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A key aspect of Gadgetbahns is they are always Not Trains™ and the reason for that is because trains are old tech that is hard to hype, but moreso because hard
by darkpuma 8y ago
A key aspect of Gadgetbahns is they are always Not Trains™ and the reason for that is because trains are old tech that is hard to hype, but moreso because hard data already exists for how expensive trains are to build and Gadgetbahn advocates would rather have the luxury of pulling numbers out of their ass.
- throwaway2048 8y agoAnother thing they share is they have almost all the same requirements as trains, and thus, inevitably, similar costs.
- bobthepanda 8y agoYeah. A lot of times, you will see things like “this new technology can be built elevated/underground really cheaply so you don’t have to buy the land underneath!” Except that’s not how property rights work in Western countries at all, and at a practical level things like emergency walkways or fire ventilation or maintenance passageways end up eating whatever the miniscule difference in right-of-way width is.
- darkpuma 8y agoYou also have the matter of the Gadgetbahn advocate convienently neglecting to mention that most of the cost of a typical subway system goes into the cavernous stations. They pretend the costs of a modern subway station is purely the cost per mile of tunnel, and that's the number they compare their pure cost per mile number to. So the subway cost per mile includes stations, while the Gadgetbahn cost per mile doesn't include anything other than tunnel boring. Certainly not the costs of each ludicrous car elevator.