A thought experiment: Do we have a transportation supply problem? I’d say no. We’ve got plenty of roads, plenty of transit and plenty of freeways. We do not have a transportation supply problem. (I’m well aware, of course, that there are certain large American and developing world cities that have slim to no transit, but...
A quick look at some of the things that make your cities work (or not): World’s first highway integrated building: Japan’s Gate Tower Building Toyota’s Segway: Winglet Max speed: 6km/h Max speed of world’s first electric motorcycle, Enertia: 72km/h Range: 72km Range of hydrogen fuel bus: 400km Cost: $2 million Time to charge: 6 minutes...
A few highlights from around the world of Urban Gondolas and Cable Propelled Transit: In the most ridiculous example yet of American security concerns run amok, skiers waiting to board the Steamboat Springs’ gondola in Colorado are being subjected to police pat-downs. Skiers and snowboarders “must unzip, de-layer, and turn out their pockets.” No comment...
Toronto’s grand LRT scheme, Transit City, appears headed for a premature grave. Almost immediately after assuming his new role as Toronto’s Mayor, Rob Ford declared to the province his intention to kill Transit City and replace it with subway lines. Toronto media has been ablaze with the story since it hit yesterday, but no one...
On Tuesday, New York’s Roosevelt Island Tram reopened after a 9 month, $25 million refurbishment. The rebuild, conducted by Poma, transforms the system from an Aerial Tram to a Funifor-type system. That means vehicles will operate independently of one another. When one vehicle is taken out of service, the other can still be operational. This...
The following is a guest post by Wellington Cycleways’ Matt Thredgold. Steven asks us what we can learn from elevators. He notes that they are the world’s most used form of public transit. It is perhaps stretching the definition of public transit a bit to include elevators, but in some places in the world elevators...
Katharina points us to the Zacatecas Teleferico in the small city of Zacatecas in Mexico. The system is an old Aerial Tram and dates from 1975, likely a Von Roll built system. It’s clearly more tourist attraction than urban transit, but it’s well worth the photos: Thanks so much to Katharina for passing this along!
A quick look at some of the things that make your cities work (or not): Number of Americans traveling 50+ miles for Thanksgiving: 42 million Number of turkeys eaten: 226 million Pounds consumed: 736 million Number of cities with Google Transit: 500+ Cost of LRT compared to BRT in Tampa, Florida: 2.5 x more expensive...