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the monorail wasn't really mass rapid transit either, it was more of a tourist attraction that just services the strip. there's a ton of taxis too for drunk tourists, and locals either drive anywhere or take the bus. las vegas is a very young and car oriented city without any decent transit options also i was incorrect about the monorail, it was bought by the local casino tourism board to keep it running. however, the bankruptcy filing is what allowed boring co to expand, as the monorail changed hands and is probably going to be kept afloat by the casinos who paid for monorail stops
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Jan 10, 2022 00:46
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:the monorail wasn't really mass rapid transit either, it was more of a tourist attraction that just services the strip. Right. Granted I've never been to Vegas, but it sure seems like everyone I know who's been there basically stayed on the strip and then went to other places on the strip, so frankly the monorail seems pretty useful in terms of getting a whole bunch of vehicles off the road and being convenient for tourists to use.
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Jan 10, 2022 01:04
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Vegas is like America distilled, of course its public transit is a dumpster fire heavily co-opted by rich sociopaths
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Jan 10, 2022 01:06
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PT6A posted:Right. Granted I've never been to Vegas, but it sure seems like everyone I know who's been there basically stayed on the strip and then went to other places on the strip, so frankly the monorail seems pretty useful in terms of getting a whole bunch of vehicles off the road and being convenient for tourists to use. las vegas is a single-industry town, it exists because people come from all over the world to go to the strip. ideally the casinos don't want people to leave their complex but it happens, when you get so many flashy places together in one spot people like to mix it up by visiting different casinos. but there isn't much of a need for visitors to go places other than the strip las vegas exists because after prohibition, organized criminal groups in america recognized that their options were to go legitimate or slowly be killed as the government brought its increasing resources to bear on shutting down organized crime. nevada's legalized gambling provided the most convenient method for taking illegal profits and converting them into legal, profitable enterprises - organized crime groups were already well versed in illicit gambling as a business. there were other options at this time, such as havana, cuba (until the revolution) and hot springs, arkansas (until the dispute between local gamblers and local biblethumpers ended in a victory for the religious faction) but in the end las vegas won out and became the place where the mafia went corporate. a fun fact is that the las vegas strip isn't actually in the city of las vegas - much of it is in the adjacent city of paradise - but the overall metro is mostly a creation of the later 20th century, as the first tentative steps into large casinos in the 1940s and 1950s snowballed into ever larger casino/hotel/resort complexes. vegas as we know it didn't exist in 1950, and as one can expect a young city without much metropolitan coherence is going to have the most decentralized transportation network possible in the clip below, the las vegas strip is the strong vertical line in the south-center of the city. the large L shaped airport is immediately to the east of the strip https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDLDTT4JtCI Mr. Fall Down Terror fucked around with this message at 01:28 on Jan 10, 2022 |
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Jan 10, 2022 01:26
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pairofdimes posted:Tesla or Space-X where there were big incumbents ignoring technologies or new advancements that they could take advantage of and leap ahead. Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:silicon valley innovation. Both of these posts suggest that you may believe that "Silicon Valley innovation" is a thing. As this thread has shown countless times, that phrase invariably means "apply vast amounts of venture capital to completely flaunt regulations and/or establish a monopoly, while hiring a good PR department and/or front person to give it a sci-fi veneer." I don't really think that the "Loop" is all that different from Tesla or SpaceX in that way.
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Jan 10, 2022 01:28
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PT6A posted:Right. Granted I've never been to Vegas, but it sure seems like everyone I know who's been there basically stayed on the strip and then went to other places on the strip, so frankly the monorail seems pretty useful in terms of getting a whole bunch of vehicles off the road and being convenient for tourists to use. The monorail covers part of the strip but it's not really super convenient. Like you'd think a monorail that just goes up and down one road should be easy but no. The entrances are buried on the other side of the casinos. So you kinda have to know/remember they exist, and then make your way through the casinos to get to them. It mostly serves as a way to get to some of the casinos from the convention center.
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Jan 10, 2022 01:30
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Lead out in cuffs posted:Both of these posts suggest that you may believe that "Silicon Valley innovation" is a thing. i dont know what part of any of my posts itt makes you think that i used that phrase in anything other than the most sarcastic meaning, so i can only assume that you didn't read them and you're selectively looking for phrases to argue about 
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Jan 10, 2022 01:31
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:las vegas is a single-industry town, it exists because people come from all over the world to go to the strip. ideally the casinos don't want people to leave their complex but it happens, when you get so many flashy places together in one spot people like to mix it up by visiting different casinos. but there isn't much of a need for visitors to go places other than the strip Someone should make a movie about this
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Jan 10, 2022 02:49
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The casinos are also heavily serviced by moving walkways that connect all of the major casinos together. You can move along the entire length of the strip without really going outside, and they're used by a lot of people.
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Jan 10, 2022 02:56
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The post-apocalyptic New Vegas feels wholesome by comparison.
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Jan 10, 2022 03:23
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Thomamelas posted:The entrances are buried on the other side of the casinos. I imagine that the casino owners demanded this, believing that making riders walk through the casinos would maximize gambling. Capital is great at decisions like this that seem reasonable at face value but fail when examined. I rode a loop on the monorail last time I was in Vegas, because I like things like that. I don’t remember anything about the ride, so I guess it was just ok.
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Jan 10, 2022 06:00
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TheMadMilkman posted:I imagine that the casino owners demanded this, believing that making riders walk through the casinos would maximize gambling. Capital is great at decisions like this that seem reasonable at face value but fail when examined. well one they want you on their premises at all time controlled by them so they monopolize your time and spending though the real answer is that all the casinos face the strip and no one gives a poo poo what's literally 1 block behind them, so it's a ton easier to route it up that way
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Jan 10, 2022 06:17
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TheMadMilkman posted:I imagine that the casino owners demanded this, believing that making riders walk through the casinos would maximize gambling. Capital is great at decisions like this that seem reasonable at face value but fail when examined. you can't blame capital here, the casinos didn't demand diddly. the las vegas strip is basically a road along which all the big famous casinos are built. not all the casinos in vegas, but the really big and known ones. if you're going to connect them, you either need to build over the major roadway (expensive) or on the side of the casinos not facing the major roadway (less expensive). the casinos on the roadway face the major roadway, because of course they do. the side facing away from the major roadway is less important. it makes sense that the fairly recent attempt at a train system would end up in the casinos relative backyards. here's a map  its always comforting to assume someone is in charge, and that this someone in charge makes bad decisions because they are stupid and greedy. the idea that things just sort of happen in an uncoordinated fashion because nobody is in charge and events just sort of unfold one after another, out of control - well, this idea is a lot more existentially harrowing for many people OJ MIST 2 THE DICK posted:though the real answer is that all the casinos face the strip and no one gives a poo poo what's literally 1 block behind them, so it's a ton easier to route it up that way yeah exactly this. building above the strip would be gobs more expensive than choosing not to build above one of the most famous, photographed, and congested roadways in the world
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Jan 10, 2022 07:28
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I had forgotten hat it didn’t actually go to the airport. And you’re right that it’s comforting to think there is someone to blame. I just looked up and read the history of it, and had no idea how haphazard it really was. It really did just kind of happen. Weird.
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Jan 10, 2022 08:29
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Well that’s weird, I distinctly remember getting on what I thought was the monorail from the Luxor but that map says it’s on the other side of the dang road. After looking it up, I guess we must have ridden on the “Mandalay Bay–Excalibur tram”? So how about that, turns out Vegas is simply brimming with public transit options 
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Jan 10, 2022 09:28
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When I was in Vegas in 2008 I used the monorail twice. Basically from the strip you would walk at a 90 degree angle away from it for 15 minutes. The walk was through endless different casinos, inside with casino lighting so it was impossible to place where you actually were. Then you took the monorail for 5 minutes, then a similar walk back to he strip from your stop. The only benefit versus walking the strip was avoiding the crowds and sun (which solves itself at night obv.). The whole purpose seemed to be to funnel people into casinos that were further away from the strip.
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Jan 10, 2022 09:56
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pairofdimes posted:If I remember the hype correctly, the Boring Company sort of started that way, in that they began with a used boring machine to start boring and make a tunneling company to learn about the technology. The problem is I think they expected it would be like Tesla or Space-X where there were big incumbents ignoring technologies or new advancements that they could take advantage of and leap ahead. Instead it turns out tunneling is pretty well understood and there's no easy way to tunnel much faster. So far their main innovation seems to be making smaller tunnels. Elon's big innovation was to ask them to run the machines faster. Yes, brilliant! No one has ever thought to just increase the speed of the tunnelling machines. Unsurprisingly this was also his big idea to increase production at the Fremont plant. Just make the robot arms move faster. Elon is very loving stupid.
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Jan 10, 2022 17:43
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Epic High Five posted:Vegas is like America distilled, of course its public transit is a dumpster fire heavily co-opted by rich sociopaths I mean, its pretty much a city founded by rich sociopaths...
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Jan 10, 2022 17:55
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the smaller tunnel thing is also important, the idea is that you can save money by just making the tunnels narrower. too narrow for safety features? easy, just design a machine that won't break or malfunction
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Jan 10, 2022 17:59
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:the smaller tunnel thing is also important, the idea is that you can save money by just making the tunnels narrower. too narrow for safety features? easy, just design a machine that won't break or malfunction "Just don't have a fire or die" is not the winning argument in safety driven architecture and design.
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Jan 10, 2022 18:44
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Epic High Five posted:Vegas is like America distilled, of course its public transit is a dumpster fire heavily co-opted by rich sociopaths The Taxi folks prevented the monorail from being extended to the airport. If you ever attended a pre-Pandemic CES you would have experienced the crazy long taxi lines.
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Jan 10, 2022 19:14
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VideoGameVet posted:The Taxi folks prevented the monorail from being extended to the airport. "But our jobs/industry will become redundant" should be banned as an argument for any construction or regulation ever.
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Jan 10, 2022 19:43
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
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suck my woke dick posted:"But our jobs/industry will become redundant" should be banned as an argument for any construction or regulation ever. Errr no it shouldn't. People's livelihoods should always be a factor when doing these things.
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Jan 10, 2022 19:58
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Mega Comrade posted:Errr no it shouldn't. People's livelihoods should always be a factor when doing these things. We shouldn't prop up actively harmful industries because jobs, we should expend government resources to provide everyone with their basic needs and to provide job training for those who want to transition to new lines of work.
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Jan 10, 2022 20:04
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I think labor impact always needs to be considered, but then again it usually is. That doesn't mean it needs to be decisive. Creating an intentional transportation gap so that taxi drivers can have a service monopoly on the airport certainly isn't reasonable or good policy. But I could see a labor argument in favor of banning ride-sharing in order to preserve the jobs of regulated cabbies.
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Jan 10, 2022 20:22
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Cataffy posted:When I was in Vegas in 2008 I used the monorail twice. Basically from the strip you would walk at a 90 degree angle away from it for 15 minutes. The walk was through endless different casinos, inside with casino lighting so it was impossible to place where you actually were. Then you took the monorail for 5 minutes, then a similar walk back to he strip from your stop. The only benefit versus walking the strip was avoiding the crowds and sun (which solves itself at night obv.). The whole purpose seemed to be to funnel people into casinos that were further away from the strip. The main benefit of the monorail is that it could take you to the Las Vegas Hilton, which was not really on the strip (or was at the far end of it), as that was where the Star Trek Experience was. Once there, you could enjoy the two rides (one was very good) and then get completely shitfaced in Quark's Bar with punchbowl drinks like the "Warp Core Breach" (purple), "Borg Sphere" (green) and "Long Island James Tea Kirk" (blue), all containing dry ice for extra effect. Following that and some amusing arguments with a wandering Klingon, you and your friend who you shared this with could stumble into the arcade where you would lose a dollar playing "Mad Dog McCree" and then beating on each other with the surprisingly hard plastic guns. A short sit on some benches to ease the stomach and then it's back on the monorail to return you to the Imperial Palace!
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Jan 10, 2022 20:22
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Kaal posted:I think labor impact always needs to be considered, but then again it usually is. That doesn't mean it needs to be decisive. Creating an intentional transportation gap so that taxi drivers can have a service monopoly on the airport certainly isn't reasonable or good policy. But I could see a labor argument in favor of banning ride-sharing in order to preserve the jobs of regulated cabbies. Sure, but transitioning cities away from car centric designs and facilitating better mass transit would be better overall. We shouldn't just keep propping up car based society for the sake of cabbies. We should provide enough government aid so that cabbies that end up out of work can have their needs met and train for other work if they so desire.
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Jan 10, 2022 20:30
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Mega Comrade posted:Errr no it shouldn't. People's livelihoods should always be a factor when doing these things. No they absolutely should not; this is a bad solution to a fake problem. We should not keep people doing work that either does not need to be done or is actively harmful. When work is obsoleted we should redirect people to useful work where we can, and if there's not enough work to go around then we obviously have enough surplus to be providing for everyone anyway.
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Jan 10, 2022 21:07
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keep in mind that the las vegas monorail isn't what we think of as a public transit option even though it is definitely train shaped, and we associate trains with public transportation in america. it was a for profit solution with a fare far higher than you typically see on publicly subsidized and government run train systems. why would it run to the airport? the purpose of the system wasn't to effectively circulate people around the city, it was to allow casinos to share customers and traffic, and was thus a privately funded and operated venture. if the costs to run to the airport was too high, then why would the corporate partners who run the thing want to pay for it? even then it went bankrupt more than once until it was finally bought by the las vegas tourism agency to keep it afloat imo the taxi driver claim is a red herring, the system was never intended to be public transportation and holding it to that same standard of "why doesn't it go anywhere useful?" is asking the wrong questions e: i was curious so i went looking for documents, it looks like the plan was to extend the monorail further to the south to connect to more casinos, and then eventually to the airport car rental lot for a link to the airport proper by shuttle bus. to connect directly to the airport, the monorail would instead have had to go southeast, as the airport is oriented such that the terminals are on the eastern side of the complex and runways would block access to the monorail unless it expensively hooked around all the way from the south, or blocked off future expansion along the southern portion of the strip. it was a challenging right of way situation without clear funding, and these plans never came to fruition anyway because no public dollars were used to prop up the privately owned, for profit system Mr. Fall Down Terror fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Jan 10, 2022 |
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Jan 10, 2022 21:10
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https://twitter.com/ShujaUH/status/1479821836321918978
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Jan 10, 2022 21:10
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*6 months later* we regret to inform you that the cows have been radicalized by algorithms
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Jan 10, 2022 21:14
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Irony.or.Death posted:No they absolutely should not; this is a bad solution to a fake problem. We should not keep people doing work that either does not need to be done or is actively harmful. When work is obsoleted we should redirect people to useful work where we can, and if there's not enough work to go around then we obviously have enough surplus to be providing for everyone anyway. Ok Thatcher. edit less flippant response. Jobs should be phased out carefully. Not just replaced. Else you risk destroying peoples lives and even whole communities. Professor Beetus posted:We shouldn't prop up actively harmful industries because jobs, we should expend government resources to provide everyone with their basic needs and to provide job training for those who want to transition to new lines of work. Mega Comrade fucked around with this message at 21:43 on Jan 10, 2022 |
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Jan 10, 2022 21:39
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:keep in mind that the las vegas monorail isn't what we think of as a public transit option even though it is definitely train shaped, and we associate trains with public transportation in america. it was a for profit solution with a fare far higher than you typically see on publicly subsidized and government run train systems. why would it run to the airport? the purpose of the system wasn't to effectively circulate people around the city, it was to allow casinos to share customers and traffic, and was thus a privately funded and operated venture. if the costs to run to the airport was too high, then why would the corporate partners who run the thing want to pay for it? even then it went bankrupt more than once until it was finally bought by the las vegas tourism agency to keep it afloat It is fundamentally absurd that there are four independent tram / monorail systems within a mile of two major airports, and none of them connect to each other or either airport.
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Jan 10, 2022 21:40
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"You are trapped in the Matrix, Bessie"
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Jan 10, 2022 21:41
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Kaal posted:It is fundamentally absurd that there are four independent tram / monorail systems within a mile of two major airports, and none of them connect to each other or either airport. it can cost a lot of money to connect to an airport, they're big and you can only approach them from certain directions, and the directions in which it is possible to approach them are usually covered over in existing immovable infrastructure. there's a good number of airports which have or had lovely transit access, JFK is a pain in the neck to get to from the subway and until a few years ago denver was way the hell outside of the city with no transit access at all. a lot of airports just end up building their own little internal transit networks and then connecting them to external systems because the cost of connecting the airport proper to a metro train system can be prohibitive if not included in the planning phase of the airport
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Jan 10, 2022 21:55
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FWIW, I don't think this:Mega Comrade posted:less flippant response. Jobs should be phased out carefully. Not just replaced. Else you risk destroying peoples lives and even whole communities. Disagrees with this: Irony.or.Death posted:No they absolutely should not; this is a bad solution to a fake problem. We should not keep people doing work that either does not need to be done or is actively harmful. When work is obsoleted we should redirect people to useful work where we can, and if there's not enough work to go around then we obviously have enough surplus to be providing for everyone anyway.
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Jan 10, 2022 22:03
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Mega Comrade posted:edit If people are doing a fake job as a joke why even have the job part? Why not just have them do some other job or no job?
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Jan 10, 2022 22:14
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:it can cost a lot of money to connect to an airport, they're big and you can only approach them from certain directions, and the directions in which it is possible to approach them are usually covered over in existing immovable infrastructure. there's a good number of airports which have or had lovely transit access, JFK is a pain in the neck to get to from the subway and until a few years ago denver was way the hell outside of the city with no transit access at all. a lot of airports just end up building their own little internal transit networks and then connecting them to external systems because the cost of connecting the airport proper to a metro train system can be prohibitive if not included in the planning phase of the airport That can be an issue in some places, but it isn't an issue at McCarran, which is absolutely surrounded by open space and parking lots. They could run a mile of elevated tramway down either Sunset Road or the Airport Connector and the only thing at risk would be some Short Term Parking spots.
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Jan 10, 2022 22:18
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Professor Beetus posted:FWIW, I don't think this: It may not on re-reading. My original comment was to the idea that people jobs being redundant shouldn't be a factor at all, which is a very touchy subject for me as thats exactly what happened to where I was born and the surrounding areas in the 80s. They still haven't recovered. Owlofcreamcheese posted:If people are doing a fake job as a joke why even have the job part? Why not just have them do some other job or no job? That would be lovely but sadly we don't live in a world where most people accept the idea of people having 'no job'. Mega Comrade fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Jan 10, 2022 |
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Jan 10, 2022 22:19
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:it can cost a lot of money to connect to an airport, they're big and you can only approach them from certain directions, and the directions in which it is possible to approach them are usually covered over in existing immovable infrastructure. there's a good number of airports which have or had lovely transit access, JFK is a pain in the neck to get to from the subway and until a few years ago denver was way the hell outside of the city with no transit access at all. a lot of airports just end up building their own little internal transit networks and then connecting them to external systems because the cost of connecting the airport proper to a metro train system can be prohibitive if not included in the planning phase of the airport Counterpoint: no. If you really think the cost of constructing a train to the airport is the limiting factor in most cases, you're insane. Yes there are distance arguments in some cases but mostly, they don't build trains to the airport because they wish not to. In Calgary, for example, the train goes directly beside the airport with no connection (bus or otherwise) to the terminal, despite the fact we specifically engineered a tunnel for an LRT right-of-way. There is not even a bus route that goes through that tunnel from the terminal, and the actual road needed to accommodate that route already exists -- the airport express bus route instead takes a strange transit-only route down a narrow street in the middle of bumfucking egypt. Montreal has a great metro and commuter train system, and again, they go very near but not actually to the airport (and it's not feasibly walkable even though the distance is short; I looked when I lived in Montreal and wanted to save money). Meanwhile, Schiphol is miles from Amsterdam and has an insane variety of train services from it, to the point one may actually become confused about what train you should take from the airport. Madrid has not one but TWO metro stops at the airport, in addition to commuter train routes. Don't excuse this poo poo.
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Jan 10, 2022 23:10
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