If you work in a planning firm, city, political office, think tank, etc. where you might get fired or disciplined for mentioning or proposing the idea of urban gondolas, you probably didn’t want to work there in the first place. Places like that are interested only in gatekeeping and maintaining the status quo. They’re interested...
Last month CUP conducted a study of all planned, conceived or under-construction cable systems in South America. Our findings shocked even us: Almost 5 dozen systems are in the works on that continent and that number doesn’t even include Brazil (because of the Portuguese language issues – as in, we don’t speak Portuguese), the largest...
According to the Transportation Research Board’s Transit Capacity and Quality of Service Manual, wait times for transit are around 2 times more onerous to riders than actual in-vehicle time. They see that ratio rise to 2.5 times when wait times are coupled to transfers. With that in mind, how long is the following journey: A...
Far too often people talk about cable as a convenient technology for tackling topographical challenges. But that’s where it ends. It’s a niche technology, they claim, nothing more. In other words: Cable’s ability to avoid physical obstacles is used as an argument against it. How much sense does that make? The great irony is that...
If you’re expecting to see urban gondolas and cable propelled transit systems zipping through you city any time soon, I’m here to tell you something: You’re wrong. Sorry to disappoint you. Sure, with the right political will and visionary planners, there will be successes here and there, but things won’t change overnight. Things just don’t...
When I was a child I had a marvelous theory about thunder storms: Rain was held by clouds and thunder often accompanied rain. Thunder sounded like a loud explosion and explosions destroyed things. And since after it rained, no clouds could be seen, then thunder must be the sound of clouds exploding! In my mind, I...
Percent of energy the global industrial food system accounts for in worldwide fuel consumption: 21% Average distance an ingredient in a meal in the US is grown away from home: 1500 miles Number of new car and truck dealers in 2006: 22000 Number of new car and truck dealers in 2010: 18000 Miles of paved road in US:...
Taken For A Ride is a documentary first broadcast on PBS in 1996. It tells the story of how a consortium led by General Motors, Firestone Tires and Standard Oil systematically worked to uproot the American streetcar network and replace it with roads, buses and private automobiles. The short hand for this incident is the...
This is getting absurd: In December of 2009, Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) announced that the Oakland Airport Connector would be a cable-propelled transit system. This was a major victory for cable as the bids pitted cable technology provided by Poma and Doppelmayr against standard self-propelled technologies provided by Bombardier and Mitsubishi. That cable came...
It’s cheap and easy politics to blame the “lazy” unions; that drivers should be doing more than they already are. Frankly speaking, I don’t want my transit drivers doing more. I want them doing less. If my life is in their hands, I don’t want them dealing with transfers, tickets or irate customers. I want...