Middle Class Trains (Continued)

[whingknutt]

First off I'd like to say that while Blogs (LJ in this case) are nice for putting a quick idea out there they generally suck for having a decent on going discussion with a group of people. Hence the reason for a second post, instead of another reply

Comments

[tim_dodge]

I think that a more cost effective solution is an electric rail that charges electric motors in cars, combined with a wireless network to control simultaneous breaking and opening holes for other cars to merge into. Just like bumper cars at the fair have antennae that touch a charged grid overhead, you can have electric cars with tails that touch this rail, perhaps charged only at intervals (as a giant strip of what amounts to a "third rail" might be a little dangerous). I've always wanted a networked traffic system. As soon as one person applies the breaks, all cars in line behind them slow down as well, and then accelerate. Now, we're giving up a lot of our independence driving, but so are we also in a train. If a driver leans over to grab a CD, child, or drink, and swerves, I'd love to see every car move perfectly out of the way, each car compensating just enough to keep everyone safe. I don't think a traffic network would be all that hard

[whingknutt]

I like your idea for the networked traffic, especially in using a power-feeding grid to track movement and coordinate automation. I think that since we currently re-pave most highways and roads every 5-20 years it would be pretty easy to impliment it. The power could be fed at a low rate, merely to improve the performance of electric-based cars (such as hybrids). This would allow you to incorporate it into the pavement (don't ask me how), which would avoid the issue of hanging a wire mesh above all of the roadways. You could then just run wide strip antennae to the ground

[shogunhb]

Read "The Roads Must Roll" by Robert Heinlein.

[benana]

The conveyor belts remind me of what I always thought was a really cool (but sadly impractical, for liability reasons if nothing else) idea from Asimov's robot short stories: have a series of conveyor belts (for pedestrians) going at different speeds, I think he used 15 mph intervals (which is probably too high, by hey, it's fiction). People get on, go to a faster track if they're going far, and go to a slower one when it's time to get off. It probably wouldn't do well if it got too crowded, and maintaining a mass-transit system of n conveyor belts would probably be a nightmare, but I still think it would be really cool

[dontime]

So this is just the idea from the robot novels by Asimov right? "The Caves of Steel" for example?

[purly]

As long as you had the railing/walls moving at the same speed as the main lane, it should be fine since it will seem like you're not moving. You would need to prevent people getting sick and I think the getting on/off would be the part with the biggest possibility of crashes; I wouldn't use smaller conveyor belts speeding up and slowing down since people are likely to trip in between, but maybe some sort of sidecar mechanism that you get in and it speeds up to the speed of the belt and then you step off onto the belt: as long as someone can offer you a hand when you step onto the belt or something.