what makes Berlin Berlin.
0x or or snor perron?!
You realise that often times train delays are caused by graffiti?
The London Tube essentially killed graffiti by refusing to run any trains with any graffiti at all - panels or throwups.
Obviously, this leads directly to delays.
Furthermore, if the company is dropping 10M on cleaning per year, that's 10M on maintenance that it's (presumably) not spending..