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Yeah. For the cost of all this retrofitting of roads, you’d be able to build the most insanely comprehensive transit system anyone has ever heard of. FWIW thou

Yeah. For the cost of all this retrofitting of roads, you’d be able to build the most insanely comprehensive transit system anyone has ever heard of. FWIW though, it probably is possible to use this sort of technology for buses and shuttles. You can’t fix markings on ALL the roads, but you can make sure the markings are good enough on main arterials to have a dedicated bus lane.

supertrope 7y ago
A lot of tech solutions to transportation problems are reinventing elements of mass transit. Self-driving trucks that are virtually linked like a train. Telling Uber pool rides to walk to the nearest intersection to optimize routes (like a bus stop). Central scheduling to share right of way timeslots between vehicles. Or tech fails to reinvent the wheel, e.g. assuming that the congestion and parking issues caused by too many single occupancy vehicles can be solved with software instead of dynamic road and parking pricing and high occupancy vehicles.
- naravara 7y ago
  >A lot of tech solutions to transportation problems are reinventing elements of mass transit. For sure. And I feel like they're going about it backwards by defaulting to maintaining norms of private property and leasing things starting with private/personally owned property and developing ways to lease it to for communal use. They'd probably have a more viable business model if they had started with communal property and charged rent or usage fees for maintenance instead. Jitney cabs or dollar vans have been around forever, and their big challenge was figuring out how to do dispatch and routing in a way that didn't give people intolerably long wait times.
wozniacki 7y ago
For the love of everything holy, some of us just dont want public transit - especially having seen the horrors of most public transit options even in the best managed nations and conditions. From one of my previous comments on a different post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638171 - - - - Reducing the number of cars (and therefore traffic) on the roads will benefit everybody You seem to have a rose-tinted view of the world we live in. Have you ever had to commute in less-than-ideal conditions? Heavy snow? Sleet? Black ice? Have you ever lived in places that are not perfectly flat? or lived in places that are hot that make bicycling unfeasible? Did you have sporting gear / work gear that you had to lug? Did you know some people have to fetch their own gear to work Did you have to take calls during transit? Did you know its common practice for employees to call into meetings during their commute and/or help assist operations via conference calls? Have you had to shop for more than a baguette or a bagel at a store? You know how cumbersome that gets for even a family of three? Do you have the slightest clue how much casual violence and crime happen on public transit?[1] Not to belabor the point but there simply are dozens of cases where bicycles or public transit just don't cut it. Not to mention the hygiene, personal safety (from other passengers for example) and personal space aspects involved in someone choosing a mode of transportation other than public transit or bicycling. Ride-sharing, autonomous vehicles and emission-free vehicles should all alleviate the issues we currently face with traffic, parking and accidents. However doing away with cars or vehicular traffic is just pollyannaish madness. [1] Teen robbed at gunpoint at Fruitvale, BART officer says writing a report is a 'waste of resources' https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bart-police-refuse-report-video-phone-call-oakland-13760013.php https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bart-police-refuse-repo... - - - - edit: formatting
- naravara 7y ago
  > Ride-sharing, autonomous vehicles and emission-free vehicles should all alleviate the issues we currently face with traffic, parking and accidents. No they won’t. This is just willful self-delusion on the part of transit haters. Most of your concerns are either just plain petty (like, just wear headphones if you don’t like hearing other people) or lacking in perspective (cars kill way more people than whatever safety concerns on a transit system you want to gussy up).

supertrope 7y ago

A lot of tech solutions to transportation problems are reinventing elements of mass transit. Self-driving trucks that are virtually linked like a train. Telling Uber pool rides to walk to the nearest intersection to optimize routes (like a bus stop). Central scheduling to share right of way timeslots between vehicles. Or tech fails to reinvent the wheel, e.g. assuming that the congestion and parking issues caused by too many single occupancy vehicles can be solved with software instead of dynamic road and parking pricing and high occupancy vehicles.

naravara 7y ago
>A lot of tech solutions to transportation problems are reinventing elements of mass transit. For sure. And I feel like they're going about it backwards by defaulting to maintaining norms of private property and leasing things starting with private/personally owned property and developing ways to lease it to for communal use. They'd probably have a more viable business model if they had started with communal property and charged rent or usage fees for maintenance instead. Jitney cabs or dollar vans have been around forever, and their big challenge was figuring out how to do dispatch and routing in a way that didn't give people intolerably long wait times.

wozniacki 7y ago

For the love of everything holy, some of us just dont want public transit - especially having seen the horrors of most public transit options even in the best managed nations and conditions. From one of my previous comments on a different post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19638171 - - - - Reducing the number of cars (and therefore traffic) on the roads will benefit everybody You seem to have a rose-tinted view of the world we live in. Have you ever had to commute in less-than-ideal conditions? Heavy snow? Sleet? Black ice? Have you ever lived in places that are not perfectly flat? or lived in places that are hot that make bicycling unfeasible? Did you have sporting gear / work gear that you had to lug? Did you know some people have to fetch their own gear to work Did you have to take calls during transit? Did you know its common practice for employees to call into meetings during their commute and/or help assist operations via conference calls? Have you had to shop for more than a baguette or a bagel at a store? You know how cumbersome that gets for even a family of three? Do you have the slightest clue how much casual violence and crime happen on public transit?[1] Not to belabor the point but there simply are dozens of cases where bicycles or public transit just don't cut it. Not to mention the hygiene, personal safety (from other passengers for example) and personal space aspects involved in someone choosing a mode of transportation other than public transit or bicycling. Ride-sharing, autonomous vehicles and emission-free vehicles should all alleviate the issues we currently face with traffic, parking and accidents. However doing away with cars or vehicular traffic is just pollyannaish madness. [1] Teen robbed at gunpoint at Fruitvale, BART officer says writing a report is a 'waste of resources' https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bart-police-refuse-report-video-phone-call-oakland-13760013.php https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bart-police-refuse-repo... - - - - edit: formatting

naravara 7y ago
> Ride-sharing, autonomous vehicles and emission-free vehicles should all alleviate the issues we currently face with traffic, parking and accidents. No they won’t. This is just willful self-delusion on the part of transit haters. Most of your concerns are either just plain petty (like, just wear headphones if you don’t like hearing other people) or lacking in perspective (cars kill way more people than whatever safety concerns on a transit system you want to gussy up).