I rode the bus to school in the 70s. If I become wheelchair-bound I can use the low-chassis busses and trains currently standard in my city, and the free city shuttles we have specifically for moving for people who need pickups. It exists.
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There’s a million of these naysayers on YouTube. Most of them just really don’t get engineering.
The good thing is they are bringing up issues for the engineers to address.
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This guy is an electrical engineer. That’s the basis of his channel.
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I have worked in really out there R&D environments and, yeah, a lot of prototype stuff is kind of put together with gum and spit and duct tape. It’s possible that the materials they are working with now will not be the final materials. It’s possible this company won’t survive or won’t be the one to get it out in the world. But, it’s coming.
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When my beloved car needed several thousand dollars in repairs last year, I decided to sell it, and while perusing auto ads for its replacement, I realized… I don’t need a car. I live two blocks from a subway, I have grocery stores within a ten minute walk, and for what I’d save on insurance, I can get a taxi or Zipcar if needed. It was kind of weird at first being car-free, but every time there’s a huge snowstorm and I don’t need to dig out my car, I am hugely grateful.
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I have been on the verge of getting rid of my car for… it must be ten years now. I only got my first one when I was 32 (and that was for work), and this is my second one, so there’s that.
Both times I have got this close to trading it in and walking away, my place of work has moved to the burbs, and I’ve gone from driving twice a month to driving 30+ times a month.
My current car is a two-door hatchback bought in 2005, and my work colleagues are always astonished at how few kilometres I have on it. The reason why is simple: I don’t drive it on weekends unless I’m visiting an out-of-town relative, and I don’t drive it for errands (unless they are on a direct route home from work). I still have a transit pass, and I use that for all my in-town transportation if it’s too far to walk. I love my bike, and I wish I rode it more, but bike riding is still a scary prospect in a lot of Toronto (if the cars don’t get you, the other cyclists will).
A change of work location or a change of work status (ie: retirement or full-on working from home) are all it would take to get me thinking about getting rid of the car again.
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Oh you mean the Koch (rhymes with cock) brothers? There was a study to setup a new mass transit line here in Nashville and those fucktards poured in lots of money to get it killed. Why? Cause they’re assholes, nothing else.
If I heard a meteor hit Wichita, Kansas, I would feel no pity (they are based out of there seems like)
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I associated “-tard” constructions with school bullying and casual ableism.
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Rural areas. Hills.And our local buses have spaces for one wheelchair, which replaces 5 ordinary passengers. If two people want to use that space, problem.
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Okay, I will not use that word anymore.
Trimet train cars each have space for several, buses accommodate two or three mobility devices at a time with foldable seating… etc.
It really sounds like you have no credible public transit system where you are so we’re right back to the plutocratic war on transit.
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Here the buses have painfully loud beeps as each passenger pays, they don’t have any protection from the stabby pains as the bus passes under trees, and they sometimes have very loud transmissions.
Here the subway stations have @#$% dangerous safety signals. Sometimes I couldn’t get into the station because of a strobe battery in the entrance. I worry that if I used the system, and did get into the station, I could end up on the tracks because of a strobe battery inside.
Supposedly there’s a plan to start perfuming the subway cars too. Which can trigger eye pain, blinding tears, throat pain, etc.
Here they have signs saying [system] is accessible, since that’s cheaper than accessibility, and pain numbers to call about accessibility problems, which screens out some of us disabled people facing some of the accessibility problems. I don’t know if they have other steps which screen out other disabled people.
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They seem to have ticked all the boxes. >:-(
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I think it’s great that this guy is looking at the costs, the materials, the installation costs, the return. It’s all just problems to be solved. A big change like this will require a lot of rethinking. They haven’t found the right materials YET. They haven’t figured out how to install it cost effectively YET.
I think it’s all doable; at this point there are several things in production from several different companies that have funding. They are all working to solve the problem.
These things are all solvable. Keep going solar roadways people!
I believe in you!!!
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Honestly, the only reasons I would miss having a car would be for skiing (~100 km away) and visiting my mother (~500 km away).
The rest of the inconvenience I can get used to, but when my mother wants me to visit every other month, and when I ski every other weekend in the winter, it’s just not fun to go that far that often without a car.
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The biggest issue is that these “solar roadways” need to deal with all the issues that normal solar panels deal with, PLUS issues with durability, a need to have a “grippy” surface for tires, lack of ability to be angled for solar coverage, installation issues, etc, etc. So, pretty much by definition, they’re always going to be more expensive and have lower output than “normal” installations - most improvements in the technology are going to have benefits for normal installations too, so there’s not a high likelihood of the roadway method “catching up”.
Pretty much the only thing the roadway idea has going for it is that it can use currently unused space, but if there’s any other unused space nearby then using that space for a normal installation is likely going to be a more cost/resource effective option.
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I think there are a lot of other things going for it, for the functionality it can add to roads, by turning them into smart surfaces. The original intent was to reduce the maintenance during cold weather, not to make money off of solar energy. If they can show a savings in maintenance costs, or by reducing the need to build new roads by using the existing area more effectively, then I think those savings need to be factored into the cost analysis. I don’t think this should be compared to a solar roof or solar grid.
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One of the things that pleases me about the switch to renewables is that there is a diversity of solutions. It boggles me that today we have a mix of coal, hydro, nuclear, natural gas, and petroleum (plus now some renewables) to meet our energy needs, yet often when new renewable tech is announced, there’s always people jumping in to say “well it won’t work in X scenario” and acting like that makes the tech worthless. By that logic Niagara Falls shouldn’t be used for hydro because there are no waterfalls of that size in Arizona.
If a solar road suits an area, build a solar road. Or a row of windmills. Or run turbines under a waterfall. Go with the renewable that works.
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Sure, but that’s where car rentals come in. There’s a Car2Go service that parks right behind my building. If I only needed a car to visit relatives and make the odd trip to a DIY big box or IKEA, I’d be happy to rent.
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