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A more realistic future (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/dankmemes@lemmy.world
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[–] 15 points 2 years ago (4 children)

How about self driving buses?

Trains are really cool, but not ideal for low traffic conditions + areas requiring a lot of route flexibility. We definitely should build a lot more trains/trams than what were building right now, but self driving buses will still have a very large use case.

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  • [–] 25 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    No one wants a bus! That's not cool.

    However, I've invented a revolutionary "shared mega limo". It's like an Uber, but with 50 seats, and optionally you can ride standing if you're sporty. It's the size of a bus, but definitely not a bus.

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  • [–] 16 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    The trick is you do both buses and trains. You use the buses to connect communities that don't have large transit requirements between them and then for commuting you use buses to direct people to train stations where they can get the trains to work/ where they need to go en masse. Transportation is a multilevel solution that requires multiple modes to get people where they need to go but you can't just rely on buses as quite frankly they lack the ability move all that many people even across quite short distances.

    Also to address the self driving part: autonomous road vehicles that can operate safely and at scale are well in the fucking magic territory of technology. If you want a proven highly autonomous travel technique that works trains have been doing it for decades.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago

    The trick is you do both buses and trains. You use the buses to connect communities that don’t have large transit requirements between them and then for commuting you use buses to direct people to train stations where they can get the trains to work/ where they need to go en masse. Transportation is a multilevel solution that requires multiple modes to get people where they need to go but you can’t just rely on buses as quite frankly they lack the ability move all that many people even across quite short distances.

    Multi-modal transport! This really is the way to do it and it's a damn shame that so many governments still seem hell-bent on the highway only. TxDOT's motto literally might as well be if you don't like it get out. The way it should be is this: If you wanna drive, drive but you are going to pay for your fair share. Nothing terribly expensive as seen $9 a day is all it takes in New York, and as an added benefit the reduced traffic from people taking other means will cause less car traffic for you. Sunny day and you want to enjoy the scenery, you got time? Separate grade bike paths along multipurpose drainage areas already being used and government-owned ROW, can bike wherever you're going on those shorter trips. Pouring rain outside and not safe to ride, but don't want to drive? Take the bus, a raincoat will keep you dry for the walk between home and the covered bus stop. Need to get to the airport across town? That's 30 miles, take the train and you'll be there soon and not have to worry about car parking since you left the car at home.

    This really is how things should be. But that would also mean big finance from car loans and big auto from repairs and costs, big insurance from legal fees of cars, and big energy sector from oil / gas / polymers / etc would all lose from less resources used. So they pressured the shit out of government to change things for the worse. Hopefully it gets better soon before I get too old to benefit from it.

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  • [+] 4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)
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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago

    Yeah self-driving at this point doesn't really add much. Just improving driving conditions with bus lanes and better driver support is much more useful as you'd have to have a supervisor on the bus anyway.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago

    BRT is a very good use case for this, where if rail is too expensive per mile to maintain from ridership you can still have a fast connection with 15 minute headways or better.

    It's popular because it's cheap and fast to implement, so much so that latin american cities all over have been having massive success with them despite a limited budget. Unfortunately where I'm at the political fight has gotten so bad that they are cancelling bus lanes with lame duck reasoning such as "the paint is too expensive to maintain" and "we need more lanes for general traffic to sit in traffic in".

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