3 ms·

I understand this is asked every time, but honestly in the 2 months of Covid19 and 20 years of post-9/11, I still haven't seen an answer that makes sense: Why

I understand this is asked every time, but honestly in the 2 months of Covid19 and 20 years of post-9/11, I still haven't seen an answer that makes sense: Why are we obsessing over airplane security so much, but completely ignoring ground transportation? Never mind Metro/Subway/Underground, which we can claim not every city has (I'd still imagine total number of subway passengers daily outweighs airplane passengers or is at least comparable) - what about buses? Trains? Street cars and trams? Any airplane I've ever flown had better filtering and circulation, more spacing and better hygiene, than any bus I've ever ridden in. Every airport terminal was more spacious than every indoors bus or train terminal. Across countries and continents this ratio has held true. So why this obsession with airplanes as the vulnerable part of the equation? Is it all just... human inability to calculate risks and our focus on the "flashy"? I've done 50-75 flights a year over last 10 years; none last 2 months obviously, and I don't foresee any soon; but I'm DEFINITELY not going to take our friendly neighbourhood Toronto subway if I can help it, as much as it's the key to fighting traffic and pollution. This should be throwing our entire transportation industry into disarray and restart fundamental discussions about urban planning and urban landscaping of the future... and yet I only ever see the airline industry mentioned.

ajsnigrutin 7y ago
> Is it all just... human inability to calculate risks and our focus on the "flashy"? I think this ^ Plus, on the ground we think we have control... someone sick comes on the bus, we think we can 'escape' from the bus on that (or next) station. Same with general safety.... if you drive a car, you think you're invincible, and that your superpower reflexes and supersenses will predict anything happening around you, and you'll be able to avoid any accident... but on a plane, engines stop working, and there's literally nothing you can do, sometimes for many minutes until you (probably) crash and die. Of course, statistics show different safety numbers, but for most people, statistics is about "them" and not "us".
hartator 7y ago
Airplanes are private so the authoritarian left is happy over regulated them. Buses and trains are usually public, so no one dares talking bad about them.
- chasd00 7y ago
  I think there's truth here too. Given how likely the NYC subway is responsible for the disproportionate illness and death why hasn't it been shutdown?
  - ghaff 7y ago
    Because the city cannot function without it.
sesuximo 7y ago
A plane costs 200mil and a bus costs a few hundred k. I don't think it's "flashiness" ... It's cost. Also, arguably we over fit tragic experiences. Because we lived through 911, we made sure the exact same thing would be hard to repeat... We didn't make it much harder for that type of thing to happen
michaelt 7y ago
Probably because airlines go bankrupt constantly, and are begging the government for cash handouts right now? Whereas busses and metro systems and roads are often city-owned, and them being given taxpayer cash is just business as usual.
- chasd00 7y ago
  Also, all the outbreak games, animations, and simulations show planes flying everywhere spreading disease and not packed subways and buses. finally, like you said, the airline industry is always living on the edge and in the news.
dredmorbius 7y ago
Inter-regional disease vectors. Air travel is a pandemic engine. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23142043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23142043
throwaway9d0291 7y ago
I agree we should have more/better ground transportation but: > Any airplane I've ever flown had better filtering and circulation, more spacing and better hygiene, than any bus I've ever ridden in. And most modern trains I've ridden beat a plane on all of those metrics. > Every airport terminal was more spacious than every indoors bus or train terminal. Airport terminals have to accommodate planes, which are enormous, inconveniently shaped, move slowly between the runway and the terminal and spend at least ~1h exchanging passengers and cargo. This means there's a large number of very large vehicles sitting around that need space and infrastructure, which means the airport terminals have to be huge. Since they're required to be huge and large amounts of real estate are needed, airports are also usually located far from the center of the city they serve. And finally, people are forced to spend a lot of time in an airport, so there's a lot of opportunity to make a lot of money from passengers, which means incentive to spend a lot making the terminal a nice place to be. Trains and buses are much easier to accommodate and typically sit at their station for minutes at a time, which means the station can be much more compact. The stations are usually located throughout the cities they serve, which means real estate is expensive and should be kept to a minimum. Passengers usually pass through a train station in a matter of minutes and don't have a need to loiter and be captive to the shops there, so there's not as much in the way of opportunity for profit. > So why this obsession with airplanes as the vulnerable part of the equation? Is it all just... human inability to calculate risks and our focus on the "flashy"? Because airlines can go bankrupt relatively easily. It's exciting when a big, well-known company dies. > This should be throwing our entire transportation industry into disarray and restart fundamental discussions about urban planning and urban landscaping of the future... and yet I only ever see the airline industry mentioned. I think because there's not a whole lot that can be done there. Cities are already there, they've already been planned. You can't easily take a city built around roads and rebuild it around trains, trams or a subway, especially in America, which is what you'll see most of on HN. The most I've seen is a city that already has trams and trains replace roads to expand their already mature train or tram network.

ajsnigrutin 7y ago

> Is it all just... human inability to calculate risks and our focus on the "flashy"? I think this ^ Plus, on the ground we think we have control... someone sick comes on the bus, we think we can 'escape' from the bus on that (or next) station. Same with general safety.... if you drive a car, you think you're invincible, and that your superpower reflexes and supersenses will predict anything happening around you, and you'll be able to avoid any accident... but on a plane, engines stop working, and there's literally nothing you can do, sometimes for many minutes until you (probably) crash and die. Of course, statistics show different safety numbers, but for most people, statistics is about "them" and not "us".

hartator 7y ago

Airplanes are private so the authoritarian left is happy over regulated them. Buses and trains are usually public, so no one dares talking bad about them.

chasd00 7y ago
I think there's truth here too. Given how likely the NYC subway is responsible for the disproportionate illness and death why hasn't it been shutdown?
- ghaff 7y ago
  Because the city cannot function without it.

sesuximo 7y ago

A plane costs 200mil and a bus costs a few hundred k. I don't think it's "flashiness" ... It's cost. Also, arguably we over fit tragic experiences. Because we lived through 911, we made sure the exact same thing would be hard to repeat... We didn't make it much harder for that type of thing to happen

michaelt 7y ago

Probably because airlines go bankrupt constantly, and are begging the government for cash handouts right now? Whereas busses and metro systems and roads are often city-owned, and them being given taxpayer cash is just business as usual.

chasd00 7y ago
Also, all the outbreak games, animations, and simulations show planes flying everywhere spreading disease and not packed subways and buses. finally, like you said, the airline industry is always living on the edge and in the news.

dredmorbius 7y ago

Inter-regional disease vectors. Air travel is a pandemic engine. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23142043 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23142043

throwaway9d0291 7y ago

I agree we should have more/better ground transportation but: > Any airplane I've ever flown had better filtering and circulation, more spacing and better hygiene, than any bus I've ever ridden in. And most modern trains I've ridden beat a plane on all of those metrics. > Every airport terminal was more spacious than every indoors bus or train terminal. Airport terminals have to accommodate planes, which are enormous, inconveniently shaped, move slowly between the runway and the terminal and spend at least ~1h exchanging passengers and cargo. This means there's a large number of very large vehicles sitting around that need space and infrastructure, which means the airport terminals have to be huge. Since they're required to be huge and large amounts of real estate are needed, airports are also usually located far from the center of the city they serve. And finally, people are forced to spend a lot of time in an airport, so there's a lot of opportunity to make a lot of money from passengers, which means incentive to spend a lot making the terminal a nice place to be. Trains and buses are much easier to accommodate and typically sit at their station for minutes at a time, which means the station can be much more compact. The stations are usually located throughout the cities they serve, which means real estate is expensive and should be kept to a minimum. Passengers usually pass through a train station in a matter of minutes and don't have a need to loiter and be captive to the shops there, so there's not as much in the way of opportunity for profit. > So why this obsession with airplanes as the vulnerable part of the equation? Is it all just... human inability to calculate risks and our focus on the "flashy"? Because airlines can go bankrupt relatively easily. It's exciting when a big, well-known company dies. > This should be throwing our entire transportation industry into disarray and restart fundamental discussions about urban planning and urban landscaping of the future... and yet I only ever see the airline industry mentioned. I think because there's not a whole lot that can be done there. Cities are already there, they've already been planned. You can't easily take a city built around roads and rebuild it around trains, trams or a subway, especially in America, which is what you'll see most of on HN. The most I've seen is a city that already has trams and trains replace roads to expand their already mature train or tram network.