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The cleanliness is impressive, but what impressed me even more was the efficiency. One morning in Tokyo, I saw construction workers starting to dig up a street
by jaynetics 7y ago
The cleanliness is impressive, but what impressed me even more was the efficiency.
One morning in Tokyo, I saw construction workers starting to dig up a street. It was a large operation, they were exposing some massive pipes, and there were a few policemen, politely pointing pedestrians to a way around the site.
In the evening I went the same way again, to see how far they had gotten with the digging. However, there was no hole anymore. They were already done, and the street looked like new, with hardly a trace of what had happened.
I felt kinda bad about my place (Germany), where this would have taken at least a week.
- mrmonkeyman 7y agoYou don't know if it was: A) just an inspection B) regulated to the same degree as in Germany (i.e. digging a hole and covering it up is easy if don't have rules) C) succesful D) done properly
- munmaek 7y agoThose are some rude assumptions, frankly. Yes they must be not as civilized as great Germany.
- scarejunba 7y agoSomehow, I suspect B, C, and D are spurious concerns.
- an_ko 7y agoSpeaking of 1 week: That's how long it took to repair this big sinkhole in front of Hakata main railway station in 2016, underground utilities and all. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/15/japan-fixes-vast-fukuoka-city-sinkhole-repaired-two-days https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/15/japan-fixes-va...
- Symbiote 7y agoYou would find the same in Central London, but not somewhere suburban. It's more a function of the size of the city, at least in rich countries with a functioning public service.
- nitrogen 7y agoSan Francisco streets seem to take years to be repaired.
- danans 7y agoPotholes yes, those take forever. But just this week I just saw a pipeline/conduit repair under the street in SF (like the GP described happening in Japan) that took 1 day. I suspect the job was prioritized somehow, or that it was just not too complicated.
- Ftuuky 7y agoIn Portugal it would have taken at least 2 months and the end result would be worse than before.
- jaclaz 7y agoSame in Italy, but with a twist, the actual work is actually done in two or three days, at the most four of five, but one day per week and a couple of weeks when noone is on site.
- crimsonalucard 7y agoDon’t feel bad, in San Francisco it took them 1 year to fix the 24th st. Bart escalator. 1 year. It’s pathetic.
- axaxs 7y agoIt's as bad if not worse in the US. There are plenty of national examples, so I'll just tell of a local one. Where I live, recently they decided to repair 3 sidewalk squares. I figure I alone could have done this in a few hours, a day at most. The crew of 3 spent the first day taping off the sidewalk. Day 2 tearing up one square. Day 3 tearing up the other 2 squares. Day 4 pouring one square. Day 5 pouring the other 2 squares. Day 8(after weekend) removing the caution tape. Six working days for one very tiny project.
- Tempest1981 7y agoOn Hwy 101 near Facebook, it seems like the roads have been under construction for maybe 1 year? And 2-3 years near University Ave. I wish we could invent some super-efficient equipment that makes road-building/construction 10x faster...