A truck loosely based on this idea could let cars pass beneath, doubling lane capacity.
Posted on 06/06/2012 2:44:37 PM PDT by Zakeet
Why not just build a normal railroad track with no crossings? A lot cheaper!
Why not just build a normal railroad track with no crossings? A lot cheaper!
Considering the fact that the trucks carry the products we buy, I’d say that we’re at least partially responsible for damage done to the roads. If we want to stop buying things we can ease the wear and tear.
It isn’t necessary to get all trucks off the road — it’s a matter of taking off as many as makes economic sense to do so.
That’s why I added the bit about switching modes. New hubs can be added, the distance between them doesn’t need to remain at 500 miles. That likely reflects the economics of older intermodal technologies — the point where it becomes economic to go multi-modal. If containers can be switched rapidly and cheaply (which new technologies do allow), then the break-even distance between trucking only, and multi-modal drops.
In thinking about this it could function much like a ski chair lift. The next problem would be to devise the terminal at each to load and unload the shipping containers at an efficient pace of production...
You do realize you’ve created a false dilemma? We can continue to use trucks when it makes sense to do so. If multi-modial solutions are used when economic (rail, barge, or ship), then we will have reduced wear and tear on the infrastructure, and saved shipping costs. Now, we can use those tax savings, and freight savings to buy more of what we actually want.
Not enough stimulus.
Note that the Milwaukee RR took out their well engineered, electrified rail operations in MT/ID/WA in the 1970's.
Rail operations at the ends of some coal operations have continuous load/dump loops.
It doesn’t matter. Here in the real world things are the way they are.
A truck loosely based on this idea could let cars pass beneath, doubling lane capacity.
Right. They’ve always been that way, always will. Nothing ever changes. No new technologies are ever developed, and if they are they don’t work.
Powered by electricity? We had rolling brownouts last summer. Is there suddenly a glut of electrical power?
I’m guessing you haven’t checked bridge heights on I-35 lately. Most of them are only a little taller than a standard truck. Rebuilding ALL the bridges could cost more than adding a lane in some areas.
Even if it was only adopted by UPS, FedEx and USPS in Texas, it would get a third of the trucks currently on I-35 off the road and they could have their containers dropped off at their facilities right away rather than having to wait for a train to arrive, unload, go to the next station, unload, etc., etc. - and unlike the train, it scales up and down plus isn’t held to a fixed schedule.
FYI, it’s a bunch of ex-Lockheed engineers behind this.
Looks to me like they’re mostly concerned with going green.
http://www.metrans.org/nuf/documents/Roop.pdf
Apparently this isn’t as privately funded as the article indicates. Stephen Roop seems to favor “Public-private partnerships” for everything else so I think its fair to assume he favors them here.
http://tti.tamu.edu/documents/0-4565-1.pdf
In general, it's not a good idea to stand or walk under same unless you have some redundant support(s) and a good reason to be there.
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