3 ms·

Basically - NIH syndrome from the 60s. Some more historical research here: https://www.kalw.org/show/crosscurrents/2016-07-05/hey-area-how-the-width-of-bart-t

Basically - NIH syndrome from the 60s. Some more historical research here: https://www.kalw.org/show/crosscurrents/2016-07-05/hey-area-how-the-width-of-bart-tracks-affects-your-commute https://www.kalw.org/show/crosscurrents/2016-07-05/hey-area-... Seems highly likely that keeping freight trains off the tracks also factored into the decision. Huge shame that they didn't consider the ongoing maintenance cost of using a non-standard gauge.

apsurd 4y ago
I have to be honest, I frequently find myself with NIH syndrome. I just don't understand how we can make progress if we defer to "everything is a solved problem!" Truly, help me understand how to better navigate when to defer and when to have the courage to invent here.
- syntheweave 4y ago
  The secret lies in the difference between addressing the problem and solving the problem. Society is full of problems that are addressed with "solutions" that don't work, or don't work in the way we think they do. Arguments like "the best code is no code" basically allude to the idea of defining the problem in a way that allows a solution without addressing it through some complex technical dependency. In transportation there is a lot of popular discussion based around different modalities like car, train, bike. Each one has its enthusiasts arguing for a mode being a solution. This is a very engaging topic because it creates the grounds for an ideology: "everything will be great once we eliminate x and build more y". A great way of addressing transport issues while not discussing the overall problem in terms of land use, tripmaking needs, accessibility, safety, etc. The path to the actual solution is through studying all those other things to identify what key metrics are in play and then specifying your solution in terms of "must meet this metric". That's where the meat of any problem lies, because the person who lays down the finishing touches is building on all that preparatory work - supply chains, scientific principles, engineering tolerances and so on. And, of course, there's another path into addressing without solving by selecting unrealistic metrics that don't suggest how to move forward. Before you even have the metrics you need good critical thinking skills, ability to collect and analyze data, and some resulting media that communicates the findings like a document. That's a whole job in itself, and then selling and marketing it is another. And then maybe we get to actually implementing something. It takes a lot, in all. It's almost imperceptible how we progress on big issues. And the whole way through someone is trying to steal credit for some part of it.
- bluGill 4y ago
  There is a difference between inventing something different to understand and not using it and inventing something and trying to force it on the world. Standards are often useful. In the case of trains they could be a lot cheaper if everyone agreed one one standard and only made changes when everyone agrees to upgrade at once (over 40 years counts as at once,so long as there is agreement). All the different standards mean manufactures have to have more expensive jigs, and also cannot optimize their lines as much. Though wheel gauge within limits that Bart fits is not too big a deal to adjust on a line.
  - eternityforest 4y ago
    This one is hard, it seems like the wider gauge really is way better, but... it's not the standard. Not really any ideal solution here, if the standard isn't suitable, you need something nonstandard.
    - thaumasiotes 4y ago
      Why does it matter that it's not the standard? Standards are for interoperation. Are we trying to run BART trains on non-BART tracks?
      - bobthepanda 4y ago
        Often the cheapest way of building new rail lines is to repurpose existing ones. Having to regauge or parallel them instead significantly raises costs. BART has actually built or planned to build standard gauge since then to reduce costs on future extensions. Some extensions, like BART absorbing Caltrain to go to San Jose, have failed due to the cost.
        frosted-flakes 4y ago
        Toronto's streetcars and subway trains also have a unique gauge, but all new lines built and about to be built will use standard gauge. Extensions to the existing three subway lines and the streetcar network will continue to use the old gauge.
- eternityforest 4y ago
  Things being standardized is in itself a benefit. Anything unique has to outweigh that. If you invent a competitor to microSD that somehow stores 50% more data in the same space(For example only, just ignore the fact that form factor is independent of the flash storage tech), I would be annoyed. If you push to make it the global standard and succeed, I'll still be annoyed but appreciate the progress. If you just make a line of devices with unique storage, I'll probably be like, yeah, but MicroSD was fine and this doesn't work with my readers, and now I have to buy a new card. In software NIH often doesn't offer much benefit at all. It's usually just "We want to build it ourselves and really understand it". Sometimes features are even worse("We don't need to support importing those formats, build something smaller that only support one"). Sometimes performance is worse ("Who needs a million line library with crazy vector instructions? 5 lines of C will do").
- DonHopkins 4y ago
  Get to the money!!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taJ4MFCxiuo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taJ4MFCxiuo
- light_hue_1 4y ago
  > I frequently find myself with NIH syndrome. I just don't understand how we can make progress if we defer to "everything is a solved problem!" Progress involves making the best changes we can. NIH syndrome means re-litigating small changes that aren't impactful rather than focusing on the new big ticket items that will really make a difference. What's the point in optimizing something that will have a negligible return when there are better opportunities? And there's also the important downside of NIH syndrome. It might just be that the people who solved the problem initially knew what they were doing and you'll discover years down the road that your solution doesn't help anyone make progress, it was actually a terrible mistake. Like the BART solution. The people who did this were aerospace engineers. They thought they were improving on train design. Well, they were not. They were ignoring important constraints you only learn about later: the fact that interoperability between train tracks is critical to long-term development and efficient operation. Extending BART is a nightmare, it cannot share track with other systems, you cannot move trains on other systems to get them to BART which makes it far more expensive to do anything, the parts are incredibly expensive now that the supply chain for them is tiny. Basically every commuter suffers every day because of this idiotic decision which keeps the system fragmented. And that's what NIH syndrome gets you. You think you're making progress. But you often just have a terrible understanding of the problem and you're building yourself long-term technical debt.
QuadrupleA 4y ago
From reading TFA: it was a cheap way to improve lateral stability of the lightweight cars in high wind conditions. And the gauge used was common in some other countries like India. Don't know what NIH syndrome has to do with it, doesn't sound like interoperating with other rail systems was in the spec.
- bobthepanda 4y ago
  The people who developed the BART were Rohr Inc., which up until that point was an aerospace company. In that sense, they basically ignored most of the previous lessons learned by the industry. They also entered busmaking at this time and produced the Flxible 870, a notorious lemon of a bus.
- amacneil 4y ago
  From TFA: “The pamphlet does not specify why only the wide gauge of five-feet-six inches was tested and not others.” Standard gauge was ubiquitous in the US at the time, and this engineering firm didn’t even evaluate it in their report, despite the fact that the original BART plans called for standard gauge. Stability of standard gauge has since been proven to be a complete non-issue. If you read more about the history of BART, everything about it was NIH. They thought they were going to design some new space-age standard and usher in a new era of public transportation.
andbberger 4y ago
meanwhile the peninsula joint powers board (caltrain) had the option to kick freight off their right of way and opted not to. and spends hundreds of millions of dollars building grade separations to freight standards (low max grade) while getting the rails destroyed nightly by heavy badly maintained freight cars

apsurd 4y ago

I have to be honest, I frequently find myself with NIH syndrome. I just don't understand how we can make progress if we defer to "everything is a solved problem!" Truly, help me understand how to better navigate when to defer and when to have the courage to invent here.

syntheweave 4y ago
The secret lies in the difference between addressing the problem and solving the problem. Society is full of problems that are addressed with "solutions" that don't work, or don't work in the way we think they do. Arguments like "the best code is no code" basically allude to the idea of defining the problem in a way that allows a solution without addressing it through some complex technical dependency. In transportation there is a lot of popular discussion based around different modalities like car, train, bike. Each one has its enthusiasts arguing for a mode being a solution. This is a very engaging topic because it creates the grounds for an ideology: "everything will be great once we eliminate x and build more y". A great way of addressing transport issues while not discussing the overall problem in terms of land use, tripmaking needs, accessibility, safety, etc. The path to the actual solution is through studying all those other things to identify what key metrics are in play and then specifying your solution in terms of "must meet this metric". That's where the meat of any problem lies, because the person who lays down the finishing touches is building on all that preparatory work - supply chains, scientific principles, engineering tolerances and so on. And, of course, there's another path into addressing without solving by selecting unrealistic metrics that don't suggest how to move forward. Before you even have the metrics you need good critical thinking skills, ability to collect and analyze data, and some resulting media that communicates the findings like a document. That's a whole job in itself, and then selling and marketing it is another. And then maybe we get to actually implementing something. It takes a lot, in all. It's almost imperceptible how we progress on big issues. And the whole way through someone is trying to steal credit for some part of it.
bluGill 4y ago
There is a difference between inventing something different to understand and not using it and inventing something and trying to force it on the world. Standards are often useful. In the case of trains they could be a lot cheaper if everyone agreed one one standard and only made changes when everyone agrees to upgrade at once (over 40 years counts as at once,so long as there is agreement). All the different standards mean manufactures have to have more expensive jigs, and also cannot optimize their lines as much. Though wheel gauge within limits that Bart fits is not too big a deal to adjust on a line.
- eternityforest 4y ago
  This one is hard, it seems like the wider gauge really is way better, but... it's not the standard. Not really any ideal solution here, if the standard isn't suitable, you need something nonstandard.
  - thaumasiotes 4y ago
    Why does it matter that it's not the standard? Standards are for interoperation. Are we trying to run BART trains on non-BART tracks?
    - bobthepanda 4y ago
      Often the cheapest way of building new rail lines is to repurpose existing ones. Having to regauge or parallel them instead significantly raises costs. BART has actually built or planned to build standard gauge since then to reduce costs on future extensions. Some extensions, like BART absorbing Caltrain to go to San Jose, have failed due to the cost.
      - frosted-flakes 4y ago
        Toronto's streetcars and subway trains also have a unique gauge, but all new lines built and about to be built will use standard gauge. Extensions to the existing three subway lines and the streetcar network will continue to use the old gauge.
eternityforest 4y ago
Things being standardized is in itself a benefit. Anything unique has to outweigh that. If you invent a competitor to microSD that somehow stores 50% more data in the same space(For example only, just ignore the fact that form factor is independent of the flash storage tech), I would be annoyed. If you push to make it the global standard and succeed, I'll still be annoyed but appreciate the progress. If you just make a line of devices with unique storage, I'll probably be like, yeah, but MicroSD was fine and this doesn't work with my readers, and now I have to buy a new card. In software NIH often doesn't offer much benefit at all. It's usually just "We want to build it ourselves and really understand it". Sometimes features are even worse("We don't need to support importing those formats, build something smaller that only support one"). Sometimes performance is worse ("Who needs a million line library with crazy vector instructions? 5 lines of C will do").
DonHopkins 4y ago
Get to the money!!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taJ4MFCxiuo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taJ4MFCxiuo
light_hue_1 4y ago
> I frequently find myself with NIH syndrome. I just don't understand how we can make progress if we defer to "everything is a solved problem!" Progress involves making the best changes we can. NIH syndrome means re-litigating small changes that aren't impactful rather than focusing on the new big ticket items that will really make a difference. What's the point in optimizing something that will have a negligible return when there are better opportunities? And there's also the important downside of NIH syndrome. It might just be that the people who solved the problem initially knew what they were doing and you'll discover years down the road that your solution doesn't help anyone make progress, it was actually a terrible mistake. Like the BART solution. The people who did this were aerospace engineers. They thought they were improving on train design. Well, they were not. They were ignoring important constraints you only learn about later: the fact that interoperability between train tracks is critical to long-term development and efficient operation. Extending BART is a nightmare, it cannot share track with other systems, you cannot move trains on other systems to get them to BART which makes it far more expensive to do anything, the parts are incredibly expensive now that the supply chain for them is tiny. Basically every commuter suffers every day because of this idiotic decision which keeps the system fragmented. And that's what NIH syndrome gets you. You think you're making progress. But you often just have a terrible understanding of the problem and you're building yourself long-term technical debt.

QuadrupleA 4y ago

From reading TFA: it was a cheap way to improve lateral stability of the lightweight cars in high wind conditions. And the gauge used was common in some other countries like India. Don't know what NIH syndrome has to do with it, doesn't sound like interoperating with other rail systems was in the spec.

bobthepanda 4y ago
The people who developed the BART were Rohr Inc., which up until that point was an aerospace company. In that sense, they basically ignored most of the previous lessons learned by the industry. They also entered busmaking at this time and produced the Flxible 870, a notorious lemon of a bus.
amacneil 4y ago
From TFA: “The pamphlet does not specify why only the wide gauge of five-feet-six inches was tested and not others.” Standard gauge was ubiquitous in the US at the time, and this engineering firm didn’t even evaluate it in their report, despite the fact that the original BART plans called for standard gauge. Stability of standard gauge has since been proven to be a complete non-issue. If you read more about the history of BART, everything about it was NIH. They thought they were going to design some new space-age standard and usher in a new era of public transportation.

andbberger 4y ago

meanwhile the peninsula joint powers board (caltrain) had the option to kick freight off their right of way and opted not to. and spends hundreds of millions of dollars building grade separations to freight standards (low max grade) while getting the rails destroyed nightly by heavy badly maintained freight cars