|
Carbon dioxide posted:I guess you could always just mix the cement powder and water on the spot if you need to, that would remove any distance limits on transport. Yeah, but I don't think you want to do that for any larger projects like road construction. I was once at a party with a man whose line of business was building cement factories in developing countries. You'd be amazed at how much money is to be made in that, but the challenge seemed to be to get permits from the local government, because it has some environmental impact. Apparently, he'd become quite expert at bribery.
|
#
¿
Oct 3, 2013 12:03
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 13, 2024 08:55 |
|
|
Carbon dioxide posted:In the Dutch city of Utrecht, during rush hour thousands of students are trying to get from the train station to the university campus or back. Right now, they use these bi-articulated buses: Gothenburg, Sweden, are also using bi-articulated buses as a stopgap until the budget allows new tram tracks. Those things are fricking huge! Like in Utrecht, they run 3-minute traffic in rush hour, between the transportation hub (railway station etc) and a university campus. Still packed like sardines, but at least they have dedicated bus lanes for most of their stretch so it's fairly reliable. It took some pretty major investment to create those bus lanes, but still less than laying down rails and hanging power lines. (Due to the length of the buses, they had to redesign some intersections and corners. No way those things can make a tight 90 degree turn.)
|
|
#
¿
Nov 17, 2013 11:56
|
|
|
grover posted:I think Hedera Helix had a really good observation- trams seem novel to communities that don't presently have them, and don't have the stigma of buses as a poor man's ride (yet). They fundamentally seem no different than buses, though, and just doesn't make sense. I think you put your finger on something there which does not really exist in many European countries - the poor/bus connection. At least, I've never experienced it, as a long-time bus rider in Sweden. Here, it's more a division between city-dwellers riding public transport and suburbanites (+country folk) driving cars. I think the bus stigma is part of the US fetischization of the car as a sign of affluence. Ninja edit: The above leads me to believe that the stigma could be overcome by simply making the public transit better, so more people will start using it.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 17, 2013 13:20
|
|
|
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad posted:Unless you're on a bike in which case gently caress you How about helmets? Surely you have a bike helmet law?
|
|
#
¿
Nov 19, 2013 15:27
|
|
|
Jeoh posted:Helmets don't prevent accidents (and are for wusses). I'm pretty sure they reduce fatalities, which I think was what we were talking about.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 19, 2013 18:55
|
|
|
Koesj posted:Cross-country ski to work then! I really do think he has a point. As the authors of the study you linked said: quote:Thus even if the analysis suggests there is no net societal health bene t to a I'm sorry if I brought up a touchy subject, but I was honestly interested in London policy on bike helmets. Which I could have googled, instead, I guess.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 20, 2013 11:43
|
|
|
I can definitely see how a helmet law might destroy a public bike hire scheme. Do you know what the Australian helmet usage ratio was prior to the law? I imagine that the reaction to such a law would be very different in a society of 10% helmet usage, compared to one with 40 or 60% usage (where people are presumably positively disposed to helmets in general). Edit: That blind spot video is scary! Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 19:15 on Nov 20, 2013 |
|
#
¿
Nov 20, 2013 19:09
|
|
|
I don't know if this was posted before (it's an old blog post), but it's hilarious so here it comes anyway. A list of some of Britain's stupidest cycle lanes (and a couple of international examples, at least one of which looks like grafitti). http://www.anorak.co.uk/375360/sports/britains-worst-cycle-lanes-photos-of-that-olympics-legacy-in-action.html/ My favorite is the bike lane running straight into a bus shelter.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 24, 2013 19:24
|
|
|
Jeoh posted:Or just sheer incompetence on the construction crew's part. This has happened more than once over here: Lamp posts belong to a utility, though, surely coordinating with them is the responsibility of the traffic engineering office, not the road crew.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 25, 2013 14:28
|
|
|
SurgicalOntologist posted:Not sure if this will work, can't figure out how to get a direct street view link: They really ought to clear out a few trees around the intersection, I think. They probably have a lot of T-bones due to poor line of sight.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 27, 2013 20:25
|
|
|
I don't guess the professionals here will learn anything from this video, but the rest of us might enjoy this piece of highway philosophy. "How to break up stop-and-go traffic" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGFqfTCL2fs
|
|
#
¿
Jan 8, 2014 21:31
|
|
|
Carbon dioxide posted:But 2 million? That is quite an incredible number. For just turning a bunch of lights on. What the hell. Obviously, they need to invest in a remote light control system. The budget? 2 million € should go pretty far... I can imagine that the cost goes up a lot because if they want any kind of response time, the contractor will have to keep technicians on stand-by in every nook of the country. Might be cheaper to give the training and authority over the lights to each local fire or police department, for emergency use only? Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 13:22 on Jan 30, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Jan 30, 2014 13:20
|
|
|
PT6A posted:EDIT 2: Driving in Cuba, it occurred to me that we don't have double-lane yields here as they do in certain places there, but I guess I was wrong because such a thing appears to exist in traffic circles. Do we have them in any other places that I just haven't seen? I heard that Russian roundabouts also often have yields in the circle (where you have to give way to people entering). Seems backwards, I'd think the roundabout would quickly fill up when cars leaving don't have priority. Cuba seems to have some weird-rear end stuff though. I took this this morning. If I remember previous discussions correctly, this must indicate that they don't have any pre-emption for emergency services. http://imgur.com/7NtRWwO Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 00:36 on Feb 26, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 24, 2014 21:21
|
|
|
PT6A posted:EDIT: Also, your picture link is broken, so I don't know what you're talking about. One thing I do like about Cuban traffic is the "via libre" at T-intersections. Basically, if the terminating road has a green light to turn left, but there are more lanes on the straight-through than there are lanes of traffic turning, then those extra lanes can proceed through on the red light. It threw me for a loop the first time I was in a taxi and I thought the taxi driver had just blown through a red light. They also have countdown timers for both red and green on most traffic lights, which I think is wonderful. Sorry for the broken link, the connection from here is not exactly reliable so imgur is playing tricks. http://imgur.com/7NtRWwO It was a picture of a countdown timer. They do count down on both red and green and they never seem to get pre-empted. Ambulances can't be going all that fast here anyway due to all the potholes... Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 00:35 on Feb 26, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 26, 2014 00:24
|
|
|
PT6A posted:It took a newly restored building in Habana Vieja getting gutted by fire before they realized it was a bad idea to block large areas off to all vehicle traffic (including fire engines), so I'm guessing they haven't really thought of all the negatives to something as small as not being able to pre-empt traffic lights. I'm just visiting for business for a few weeks. The hotel charges an arm and a leg for an hour of internet time, but they have it at the office for free, so... It's flaky though. Another peculiarity is the arterial roads with segregated speed limits. 80 KPH in the left lane, 60 in the right. I guess it's to avoid rear-ends, because the street has exits on the right only except at signals.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 27, 2014 15:03
|
|
|
virtual256 posted:http://kuow.org/post/seattle-s-crosswalk-chirps-being-killed-rapid-ticks I don't know about the MUTCD, but rapid ticking meaning "walk" is in line with much of Europe. That can only be advantageous. Do they also tick more slowly on "don't walk"? One cool feature you'll find on Swedish crosswalks, at least, is dynamic volume. So at noisy times (lots of traffic) the ticking is louder, allowing the blind to find the crosswalk even in rush hour. At night, they're quiet enough not to bother neighbors. A fun trick it to hit the little box a couple of times and hear the ticking get really loud as a response. Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 17:11 on Mar 12, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 12, 2014 16:53
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:Dude it's easier to learn like 3 words then to try to decode patterns of beeps and boops. Well, the ticking patterns are pretty universal though (the beeps and boops, not so much). So any blind globetrotters will have it easier if you conform and use ticking.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 17, 2014 12:46
|
|
|
This surfaced in my feed today. Seems like having a traffic light upside-down would be a HUGE legal liability to the city, in case any colorblind driver is ever T-boned in that intersection. Is this for real? http://gizmodo.com/the-story-behind-syracuses-upside-down-traffic-light-1545301615
|
|
#
¿
Mar 19, 2014 17:06
|
|
|
Did someone already post the Norwegian Silly Walk crossing sign? I couldn't find it so here goes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=By95MlAGTjE At least the mayor approves! Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 14:05 on Apr 8, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Apr 7, 2014 16:49
|
|
|
exo posted:The other advantage of the Australian indicators is that they have embossed arrows to indicate direction of travel for the blind, and haptic feedback for the deaf on when to cross. Next time you're at one put your fingers on the front of the top circle - there's a mechanically actuated striker behind the plate that taps in-time with the tone.  It not only indicates the direction of the crossing, it also has tactile information about the layout of the road you're crossing. Plus the stuff you mentioned. Swedish accessibility laws. They kind of rule. Edit: I think that reads as you'll cross (read this from the bottom up): car lane from right car lane from right tram tracks from right (I could be wrong here) island car lane from left car lane from left bike lane (bidirectional) Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 14:36 on Apr 10, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Apr 10, 2014 14:32
|
|
|
I figure someone here might enjoy this ad campaign by the Stockholm public transit agency "SL": http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/144615-doge-sl-facepalm/ They're advertising a "all-summer ticket" which is apparently geared towards kids and teens. Not sure whether it's a  or a  .
|
|
#
¿
Apr 27, 2014 10:11
|
|
|
Varance posted:Modern trams weigh in excess of 50 tons. If either hits your car, even at a low speed, you're getting totaled and potentially killed. Big objects, hard to miss unless you're inebriated, texting or otherwise distracted/impaired. Still, a modern tram can stop more or less on a dime. A freight train will not.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 29, 2014 14:44
|
|
|
mamosodiumku posted:Is there a reason to do what they're doing instead of using pre-cast segments for the bridge? Seems like using pre-cast segments would be faster to do, and maybe cheaper since labor is expensive. Faster? Maybe in terms of on-site time. You'd still need to put in the hours to build casts, bend rebar and pour concrete, whether you do in on a build site or in a cement factory. So it's not obvious that it would take less labor. For buildings with standardized segments (let's say you use the same or similar layout on 40 floors), obviously mass producing them in a factory could be cheaper. I really don't think you'd save much on a bridge project, though. There's also the issue of transporting huge concrete slabs as opposed to ready-mix concrete. And you can make bigger segments if pouring on-site.
|
|
#
¿
May 7, 2014 13:27
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:It's way too expensive for what it is but it does function. No, you mean "figuratively".
|
|
#
¿
May 14, 2014 15:39
|
|
|
jason87x posted:Have you ever been to Texas? We have brutally high insurance rates here because of all the uninsured drivers. I haven't been to Texas, and I had no idea about your sky-high rate of uninsured drivers (15-20% of drivers, according to this site). That's terrible, and your state should really be doing something about that. It's still slightly racist to assume that bad drivers are old hispanic ladies, not to mention uninsured and illegally in the country.
|
|
#
¿
May 19, 2014 09:46
|
|
|
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 |
|
#
¿
May 27, 2014 12:39
|
|
|
I think proper lane markings (just in the corners, mind you) could work wonders here.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 23, 2014 21:14
|
|
|
PittTheElder posted:Are they truly less efficient though? Just by concentrating your carbon emissions in one place, it becomes much more feasible to scrub it and reduce the carbon content before it hits the atmosphere. Now I have no idea if US plants actually bother to do it, but doing it on a few thousand power plants is much easier than doing it on a few million consumer vehicles. Carbon sequestration sounds like a good idea, but it's expensive (more fossil energy needed to extract the carbon dioxide from air). And there is no evidence that it actually works, long-term. Research ongoing, of course, but if you're going to hinge the future existence of humanity on hypothetical technology, in order not to reduce our energy usage, you might as well choose to hope for fusion power to be viable. This guy did some maths, and he figures there must be no more than 1% leakage per thousand years, otherwise the whole thing is completely useless. And carbon dioxide leaks very easily. http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v3/n7/full/ngeo896.html This guys says it will never be viable, as it's as expensive as solar power: http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/the-take/why-carbon-capture-and-storage-will-never-pay-off/ Edit: OK, traffic talk. I was just in the UK on holiday, and man, pedestrians have to wait a long time for green over there! It seems it's standard practice to have a separate, pedestrian-only, phase (button activated) at the end of each cycle. So at a four-way crossing, all four crosswalks would get green at the same time, while all car lanes have a red. Saw this in Liverpool and London, at least. If you need to cross diagonally in one cycle, you have to run like hell, because the ped phase is very short, too. In contrast, in Sweden (and most European countries I've been in), peds have a green when parallel car traffic has a green. So, turning cars have to watch out for peds, which might be slightly less safe I guess. On the other hand, British peds seem to very much ignore the signals because they take too long to turn green. Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 13:45 on Aug 11, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Aug 11, 2014 13:31
|
|
|
Brovine posted:You only get a green if that section of pedestrian crossing is fully protected. Otherwise, you don't. A green light when cars are still able to cross seems a very bad idea, to me. Well, it seems to work. Drivers here know to watch for peds on crossings when turning, and peds know to watch for cars. Drivers have to give way, when turning. Going by the WHO's traffic deaths report, the UK has twice as many pedestrian traffic deaths per capita as Sweden (7,75 vs 3,42 per million, in 2010, if I did the numbers right). Not that I'm saying that's all because of the traffic lights. I have no data about how many of those deaths were on signaled crossings. (Those are both pretty good numbers.) Brovine posted:There's no such thing as jaywalking in the UK - if you think it's safe to cross without waiting for the lights, then by all means do so. Well, there isn't in Sweden either, my point was that it seems like long waiting times would erode people's willingness to respect the lights. Which might lead to them getting run over, some other time.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 12, 2014 00:22
|
|
|
Fragrag posted:I'm staying in suburban Jakarta at the moment and my god the traffic infrastructure is so awful. I don't mind the driving style that much, but there are so many cars and the roads simply can't handle the volume. We left my cousin's house and not even a mile away we end up in traffic and there's till roughly 30km to our destination. I'll think twice before cursing the traffic back home in Antwerp. (but I still will because we're still the second most congested city according to INRIX) At least if you get on the toll roads, it's not too bad. But yes, definitely the worst congestion I've ever had to travel in. Nearest I've ever been to missing a flight, too. I planned for only 3 hours to make the 30 km drive. Should have planned for 4 at that hour of day. Only made it because my crazy taxi driver used the BRT lane (yes, they have BRT, but no-one seems to use it) (no, I didn't ask him to) and took it upon himself to overtake people on the outside grass verge once we got out of town.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 6, 2014 19:07
|
|
|
Haifisch posted:Shamelessly stolen from AI: I live nowhere near here, thank god. (Make sure you rotate 180 degrees to see the full horror) This is why Brits invented the 7-legged roundabout. Plenty of space there to fit one in, particularly if you intrude a little on the parking lot.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 3, 2014 09:34
|
|
|
dupersaurus posted:[...] terrorists seem to mostly be about the grand and bloody symbolic gesture of putting that semtex in the middle of a crowd at the Super Bowl. That's not necessarily true, though. But most of our current security efforts are aimed at just such high-profile threats, because they are easier to predict. It's feasible (albeit uncomfortable and expensive) to search everyone's backpack at the Superbowl, but it's entirely infeasible to guard against the kind of attack Cichlidae described. So we guard against what we can, and ignore what we can't guard against. Slowly, our mentalities adjust, so it seems reasonable to do so. In the end, we get Security Theater, as Bruce Schneier describes it. https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/11/beyond_security.html Also, what GWBBQ said. Most people are mentally incapable of killing others without first being trained / brainwashed, which is a great blessing.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 17, 2014 08:39
|
|
|
Oh, man, I missed the fuel/road tax discussion! I could never understand the philosophy of "who uses the infrastructure should pay for it". I guess it's an ideologically important thing in the US? Relatedly, is is there a federal law that DoT budgets may only be made up of incomes from fuel/road tax, and vice versa, that fuel/road tax may only be used by the DoT? Because it sure sounds like that from the discussion here. Here in Sweden, the gas tax is sky high, like in most of Europe, but it goes into the state's general budget and is used for whatever (like all other taxes we have, I think). Which has the advantage that if you as a citizen want more highways but don't care much for raised taxes, you can vote for the party that wants to increase road spending and cut welfare. And vice versa. No need to have the "low tax vs high tax" debate mixed into the issue of infrastructure spending. The level of the fuel tax is decided in part by the environmental ambitions (suppress driving) and in part by the need for income. Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 12:42 on Nov 9, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Nov 9, 2014 12:32
|
|
|
Peanut President posted:It's a push back against decades of spending trillions on roads then going to the public transit folks going "oh we don't have any money sorry for your lots seeya next year" Not sure I get what your saying. When was what you describe the case, that regular taxes were spent on roads, to the exclusion of other interests? When did that stop, i.e. when did the current doctrine of only using fuel taxes begin? I'm not sure I see how the current setup help public transit either, since it seems they get even less money than before.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 10, 2014 14:02
|
|
|
FISHMANPET posted:(Insightful commentary) Thanks for that! I had some preconceptions that were a little off, then. Glad to hear the system is not quite as insane as I thought.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 10, 2014 22:22
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:I figured it was just a way for light cameras to give people tickets with photo evidence. If you're past the line when it turned yellow and still went through you get a ticket. Won't do gently caress all for safety but might increase ticket revenue. It's fairly easy to get out of yellow light tickets just say "I didn't feel I could safely stop in time". I infer that your country applies the same law as Sweden: If the light turns yellow, you must stop UNLESS it would be dangerous (due to high speed, risk of rear-ending etc). I gather that this is also the case in some U.S. jurisdictions, but not all. (I could be wrong, Source) In practice, I've never heard of anyone here getting ticketed for running a yellow, but then we don't have red light cameras. I do believe the stop-on-yellow rule has helped reduce red light running, and thus security overall. I think the scenario Fangz described won't occur, because when you see a yellow you will be prepared for the car in front of you to stop. Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 16:35 on Nov 17, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Nov 17, 2014 16:21
|
|
|
Pet peeve: At least two people on every page writing about the local conditions "here". Wherever that is.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 28, 2014 04:25
|
|
|
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/12/major-chicago-study-finds-red-light-cameras-not-safer-cause-more-rear-end-injuries/quote:Major Chicago study finds red light cameras not safer, cause more rear-end injuries Anyone surprised? Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 22:31 on Dec 20, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Dec 20, 2014 22:05
|
|
|
Kaal posted:Ok so which one of you goons did this? This is the full URL, your link is broken: http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2015/02/11/guerrilla_public_service_on_99_invisible_richard_ankrom_replaced_a_los_angeles.html
|
|
#
¿
Feb 12, 2015 20:53
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 13, 2024 08:55 |
|
|
Lead out in cuffs posted:It's not exactly very strong language in there. Well, to be fair, it's a "must" clause, that's one of the strongest words you're likely to find in a legal document.  But I agree with your overall point, just nit-picking.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 16, 2015 07:28
|
|