10
Aug

2010

One Empty Path (London Cable Car)

Post by Steven Dale

Alex Dziuk (LX to comment readers) is a reader of The Gondola Project and a Masters student at the University of Stuttgart. Last week he sent me these images he prepared for his thesis on a potential London Cable Propelled Transit system.

They’re witty, inspired and beautiful. And just to prevent any confusion they may raise, they have nothing to do with the proposed Olympic Cable Car/Gondola for the 2012 Olympics.

Take a look:

Thanks so much to LX! Good luck on the thesis!



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Want more? Purchase Cable Car Confidential: The Essential Guide to Cable Cars, Urban Gondolas & Cable Propelled Transit and start learning about the world's fastest growing transportation technologies.

London Cable Car
10
Comments

Comments

  1. Katharina
    August 10, 2010 – 7:26 am
    WOW, great images- I like them a lot! @LX: What exactly is the topic of your thesis? How come you write about urban gondolas?
  2. Matty t
    August 10, 2010 – 8:58 pm
    "Yes, that simple" with the string pulled between the hands over the city, is a really simple and powerful image. A+ for LX.
  3. Ryan O'Connor
    August 11, 2010 – 2:37 am
    Nice Alex! Simple, thought provoking, and damn good marketing... The ropeway industry could do with more people like yourself. What was your supervisors and professors response to your cable/PT studies?
  4. Dave Brough
    August 11, 2010 – 8:28 am
    He gets a D-. People don't have imaginations, so the name of the game in marketing is "Show 'em what they're going to get, then show 'em again". If Alex can photoshop in Harry Potter and winged buses, he could also easily photoshop in gondolas suspended over the streets. Good example of integrating a gondola into a setting is Montreal's Telecabine. Back to work, Alex.
  5. LX
    August 11, 2010 – 9:24 am
    @Katharina - the topic of my thesis is London Cable. On the one hand I'm heading for the aim to proof that cable cars can be functional in urban areas and on the other hand to show the options in design and lifestyle: simply spoken their beauty. the reason? i was always fascinated in infrastructure and traffic, as in technology and design. i study architecture and urban design at the university of stuttgart and when i started my thesis, there was a suggestion of an institute about cable cars in my city. somehow i liked the idea to look behind the story and when i went to london and took a look into their preparations of the olympic games the idea was born. their transportation network is expensive and overloaded. the streets are overloaded too and during games london made the promise that out of 12000 athletes 80% would need less than 20 minutes to reach their venues and besides road-lines will be closed for the transportation of the athletes and stuff. each athlete needs support (physical staff, media and family) and they all need to be multiplied to that 20% of the 12000. so instead of building a london eye which just lifts you up 135 meters and brings you down again the idea was to design a modern urban cable car which has an exclusive olympic use (connect 2 of 3 olympic zones with each other) for athletes and media and maybe some tourists at the time when athletes won't need it and postolympic as an additional piece of infrastructure and of course probably londons best toy for tourists (which view could be better that the one flying above roofs or over streets, right?) @Ryan - the Professor likes the idea of an urban gondola. I came up with a very simple route to connect 3 points in London for the Olympic Games. But that turned out to be more like a usefull "London Eye". He was more interested in seeing the opportunities of an urban Gondola so I did an analysis on cable cars and proposals - like the cable car for toronto. And since you have different needs in different areas and probably the system being used right now for cable cars represents not be the best solution I'm digging right now a little deeper into opportunities in the technology itself. to inspire me the supervisors sometimes come up with ideas, which are simply not working but from time to time other good ideas are born. and that's why i would like whoever is interested to come up with ideas about direction changes and design or simply: when you did travel by cable car: what did you like? what didn't you? what would you like to see/have in an urban cable car? what should a cabin have? how would you like to travel? ANYTHING, which comes up your mind about what is good and wrong and else: write it down and post it. or send it to me (a sketch on a tissue etc. -> make a photo or scan it) alex_dziuk >!a!t!< yahoo.com is my email-address
  6. Steven Dale
    August 11, 2010 – 9:53 am
    Dave, It's easy to criticize, another thing to present an alternative.
  7. LX
    August 11, 2010 – 10:13 am
    @ Dave - you are right. But at that point right now I don't know the exact path (over streets, with streetlines, over houses). So for now the intention was to show opportunities. Next step is to get into station design and after that it's about gondola design and when all is final: i will photoshop exact images with everything in it. I'm heading back to work.
  8. Jeff
    August 12, 2010 – 12:54 am
    Wow, amazing work. Good job aLeX! ^_^
  9. Dave Brough
    August 12, 2010 – 12:02 pm
    @Steven: “It’s easy to criticize, another thing to present an alternative.” Steven. "Alternative..."? There is no alternative. We're talking gondola, and I think Alex is on to a good thing. He just needs a bit of a whack on the side of the head. As for 'criticism' and whacks on the side of the head, yes, Steven, it is easy to criticize. I recall that you're pretty good at it, even when you not only don't have a clue, you resort to yellow journalism to make a point. Example: Accusing my local mayor (Ogden, Utah's Matthew Godfrey – the one who wanted an urban gondola 'bad') of municipal corruption. It is something that you should seriously re-think - and if you have the guts to post my dissection of where you were wrong (which was nearly every sentence), I'd be happy to oblige. But getting back to the ranch, if you'd reread my 'Alex' post, you will see that it was a positive post. I not only gave him a grade (and yes, it was low, but so far, he is missing the boat), I offered ways he could improve and suggested that he get back to work. I personally think he's up to it and am eager to see what he comes up with. Aren't you?
  10. Steven Dale
    August 13, 2010 – 4:11 am
    Dave, How to respond? If you wish to contradict my perspective on Ogden, Utah, you're more than welcome to. I don't censor The Gondola Project nor its readers, so feel free. At the same time, the post has been live for more than 4 months and you've never brought this issue up before. If it offends you so, I wonder why you've waited so long to express your dismay. I have re-read the post and double-checked its sources. There was one error, which I have since changed. Mayor Godfrey did not travel to Europe to visit ski lifts. It was streetcars instead. That was my mistake and I apologize for the oversight. If you have an insider's perspective on the Ogden situation, I'd love to hear it. The major issue with the Ogden situation is a lack of transparency (which was the point of the post in the first place). I don't claim to be a journalist and the more people can lend to a story, the better.

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