JR East, the East Japan Railway Company, wants Tokyo commuters to stand on both sides of station escalators instead of reserving one side for impatient people who want to walk. A study found that most escalator accidents happen when walkers stumble over luggage or run and slip, so the all-standing policy is safer and more efficient.
Good luck with that. The policy was tried in Hong Kong, London’s underground and DC’s Metro, but it didn’t go over well. Standing to one side on escalators and walking on the other is too firmly embedded in urban behavior. In Washington, there’s even a song about it:
“Welcome to the new M.T.A.: Metropolitan Transit Athletics! Grab a towel, swipe your MetroCard, and get ready to sweat. Daily membership costs only $2.75.”
” … the gyroscopes would be initially powered by flywheels wound-up in the morning, and would continue to be powered throughout the day from energy supplied by solar panels mounted on the roofs of the cars. pods are stilted on expandable legs that can both contract and enlarge depending on the context, meaning they can pass under bridges and vehicular overpasses with ease. inside, passengers sit in rows just like they would on a subway or bus, or — alternatively — ride-in-style inside luxurious pods that include comfortable couches and TV sets.”
–” gyroscopic public transportation: your future commute?” designboom
China has almost 300 million private cars, and some of the worst traffic and air pollution in the world. Auto sales are brisk, crashes and road rage are epidemic, and it’s so dire a futuristic transit concept first proposed 45 years ago might finally get the green light.
In 1969 architects Craig Hodgetts and Lester Walker proposed the Bos-Wash Landliner, a towering vehicle running between DC and Boston with enough space underneath that passenger cars could dive under it. China’s Shenzhen Huashi Future Parking Equipment Company (HS Future) introduced a similar electric-powered “Straddle-Bus” design at a 2010 trade fair and updated it a few years later but got no, um, traction, and the concept went back into hibernation.
Until now. HS Future says it will start building the first 116 miles (186 km) of track in western Beijing’s Mentougou District for the “Widebody Elevated Dimensional Fast Bus” aka 3D Express Coach” at the end of the year. It will only travel through the city at about 38 mph (60 Km/hr) but holds 1400 passengers, isn’t troubled by traffic jams, doesn’t need its own dedicated lane or parking lot, and only costs about 15% of what a subway would.
A robotic bus in Trikala, Greece, is serving city passengers for free. In the first six months of operation there have been no accidents or complaints about rude drivers.
“The quality of life in cities has much to do with systems of transport, which are often a source of much suffering for those who use them. Many cars, used by one or more people, circulate in cities, causing traffic congestion, raising the level of pollution, and consuming enormous quantities of non-renewable energy. This makes it necessary to build more roads and parking areas which spoil the urban landscape. Many specialists agree on the need to give priority to public transportation. Yet some measures needed will not prove easily acceptable to society unless substantial improvements are made in the systems themselves, which in many cities force people to put up with undignified conditions due to crowding, inconvenience, infrequent service and lack of safety.”
— Laudato si’, Encyclical Letter of Pope Francis on care for our common home
