News Stories

[DonQuigleone]

Originally Posted by Vexx

You were probably unaware that "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" was based on actual history (okay, loosely -- but Los Angeles USED to have a quite good mass transit system of trolley cars that were consciously shut down via subterfuge by the automaking industry and its minions)

I was actually quite aware of it. But that's not the worst of it. The worst thing is just the poor sprawling layout that's endemic in many towns across America. And I don't think we can blame the car companies for that. They can buy up metropolitan streetcar companies in all the major cities, but they wouldn't be able to influence so many urban planners so thoroughly. No there was just a bad urban design paradigm in the 60s-80s.

How often do you drive through an American town to find it's main street dead, with it's activity replaced by a desolate strip mall located just out of town? Too often.

Most of the facilities offered at these malls could have been located in the centre of town, with some imagination.

[Vexx]

Originally Posted by DonQuigleone

I was actually quite aware of it. But that's not the worst of it. The worst thing is just the poor sprawling layout that's endemic in many towns across America. And I don't think we can blame the car companies for that. They can buy up metropolitan streetcar companies in all the major cities, but they wouldn't be able to influence so many urban planners so thoroughly. No there was just a bad urban design paradigm in the 60s-80s.

How often do you drive through an American town to find it's main street dead, with it's activity replaced by a desolate strip mall located just out of town? Too often.

Most of the facilities offered at these malls could have been located in the centre of town, with some imagination.

Its largely due to the self-destructive insane notion that "land use planning" is somehow communism.

Example: Houston, TX (where I grew up) is a fine example of "land use planning? Nope!". Junkyard, church, strip mall, school, strip bar, car dealer, repeat -- all along a typical street. Few people are even able to live near their work and most choose to live as far out of the city as possible with a few island exceptions. There is effectively *no* mass transit (more communism), the city buses do not run when and wear you need them.
Bike routes start nowhere -end nowhere. The city highways are arranged in a rotting onion wheelspoke and the inner sectors rot as the outer rings spread and mutate. The refineries run with little restraint and they are not maintained - the city is the brain cancer capital of the world among other things. I could go on, this is personal observation ... but I usually direct people to look at Houston when they whine there's "too much land use planning obstacles" in their city.

One of the absolutely brilliant things Portland, OR did was institute an urban growth boundary and moderate land-use planning. It has staved off much of the problems other cities have. Definitely not perfect and there's a lot to improve on, but it is rich when developers attempt to lobby away the rules that *make* the city a nice place to live so they can make a quick buck and leave.

[Tom Bombadil]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

A trouble with electric in America is distances. While they are coming to the point were an electric car can go about 200 miles on a charge....you can't recharge it in a relatively short period of time like you can pump gas into a fuel tank.

This is not entirely correct. The BYD-e6 has a quick charge mode where you can charge 50% of its capacity in 10 mins. The problem with the mode is that quick charge need special power stations, if I remember it correctly. I don't know other electric car models but I don't think this is an exclusive feature.

[Kamui4356]

Originally Posted by Vexx

but it is rich when developers attempt to lobby away the rules that *make* the city a nice place to live so they can make a quick buck and leave.

Until they succeed in doing so, of course. Then it's not so rich.

[Ithekro]

It is getting there. 10 minutes for half a charge is still a "long time" to the impatiant. One also assumes it can maintain speed at low charge, and you certainly don't want to deplete your battery even with technology improvements.

With their estimated heavy usage range (cause traffic and mountains are a thing in California) I'd guess 140 miles on a charge (for safety), with a half charge after ten minutes gets you another 70 to 80 miles. Then another ten minutes charge gets you another 70 to 80 miles....than another ten minute charge gets me 70 to 80 more miles....than one more ten minute half charge to get me to where my grandmother use to live 400 miles away. Or my father's trips to Oregon...

That is basically two to three hours of travel followed by a ten minute stop every hour and fifteen minutes at freeway speeds for the whole trip. You would need to have some sort of stations every 60 to 80 miles or so. Or some other setup to recharge the things. Mind you it takes about seven hours to make that trip confortably with a gas powered car, and one more stop than we take even when were are not rushing. One for gas, one for food, and one to let the food out. Typically we only do one stop for gas and no other stops (handling the other needs at that one time) with maybe another stop to pick up dinner just before arriving at our destination.

[DonQuigleone]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

With their estimated heavy usage range (cause traffic and mountains are a thing in California) I'd guess 140 miles on a charge (for safety), with a half charge after ten minutes gets you another 70 to 80 miles. Then another ten minutes charge gets you another 70 to 80 miles....than another ten minute charge gets me 70 to 80 more miles....than one more ten minute half charge to get me to where my grandmother use to live 400 miles away. Or my father's trips to Oregon...

Traffic would not be a consumption issue as Electric Motors don't need to idle like a combustion engine. The car could basically turn itself off.

That is basically two to three hours of travel followed by a ten minute stop every hour and fifteen minutes at freeway speeds for the whole trip. You would need to have some sort of stations every 60 to 80 miles or so. Or some other setup to recharge the things. Mind you it takes about seven hours to make that trip confortably with a gas powered car, and one more stop than we take even when were are not rushing. One for gas, one for food, and one to let the food out. Typically we only do one stop for gas and no other stops (handling the other needs at that one time) with maybe another stop to pick up dinner just before arriving at our destination.

I think the idea is that you wouldn't use such a car for such a long journey. You'd either take a train, a plane or use a petrol driven car. Electric Cars would have daily commutes as their primary use, not road trips.

[Tom Bombadil]

Found this on Youtube of an example of fast charging an electric bus.

[Dextro]

Originally Posted by Tom Bombadil

Found this on Youtube of an example of fast charging an electric bus.

That's actually a great idea for busses, it's essentially very similar to electric trams except that you don't need to be constantly feeding them energy and instead you charge a terminal at a terminal. For public transportations that sounds like a great idea.

As for the electric car I think the best route to take would be the same as the Chevy Volt/Opel Ampera: you make an electric car with some sort of generator as backup. The generator could be gas since that's the most widespread fuel we have now but nothing stops us from eventually replacing it with solar, hydrogen or, heck, even wind by using the car movement to move the paddles or something.

[Vexx]

Originally Posted by DonQuigleone

Traffic would not be a consumption issue as Electric Motors don't need to idle like a combustion engine. The car could basically turn itself off.


I think the idea is that you wouldn't use such a car for such a long journey. You'd either take a train, a plane or use a petrol driven car. Electric Cars would have daily commutes as their primary use, not road trips.

Most of the West Coast cities and intercity connections would be ideally served with a combination of electric personal vehicles, trolleys, light rail, and train - with buses used to supplement in rural or rapid growth areas. It just takes a governmental consensus rather like the Interstate Highway system did... but we don't seem to have leadership with that kind of determination for quality of life any more or the will to generate and assign the revenue allocations.

[Haak]

US Navy rescues Iranian hostages:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-16447862

[aohige]

Times like this I'm reminded of how far advanced my home country's public transportation is compared to the entire rest of the world.

One of the very few things we actually got it down to a science.

[solomon]

If youre an American, forget about public transportation until the wealthy exurbanites are heavily inconvienienced and start clamoring for it. Until then, it's pinko communism.

[Ithekro]

Actually dirty pinko communism. Most aren't all that clean.

[solomon]

If there's one thing I can say about the DC metro it's that it's DAMN clean for a US rapid transit system. No piss, no mess no nothin.

[DonQuigleone]

Or you could move to New York/Boston/Chicago.

I was fairly impressed with New York's metro.

[FDW]

Originally Posted by solomon

If youre an American, forget about public transportation until the wealthy exurbanites are heavily inconvienienced and start clamoring for it. Until then, it's pinko communism.

Well, most big American cities these do at least have the start of what could be a comprehensive system, and almost all of them have plans to expand upon those networks, with a few (Los Angeles, Denver, Dallas, Houston, Portland, Salt lake City, and Seattle) having big plans in the years to come.

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Actually dirty pinko communism. Most aren't all that clean.

As a regular Public Transit user, I can agree with you to a certain extent, though there's certainly some exaggeration about this.

Originally Posted by DonQuigleone

Or you could move to New York/Boston/Chicago.

I was fairly impressed with New York's metro.

New York's metro is really the only one like it in the world, and you can also add Portland, Philadelphia and San Francisco to the list.

And while we're on the subject of Public Transport, here's a list of planned openings and construction starts for 2012:

http://www.thetransportpolitic.com/2...nned-for-2012/

[ganbaru]

Unemployment near three-year low
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...7BM0AB20120107

[DonQuigleone]

Originally Posted by FDW

New York's metro is really the only one like it in the world, and you can also add Portland, Philadelphia and San Francisco to the list.

Well there is London, Paris and Tokyo as well. Most big cities have fairly comprehensive metro and train systems.

[MrTerrorist]

FBI updates rape-victim definition to include men

[Vexx]

Originally Posted by MrTerrorist

FBI updates rape-victim definition to include men

What year is this? 2012? And they just now got a clue?