Moving platforms- more Popular Mechanics flights of fancy

[bikkuri bahn]

Same old argument about railways being "19th century technology". You hear this sentiment often in the U.S.  You never, never, hear it in Japan.  Well, automobiles are also inventions of the 19th century, but you never have people saying they are outdated. Rather than dreaming about pie-in-the-sky designs, how about just building a reliable dedicated high speed rail system?  Some countries that claim to be "first world" can't even do that. Once again, anglocentric culture's obsession with gadgetbahn or "trying to hit the home run rather than more realistic base hits", to put it in baseball terms.

http://www.news.com.au/technology/sci-tech/the-21st-century-commute-why-change-trains-when-you-can-do-it-while-its-still-moving/story-fn5fsgyc-1226209350973

[Mudkip Orange]

You're totally misrepresenting that article.

The proposal is actually for trains, every rendering shows steel-wheel trains on what is presumably standard gauge.

The actual quote is "19th century infrastructure that was invented for steam trains." Which, if you're in the UK (as the inventor is), is entirely accurate - the Pendolinos and HSTs are, by and large, running on tracks that were laid out in the era of Stephenson and Brunel. It's not saying "rail is inherently antiquated"; it's saying "our (UK) rail is antiquated."

Yeah it's a little Buck Rogers and with a dense enough trunk of "standard" high speed lines you probably don't need it. But I frankly don't see where this is any more of a technological leap than the original Tokaido Shinkansen was circa 1964. In both cases you're supplanting an established domestic rail network with constraining geometry with a newer rail system on dedicated infrastructure.

I think you're just so anti-anglo-train proposals at this point you're chasing after hobgoblins.

[scott]

Staying out of that whole debate, this seems like a nightmare of timing. Everything has to work just right, or you won't connect up. That, or you catch-as-catch-can and the timetable goes out the window.

Plus what happens when a handicapped person or that guy with four suitcases can't get to the transfer point in time through a crowded tram?

It seems like a "neat idea" in theory, but, in practice, way more complicated than just having the trains stop at stations. And not necessarily more energy efficient.

[Martijn Meerts]

They should just concentrate on teleportation and be done with it :)

[cteno4]

the problem with futurists is there are so many variables effecting their proposals and they just ignore al of them and dream up dreams. while dreams are good, there are many more solid things to work on. the hurtles in this scheme are many. i agree with bikkuri bahn, this type of thinking is swinging for the fences and not doing the base hits that win the game.

jeff

[westfalen]

I honestly can't see this happening, if you read similar articles from fifty or so years ago we should all have our own personal hover cars by now and taking our vacations on the moon.

The reason that the shinkansen (and TGV and ICE etc) are successful is that they are basically ordinary trains, albeit with souped up traction motors and brakes, running on ordinary tracks and stopping at ordinary stations not something that tries to reinvent what Stephenson, Brunel and Co came up with in the 19th century. You can't equate 'steam age' technology with an old tea kettle gasping and wheezing along some weed grown branchline either, the above English gentlemen were achieving quite high speeds by the middle of the 19th century.

[bikkuri bahn]

I think you're just so anti-anglo-train proposals at this point you're chasing after hobgoblins.

The fact is, most of the harebrained public transport ideas come from England and the U.S. There is more realistic thinking in Germany, France and Asia.  I have nothing against the designer, it's an interesting if far-fetched concept.  The issue I have is the culture of eccentricity shared by both cultures, which has benefits it terms of invention, but also can be harmful when it is taken up by others as the only option to tried and true concepts, which are characterized as old fashioned.  Look at the PRT, or the maglev backers.  These concepts may have applications in limited cases, but have the risk of being utilized as a stalking horse for anti-rail advocates and the road lobby.  

[westfalen]

It would be easier just to run everything on time and properly coordinated like they do in Japan. You get on an all stops local at your home station, after a few stops you get off and cross the platform straight into the door of a 'semi rapid' which leaves immediately then a few more stations down the line you perform the same change into an express that takes you nonstop to the downtown terminal.

[The_Ghan]

John Wayne's been doing that on horse back in the US for over 100 years.  In fact, I'm sure I saw him do it one rainy Sunday just a few weeks back.   

Cheers

The_Ghan

[Webskipper]

Was it the Duke himself or Jerry Needam, the stunt guy?

And then a few years later a car named Trigger was jumped over a bridge. Burt Reynolds jumped between 2 cars in "Smokey and the Bandit" right? Run bandit run. Or did Sally Fields jump between seats and drive Trigger?

[gmat]

Did anyone else think of The Roads Must Roll by R. A. Heinlein when reading the Subject?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Roads_Must_Roll

Sometimes connections in Japan are maddening, like Chuo-Rikan Station where you have to pass through the small mall to get from the Den-en-toshi Line to the Enoshima Line. It seems that they wanted you to patronize the stores. Or Shinagawa Station where you have to take the stairs to the next platform to change between the Yamanote and the Keihin Tohoku Lines, but don't have to at Tamachi Station for example. I guess the latter is because the two lines separate after Shinagawa Station. It was the same thing at Noborito Station and even when they rebuilt the stations, you still have to walk a bit the change stations.

Best wishes,
Grant

[cteno4]

Roads must roll was my first thought as well. Actually a saner idea than thus guys! Good diminution x rendition (one of my modeling audio fun, old radio shows)

http://www.ussblackheart.org/radio/Dimension%20X/50-09-01%20Dimension%20X%20%20The%20Roads%20Must%20Roll.mp3

Can we say heathrow?! Not only do you have to schlep through endless malls but last time through there they limited you to one carry on item, but as much as you could carry from the malls! Folks were boarding with huge rolling bags from the mall! What a pain when things are designed to try to suck money out of you instead of doing a good job at what it should be doing!

Jeff

[Mudkip Orange]

Look at the PRT, or the maglev backers.  These concepts may have applications in limited cases, but have the risk of being utilized as a stalking horse for anti-rail advocates and the road lobby.

It's a totally valid point. PRT backers in particular have a long history of slamming almost all valid forms of public transportation.

I just don't see how this particular proposal can fall victim to that. Using steel-wheel standard gauge as a stalking horse against steel-wheel standard gauge... it can't be done.

[scott]

What a pain when things are designed to try to suck money out of you instead of doing a good job at what it should be doing!

Thus my problem with the last 50 years or so of American culture. ;-)