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Baronjutter posted:It could just be the places I've visited vs the places I've come from, but I've never had more than a single car drive by me when I'm at a crosswalk. Cars driving by a pedestrian clearly waiting to cross is unthinkable, it's like running a red light. But holy poo poo in the US a crosswalk is like "this is technically a legal place to cross but no one has to stop" Then again, I'm also in Illinois, where everyone on the road hates everyone else on the road. 
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May 22, 2014 03:43
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Baronjutter posted:It could just be the places I've visited vs the places I've come from, but I've never had more than a single car drive by me when I'm at a crosswalk. Cars driving by a pedestrian clearly waiting to cross is unthinkable, it's like running a red light. But holy poo poo in the US a crosswalk is like "this is technically a legal place to cross but no one has to stop" Yeah, this was driving me nuts when I was in Orlando last week. Had to cross a 6 lane road to get from our Hotel to the convention center, and people didn't so much as slow down. There'd be big groups of people waiting beside the median for the other direction of traffic to stop, which just seemed dangerous as gently caress. It's always the little things. The other one that kept jumping out of me was how all the tickets kept having to explicitly state 'no weapons allowed'. They put everybody through metal detectors at Kennedy Space Center, and were searching bags at Universal Studios.
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May 22, 2014 04:56
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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Baronjutter posted:It could just be the places I've visited vs the places I've come from, but I've never had more than a single car drive by me when I'm at a crosswalk. Cars driving by a pedestrian clearly waiting to cross is unthinkable, it's like running a red light. But holy poo poo in the US a crosswalk is like "this is technically a legal place to cross but no one has to stop" My perspective is kinda flawed, given that Florida is famous for dead pedestrians. Our four big MSAs take the 4 top spots for "likely to get killed trying to cross the road." If you try to cross the road in Florida, even at a crosswalk with a florescent green/yellow vest with reflective striping on, you will get run over. Walking around here is like trying to play Dark Souls in real life. You don't even have to leave the sidewalk to die. Seriously, what the gently caress? Varance fucked around with this message at 05:44 on May 22, 2014 |
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May 22, 2014 05:37
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PittTheElder posted:It's always the little things. The other one that kept jumping out of me was how all the tickets kept having to explicitly state 'no weapons allowed'. They put everybody through metal detectors at Kennedy Space Center, and were searching bags at Universal Studios. To be fair, even Canada's Wonderland (or whatever the gently caress it is called now) searches bags before entry. Security theater is huge everywhere!
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May 22, 2014 15:05
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Kakairo posted:Wow, this is a great page. I love seeing the tiny differences between countries. Also, the chart really drives home the fact that the US and Canada are among the few, if only, that use speed limit signs other than a red circle.
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May 22, 2014 16:38
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cyberbug posted:Funny how many signs are text in USA and Canada but pictorial everywhere else. What's up with that? Aren't symbols quicker and easier to understand than reading text? Presumably the pictorial signs are driven by a need for multilingualism, whereas the textual signs are motivated by a desire for legal clarity.
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May 22, 2014 16:40
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Haifisch posted:Around here a lot of people won't stop for pedestrians, but the pedestrians also jaywalk all over the place and weave between (stopped) cars. We're in that weird zone where people walk enough to get pedestrians but not enough for anyone to know what to do when another human wants to cross the road. Bigger cities have enough of both kinds of traffic that each one just goes in a wave, smaller towns can just have people cross when there's not a car coming. Well, here's the history of how this came to be. Don't mind the inflammatory headline -- the article is pretty good. Varance posted:My perspective is kinda flawed, given that Florida is famous for dead pedestrians. Our four big MSAs take the 4 top spots for "likely to get killed trying to cross the road." If you try to cross the road in Florida, even at a crosswalk with a florescent green/yellow vest with reflective striping on, you will get run over. Yeah, at one point when I was looking up safe cycling advice, I came on a Florida website, that advised people not to walk their bikes in a crosswalk, as it reduces your ability to leap out of the way of cars.  . It seemed kinda weird to me, but I guess now it makes sense.
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May 22, 2014 17:31
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Lead out in cuffs posted:Well, here's the history of how this came to be. Don't mind the inflammatory headline -- the article is pretty good. I wish this was done in a more academical manner, with sources and footnotes.
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May 22, 2014 18:46
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ConfusedUs posted:I wish this was done in a more academical manner, with sources and footnotes. Oh definitely, although that article does stick to a combination of easily verifiable facts and hyperlinks in place of references. But, since you asked, here's an equivalent, academic article for Britain: http://rhr.dukejournals.org/content/2012/114/113.short The journal is Radical History Review, though.  Here's a gentler article, focusing more on flow than safety: http://geography.uwo.ca/speakerseries/poster/Nixon.Article.for.Discussion.pdf
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May 22, 2014 23:27
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cyberbug posted:Funny how many signs are text in USA and Canada but pictorial everywhere else. What's up with that? Aren't symbols quicker and easier to understand than reading text? Most of the most commonly used text signs in North America also have a distinctive shape/color combination.
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May 22, 2014 23:59
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cyberbug posted:Funny how many signs are text in USA and Canada but pictorial everywhere else. What's up with that? Aren't symbols quicker and easier to understand than reading text? For less common signs, I think text makes more sense. If I saw a sign with a plane outline, I probably wouldn't think it means "low flying planes."
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May 23, 2014 14:14
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My dad sent me this link this morning: Solar Freakin' Roadways Looks... pretty nifty, I guess! But I'm no traffic engineer. Would something like this really be feasible?
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May 26, 2014 16:57
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Silver Falcon posted:My dad sent me this link this morning: On a small scale, I think so, provided the maintenance isn't too big a deal. I'm not sure whether they'd be viable economically, though. Even producing their own electricity, it looks like you still need to build a lot of substructure, and I don't know whether it'd be worth it from a benefit-cost perspective once you got to thousands of lane-miles of roadway. And then there's the smaller issue of "concrete and asphalt are waste products," but I'm sure we'd find something else to do with them.
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May 26, 2014 17:00
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Keeping them clean to have anywhere near peak power output would be a real hassle though.
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May 26, 2014 17:06
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I've heard about them before, and I still have to wonder how well they can keep up with snow in areas that get more than a light dusting of it. I've seen some drat heavy snows in my life, and I'm just envisioning a horrible snow/slush mix forming on these solar roads because they can't melt the snow fast enough. God help you if the heating elements break and the roads freeze back over(while still being snowed on). Can these roads even handle salt/plowing if that were to happen? Everything I find when googling it is just optimistic "we'd never have to plow again because HEATING ELEMENTS!!" fluff.
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May 26, 2014 17:21
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In seriousness, the best place to use them in place of normal paving methods, would be large parking lots that normally are nowhere near full. Things like the lots outside purpose-built flea market places that only run business half the week, or when malls have massive lots that only fill for a few shopping days a year.
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May 26, 2014 17:26
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The Solar Roadway designers have some great ideas, particularly in terms of using the infrastructure to create a foundational smart grid, and a modular road surface. But the concept is still in its infancy, and many of the potential benefits of the technology work at cross-purposes. Can the solar power production and storage operate efficiently in the urban areas where the LED road lighting would be most useful, or the rural areas where road sensors would be most valuable? The modularity, reusability and accessibility could be great for power/water/road infrastructure maintenance, but also raises significant theft concerns. The long-term profitability of the roads is enticing, but current infrastructure funding is primarily concerned with initial capital costs. Their current business plan is to conduct a manufacturing design process, and then focus on deploying small-scale proof-of-concepts. One can certainly foresee the design working well in fairground parking lots and icy private driveways. If those deployments are successful, they will probably continue to seek out niche markets where their technology can be best put to use, rather than replacing freeways. The open quads of universities and corporate campuses come to mind, or the central corridors of planned housing developments. The technology might eventually expand into suburban public planning, adopted by small progressive communities to redevelop their infrastructure with an emphasis in sustainability. I think this technology will continue to be pursued, and it can be predicted that we will include more and more technological elements into roads throughout this century. One can imagine the Solar Roadway designers developing a broad variety of plate designs that would address specific environmental and usage needs (i.e. rural cold-weather, urban mixed-usage, or high-traffic residential). The concept has endless promise, despite many challenges.
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May 26, 2014 18:44
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Baronjutter posted:It could just be the places I've visited vs the places I've come from, but I've never had more than a single car drive by me when I'm at a crosswalk. Cars driving by a pedestrian clearly waiting to cross is unthinkable, it's like running a red light. But holy poo poo in the US a crosswalk is like "this is technically a legal place to cross but no one has to stop" It's been over 10 years since the city has had a traffic engineer so signal timing is little better than random and both drivers and pedestrians treat it as a free for all.
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May 26, 2014 18:45
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GWBBQ posted:I've had to dodge cars (run or jump out of the way) three times in the past few years at one particular intersection; all three times the driver leaned on the horn because they were apparently angry that I was in the crosswalk while I had a walk signal and they were running a red light. I can't even count how many times I've had to wait when I had a walk signal because people won't wait to turn since they have a green light. I've also seen people swerve toward jaywalking pedestrians and honk to scare them a lot. You live somewhere in Russia or China right?
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May 26, 2014 18:46
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Nintendo Kid posted:In seriousness, the best place to use them in place of normal paving methods, would be large parking lots that normally are nowhere near full. Things like the lots outside purpose-built flea market places that only run business half the week, or when malls have massive lots that only fill for a few shopping days a year.
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May 26, 2014 19:05
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Varance posted:I'm thinking more along the lines of mixed use trails and pedestrian malls, to minimize the amount of wear and tear the surface is subjected to. Mixed-use paths and pedestrian malls are definitely a great niche for the technology, but the issue will be that those areas tend to be shaded by trees, awnings or buildings, which presents a significant impairment for solar production. And personally I'd much rather keep the trees.
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May 26, 2014 19:13
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Why not just put solar where it's most efficient, like on a roof or a field somewhere? Why does it have to be a solar ROAD? That seems like the worst place for them and the whole "plan" is to just seem cool and futuristic.
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May 26, 2014 19:15
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Baronjutter posted:Why not just put solar where it's most efficient, like on a roof or a field somewhere? Why does it have to be a solar ROAD? That seems like the worst place for them and the whole "plan" is to just seem cool and futuristic. Put solar there too. The idea is to expand the availability of solar sites near centers of energy usage, and then leverage that technology for other centralized infrastructural uses. It seems a pretty straight-forward concept.
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May 26, 2014 19:19
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But why even think about solar roads when 99% of other much better (and easier to install/maintain) sites aren't used yet? Also aren't a lot roads generally in a canyon of buildings or a tunnel of trees?
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May 26, 2014 19:23
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What are those clicking things at the end stations of subway lines?
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May 26, 2014 19:24
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Baronjutter posted:But why even think about solar roads when 99% of other much better (and easier to install/maintain) sites aren't used yet? Also aren't a lot roads generally in a canyon of buildings or a tunnel of trees? I guess what I'd say is that if we've learned anything about infrastructure and energy generation policy over the last two decades, it's that there is not a silver bullet for any of our problems. We need a diversified portfolio of solutions, each working in concert and covering each other's shortcomings. It's no good to doggedly chase after a single idea, pushing it as far as it will go, while deliberately sidelining any alternatives. We've done that with cars and fossil fuels, and those decisions have landed us with some severe problems. So when someone engineers a prototype device, the response should be to start identifying how it can be incorporated by society, not lambasting it for presenting new policy challenges. Perhaps the idea won't prove out, or it will be balkanized into component concepts and only used by specialist projects (i.e. changeable LED road surfaces would be of apparent interest to raceways and airports, but they'd be less interested in trading durability for solar power), but certainly the concept should be explored and developed where appropriate. Kaal fucked around with this message at 19:45 on May 26, 2014 |
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May 26, 2014 19:34
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Baronjutter posted:You live somewhere in Russia or China right? http://www.ct.gov/dot/cwp/view.asp?a=2354&q=415230 http://www.ct.gov/dot/cwp/view.asp?a=2354&q=415242
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May 26, 2014 20:20
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Groda posted:What are those clicking things at the end stations of subway lines? Which transit agency?
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May 26, 2014 21:23
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Groda posted:What are those clicking things at the end stations of subway lines? Where? On the tracks? That's kind of a vague question 
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May 26, 2014 23:57
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They're called mimics. Initially the city released genetically engineered bugs to battle the city's roach problem, but they evolved to become man-sized. The clicking is their method of communication.
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May 26, 2014 23:59
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Cichlidae posted:On a small scale, I think so, provided the maintenance isn't too big a deal. I'm not sure whether they'd be viable economically, though. Even producing their own electricity, it looks like you still need to build a lot of substructure, and I don't know whether it'd be worth it from a benefit-cost perspective once you got to thousands of lane-miles of roadway. And then there's the smaller issue of "concrete and asphalt are waste products," but I'm sure we'd find something else to do with them. I just binged through this thread from the games about the State of Nutmeg onward. I vote for a Compounce aerodrome! Seriously, what you just wrote here reminds me of something you wrote about some other lighted roadway thing: Why wouldn't people just dig up the electronics and sell it for scrap? Also, I've been in Copenhagen lately and their approach to biking seems to actually make sense. Exactly how expensive are curbed bike lanes?
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May 27, 2014 00:20
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Skeesix posted:Exactly how expensive are curbed bike lanes? You probably mean something like a Cycle Track. They're about as expensive as adding another lane to your roadway. You do have to do slightly fancier things at intersections, and you have to have the political will to do it in the first place. And the locations have to be planned as part of a larger bike network (one stretch of cycle track does nothing without destinations / other linkages). They're the right tool when you want to have large bike volumes in an urban setting.
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May 27, 2014 01:12
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Skeesix posted:I just binged through this thread from the games about the State of Nutmeg onward. I vote for a Compounce aerodrome! That is definitely a big aspect in some jurisdictions. In most neighborhoods, it's not a problem; there are better things to steal for less work. But we have cities where our signal cabinets are kevlar-lined, so expensive infrastructure is a big no-no there. Curbed bike lanes? They cost as much as putting a curb down. QuickCurb would work pretty well, and it's relatively cheap. But the REALLY expensive bit is getting rid of on-street parking. Depending on where you are, a parking space can cost as much as half a million dollars. Try to picture that...
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May 27, 2014 01:27
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Cichlidae posted:But the REALLY expensive bit is getting rid of on-street parking. Depending on where you are, a parking space can cost as much as half a million dollars. Try to picture that... Aren't on-street parking spaces owned by the municipalities themselves, usually?
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May 27, 2014 01:47
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Hedera Helix posted:Aren't on-street parking spaces owned by the municipalities themselves, usually? He's talking about the cost of relocating the parking to somewhere else, I think.
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May 27, 2014 02:00
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I'm assuming lost revenue from parking permits and stuff? Still can't imagine a single spot being worth 500k a year to the city though. Also get rid of parking and you get rid of more possible car trips and help push people onto bikes/transit/what ever. Just make sure that 'what ever' actually exists and has the capacity. The whole point isn't to re-locate the parking but convert more car trips to other modes.
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May 27, 2014 02:07
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Baronjutter posted:Also get rid of parking and you get rid of more possible car trips and help push people onto bikes/transit/what ever. Just make sure that 'what ever' actually exists and has the capacity. The whole point isn't to re-locate the parking but convert more car trips to other modes. Dutch cities are finding out you can only push this so far before people just don't come to your city center anymore and go to the nice shopping center with the free parking. Haarlem recently reintroduced on street parking for cars in a part of the city (they actually removed bicycle parking to make space for it) at the request of the shopkeepers in that street. In the average medium sized town if you remove parking spaces shopkeepers are going to call for your head. Even Amsterdam has to build a ludicrously expensive* parking garage under a canal to make the removal of on street parking spaces palpable. *= €125k per car.
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May 27, 2014 07:24
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Varance posted:Which transit agency? Stockholm (SL) and some others in Europe that escape me (so I figured it was some sort of intl standard). I'm assuming its something for the blind, but, then, why not at all stations and why don't the intercom announcements suffice? Volmarias posted:Where? On the tracks? That's kind of a vague question I'm not sure where the noise is coming from, but probably the ceiling.
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May 27, 2014 07:29
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Groda posted:Stockholm (SL) and some others in Europe that escape me (so I figured it was some sort of intl standard). I'm assuming its something for the blind, but, then, why not at all stations and why don't the intercom announcements suffice? I'm not 100% sure, but my google-fu leads me to believe it's indeed for the vision impaired (we don't call them blind anymore). I can't find any explicit mention of clicking at the terminus stations, though, but it does appear in this official document (now expired, link to Google cache). "SL:s riktlinjer för äldre och resenärer med funktionsnedsättning" (SL's guidelines for the elderly and travelers with disabilities) http://bit.ly/1gwX7lF posted:10.2.3 Ljudfyrar My translation: Audio cues shall be used at, among other places, terminus stations, to assist in orientation to next departing train. Audio cues can also be used to lead travelers to tactile maps or buttons. Edit: Found another source, from the association for the vision impaired, which tells us that it indicates from which track the next train will depart: http://bit.ly/Rwn49a posted:Vi har länge efterlyst ljudfyrar som är konsekvent placerade på Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 12:42 on May 27, 2014 |
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May 27, 2014 12:39
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NihilismNow posted:Dutch cities are finding out you can only push this so far before people just don't come to your city center anymore and go to the nice shopping center with the free parking. Haarlem recently reintroduced on street parking for cars in a part of the city (they actually removed bicycle parking to make space for it) at the request of the shopkeepers in that street. Back in the 60s where I live they put in a pedestrian walkway downtown and took out parking. All the shops bitched that without parking right outside they couldn't survive and that pedestrian only areas were worthless, so the city took it out. Within 15 years every single shop had moved out of downtown to the new mall in the suburbs, which is basically the same thing. V V
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