As the world shifts rapidly from a rural-centric to an urban-centric model, so too will business, work, and the ability for people to survive, sustain and thrive. For all practical purposes, this transition has already occurred. Some of us will never leave the cities we’re born in; some of us will never see a countryside....
Last year, when I had the opportunity to interview Metro Medellin about their Metrocable systems I stuck my foot in my mouth in a way only a North American could. We spent a couple hours going over the history, the successes and the failures of the system. When discussing the advantages of the gondola transit...
You want to build an urban gondola transit system in the hopes of attracting millions of tourists from around the world? Good luck with that. If you build one, and if you have tourists, you may very well get tourists riding your gondola, but that doesn’t mean tourists arrived because of your gondola. There’s a...
Any good marketer knows that it’s better to sell a product with a higher margin than with a lower one. Furthermore, the higher the margin on the product, the more likely it will be viewed by the buyer as prestigious and luxurious. It doesn’t matter that one car may be identical to another, the higher...
A quick thought: The cable industry positions themselves as Ski Lift manufacturers who sometimes build transit. Why not flip that around? Why not be Transit Builders that happen to provide transportation to a whole host of markets, including ski hills? There’s a difference there. It’s subtle, but it’s there.
Young people and students are the lifeblood of any new idea. Students talk, socialize and are generally more willing to wade around into the unfamiliar and unknown. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Facebook was invented by a 20 year old. It’s also no surprise that a large percentage of email I receive regarding cable transit...
From the TED Blog: Fifty percent of traffic accidents happen at intersections. Gary Lauder shares a brilliant and cheap idea for helping drivers move along smoothly: a new traffic sign that combines the properties of “Stop” and “Yield” – and asks drivers to be polite.
If I could think of one “Silver Bullet Urban Gondola Transit System” – that is a system that perfectly demonstrates the concept of Urban Gondolas and Cable Propelled Transit, I’d imagine this: Integrated by fare. The system must use the same fare system as the rest of the city’s transit grid. It must be a...
A couple years back the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) decided to do away with the practice of transit vehicle drivers announcing upcoming stations and stops. It was decided that a GPS-enabled system would instead announce upcoming stations (in the case of subways) and stops (in the case of streetcars and buses) via generic, female, computerized...
We spend too much time arguing about the type of public transit our cities should implement. It’s such a waste of time, energy and resources. Imagine what we could accomplish if we devoted just a fraction of that energy to working together and accepting the idea that all transit technologies have a place. Somewhere along...