I mean, light rail seems to be pretty effective in Portland, the problems it does have donāt really seem to be efficiency related.
https://www.opb.org/article/2024/10/23/portland-max-stabbing-crime-trimet-death-oregon-bus-lawsuit/
- Snow and ice makes the tracks and switches fail all the time. If itās snowing, stay home.
- Hot weather makes the overhead power lines expand causing trains to have to slow down. If itās near or over 100Ā°, stay home.
Thanks for the reply. TIL about the Portlandās LRT. After watching a video about it [1], my impression about the LRT is that it seems like one of the best LRT in North America.
The crime part is really unfortunate though, and I doubt there is anything the LRT can do about it as itās not their fault, rather, itās probably a systematic problem, cmiiw.
The problem it canāt solve is that rich people might have to interact with mere humans. The car in a tube seats four and locks, so thereās zero chance youāll have to sit next to a minority.
I wonder if rail would be more appealing to them if the coaches were designed as multiple isolated cells that seated 4-6, rather than straight-through corridors that permit mingling. (Iāve seen some old designs like that, in German narrow-gauge form)
The problem it canāt solve is that rich people might have to interact with mere humans.
I can relate. We, in Indonesia, have a problem where politicians, whose never even ride a train before, gets to decide the policies about public transport, and those who gets the consequenece is low-middle class who uses public transport. There was a meme from a year ago where a tone-deaf politician says the overcrowded trains in Jakarta doesnāt exist even though it overcrowding is clearly a problem in regional line (KRL) due to lack of trains.
I wonder if rail would be more appealing to them if the coaches were designed as multiple isolated cells that seated 4-6, rather than straight-through corridors that permit mingling.
Assuming weāre talking about short distance trains, absolutely no, lol. Itās just space inefficient. I will understand if it is a long distance trains, and it is a thing.
Short-distance city trains used to have multiple compartments too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swing_Door_(train) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harris_(train)
I assumed the parent commenter meant this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compartment_coach
But if the commenter meant cross-seat trains like this:
then yeah it exists
i continue to weep for the death of Per Albin Hansson, the old social democrat leader who was so steadfast in riding the tram home to his apartment that heās known for his death happening immediately after stepping off the tram (heart attack) when he could have chosen to be driven home by another politician.
But hadnāt the city paid for those tunnels? How on earth does Elon own them?
Musk is not āpeople in the USā, and most of those have no say in what āgets builtā, so rephrase your blame, fellow crab in the bucket.
Yeah, should have rephrased that. AFAIK Elon is a South African, not even US citizen right?
Iām not even from USA to be clear, but my limited image of USA is that it lacks efforts of building public transport, especially compared to other developed countries. Heck, compared to developing countries even.
One of the example, US seems like a perfect place to build a high-speed rail network. Yet, CAHSR seems to keep getting delayed. In comparison Morocco has a HSR. Even Indonesia has one opened last year.
Youāre gonna love the history rabbit hole re: the automotive industry lobbying and all but singlehandedly squashing rail expansion (see: highways), NGL. šØš½āš³
I think we should stop saying ālobbyingā and start saying ācorruptionā or ābribingā isntead
The Vegas loop is a 2 mile tunnel accessible only to Teslas. Itās not solving any problems. They want to expand it- I donāt think that will go well.
How is it making money (as mentioned in the post), do people also have to pay to use it?
Edit: found it https://lvloop.com/tickets
Turns out it is a taxi service. I thought it is a tunnel that anyone could take to save time as well. Hereās a video of how it works.
Another interesting bit that I discovered is that city is not paying for these tunnels, they are covered by Boring company. Now it makes a bit more sense why this thing was ever allowed.