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In theory, yes, and in the places where anything close to 18 lanes of highway are even remotely necessary, that's great. In the real world where 99.999% of trips are not taken on 18 lane super highways you know what you've got? A whole bunch of useless capacity. So, in fairy tale land where electric 18 lanes of super highway run to my little neighborhood that's all and good. In reality, meanwhile, how many of us live within walking distance of an 18 lane superhighway? Hands up. Yup, that's what I thought. No one. I'm four miles from the nearest freeway, and it's only six lanes.
Consider that a single lane in an urban areas regularly carry 20,000 vehicles a day. The roads within a mile of my house might carry a few thousand. So what good is 18 lanes of capacity, 360,000 vehicles, going to a quite residential neighborhoods? And that's real usage, not capacity. A lane of highway has a capacity of more like 50,000 a day. That's really nice to have a capacity of nearly a million cars when the busiest intersections handle traffic of 50-75k.
You're arguing against rail with the wrong argument.
Suburbia was designed with the automobile in mind. Of course, it's not going to be efficiently served by rail. However, when gasoline hits $8/gallon, suburbia will be too expensive for most folks to live in. Rail is ideal for consolidated populations in high density villages and cities... which is what the 21st century folks will be gravitating to.
The benefits of scalable rail can be illustrated by New York City's Subway system, where 4 tracks (2 local, 2 express) provide the equivalent of 36 lanes of superhighway. If there were no subways in NYC, and only buses and autos were available, the city would be immobilized. New York City Subway - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
One thing to remember is the entire Los Angeles bus fleet uses alternative fuels. So the price of gas is the less powerful argument. And L.A. is already the American headquarters for a major Chinese electric bus company. Sadly, there are local electric bus manufacturers that aren't benefiting from the investment.
Rail can't go everywhere. Gaps have to be filled with bus service. There's no way around it, no other solution. New York, San Francisco, and other cities haven't found one either.
Personally, I was not originally a fan of electric traction rail. I had my hopes pinned on 'new technology' - whether maglev or something that might give us inexpensive, fast, and reliable transportation.
But the facts are there, staring us in the face.
The decades of public subsidy of the automobile / petroleum / paved road paradigm are now an albatross around our necks. We spend ONE QUARTER of our national wealth to support it.
Sadly, even new developments are still relying on the belief that there will be plenty of everything, and don't worry about the next 10, 20, or 50 years. Short term profit over everything.
The automobile, petroleum or electric, won't disappear, but it won't be anywhere near the current 250 million vehicles in the USA. It might dwindle to 20% of that - to 50 million vehicles- but that leaves 80% needing cheap transportation.
If you can find anything CHEAPER than electric traction rail, to move a nation's people, by all means, show us the data.
As I stated before, I didn't want to believe that we would have to "go back to the future". But the facts are clear. And the opposition from the cartel as well as any business dependent upon automobiles (not only Mini-Marts, but Shopping Centers, and other car-friendly businesses) is going to be major.
But if we do NOTHING, what happens when gasoline prices rise to $5, $10, $15 / gallon?
Today's economic recession will look like a boom time in comparison.
Everything is dependent upon petroleum - especially food production.
Frankly, things are going to be getting very very bad, very very soon.
Service ................ Psgr mi/gal
Subway (generic rail) ... 2520
Colorado bi-level coach.. 867
TGV (300 km/hr)..... 632
Toyota Prius.......... 238
Suzuki Motorcycle (GS500) 120
Airbus 320............ 69
Beechcraft Duchess... 38
Helicopter............. 18
Electric rail (like a subway) outperforms an electric car (like a Prius) by 10:1. So for a fixed supply of fuel, to move the most passengers, there's only one solution: RAIL.
You're arguing against rail with the wrong argument.
Suburbia was designed with the automobile in mind. Of course, it's not going to be efficiently served by rail. However, when gasoline hits $8/gallon, suburbia will be too expensive for most folks to live in. Rail is ideal for consolidated populations in high density villages and cities... which is what the 21st century folks will be gravitating to.
The benefits of scalable rail can be illustrated by New York City's Subway system, where 4 tracks (2 local, 2 express) provide the equivalent of 36 lanes of superhighway. If there were no subways in NYC, and only buses and autos were available, the city would be immobilized. New York City Subway - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Yes, in comparison to what was available at the time, streetcar suburbs were definitely efficient. Likewise, in the 1960s an IBM selectric was one mean machine. Now? Not so much. The first massed produced automobile wasn't until 1901, and the Model T was the first to be affordable to anything both the wealthy and even then was more than most earned in a year. By 1920, the price was about a third of what it had been in 1910 and about a TENTH what the first mass produced cars at the turn of the century cost. Suburbia was designed around whatever means of transit was most conveniet. That's why streetcar suburbs are called streetcar suburbs. Because they were suburbs designed around the use of streetcars. Streetcars. Not automobiles. Streetcars.
New York City, as everyone knows, has a hell of a lot more than 4 tracks. It has 24 lines, with most having two (or more)tracks. That's 432 lanes of superhighways or a capacity of 21,600,000. Not even New York City comes close to using its capacity. No one cares that a line could carry 900,000 people a day if it only carries 5,000.
The guy that made the video sounds like the bus riders union type that thinks that trains are replacing buses to benefit the wealthy at the expense of the transit dependent. He was kind of right that light rail is more expensive than buses per rider in LA, but you also get a far superior service. He should have asked the train riders if they would rather be on a bus than the train. Also, the busier lines like the blue line and even now the green line (iinm) are more efficient than the bus. Buses are a lower investment, but cost more to operate and need to be replaced sooner. For busier corridors trains are cheaper.
These were quite popular. The electric streetcar wasn't kind to them as a form of transportation since the tracks tended to be rather difficult to deal with.
If at sometime in the future gas becomes $10 a gallon, people will buy more fuel efficient cars and drive less. Land use will change. Streetcar suburbs were both more dense and more self-sustaining than the car suburbs that succeeded them. Attempting to keep the current auto-dependent building stock and force rail or buses at it is asininely stupid. By all means, begin planning. Build or redeveloped neighborhoods such that they would be feasible to provide bus or rail transit to. My generation at least is generally more interesting in living there than suburbia anyway. There is demand for it, which is why you see urban residential neighborhoods in many places thriving.
Not even New York City comes close to using its capacity. No one cares that a line could carry 900,000 people a day if it only carries 5,000.
A number of NYC subway lines are at or above capacity. (might have mentioned this before). There isn't room to run more trains on the tracks safely at higher frequency, and delays cascade. Busiest line has 1.1 million / day, more than 900,000.
DC also has capacity issues on a few lines, though it might be due to design problems.
A number of NYC subway lines are at or above capacity. (might have mentioned this before). There isn't room to run more trains on the tracks safely at higher frequency, and delays cascade. Busiest line has 1.1 million / day, more than 900,000.
DC also has capacity issues on a few lines, though it might be due to design problems.
The busiest line has 1.1 million a day passing through at one spot? Not possible. How many is it carrying per day on a given section of track? They might well be running the maximum number of cars that they can during peak hours. They still aren't carrying anything close to capacity.
Again, where you can get rail up even close to capacity, it makes a hell of a lot of sense. America, however, is not NYC.
The busiest line has 1.1 million a day passing through at one spot? Not possible. How many is it carrying per day on a given section of track? They might well be running the maximum number of cars that they can during peak hours. They still aren't carrying anything close to capacity.
Again, where you can get rail up even close to capacity, it makes a hell of a lot of sense. America, however, is not NYC.
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