Why tech billionaires suck at fixing transport
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- čas přidán 27. 05. 2024
- Tech firms promise to revolutionize how we move from A to B. But their flashy inventions are often not much more than glorified buses - which are expensive, make traffic worse and suck up vital funds and attention. Why is big tech failing to fix transport?
Credits:
Reporter: Dave Braneck
Video Editor: Frederik Willmann
Supervising Editor: Joanna Gottschalk, Kiyo Dörrer, Michael Trobridge
We're destroying our environment at an alarming rate. But it doesn't need to be this way. Our new channel Planet A explores the shift towards an eco-friendly world - and challenges our ideas about what dealing with climate change means. We look at the big and the small: What we can do and how the system needs to change. Every Friday we'll take a truly global look at how to get us out of this mess.
#PlanetA #SustainableTransport #Hyperloop
Read More:
Elon Musk's original Hyperloop 2013 white paper: www.tesla.com/sites/default/f...
Leaked Hyperloop One Docs Reveal The Startup Thirsty For Cash As Costs Will Stretch Into Billions:
www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonr...
Elon Musk’s Boring Company Ghosts Cities Across America:
www.wsj.com/articles/elon-mus...
Why does it cost so much to build things in America?:
www.vox.com/22534714/rail-roa...
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:59 Traffic sucks
02:42 Flashy tech fixes
05:30 Is the hype real?
11:14 Real solutions
13:12 Outro
What's your city doing to fix transport?
LA is currently the North American city investing the most money in their public transit system. This is a result of them having the Olympic Games in 2028 so they want to ensure that we come out of the games better as a city.
There’s a BRT line that is supposed to connect me with a nearby city and a huge upgrade in train frequency which I’m personally super excited about!
Poorly timed traffic lights, inappropriately placed round-abouts, and bike lanes at an uneven asphalt-concrete seams in poorly angled gutters. These are all new or resurfaced in the last 5 years, so they consider these upgrades.
Just make cities walkable, and it will fix lots of the problems. People will spend less on verhicals, cleaner air, a more social city, smaller carbon footprint... We have a solution to the issue but people being ignorant. We have trains and Trams. That solve short city travel (trams), and Trains that solve state travel, and further we have train. Here in Europe and Asia we use it all the time and it's actually a working method. So no need to reinvent the wheel, it's just that the US is being ingnorant.
"A developed country is not a place where the poor have cars. It's where the rich use public transportation" - Gustavo Petro.
I don't want to be overly negative, but my city leaders tend to keep the status quo on over promising fixes and underdelivering on solutions. I do believe the number of residents that want to resist this holding pattern is slowly growing, but we still need a more radical shift in attitude to demand higher quality transport.
Iowa doesn't fix anything... We're adding more Interstate lanes at $1M per mile, when a train to Iowa City from Chicago woukd cost $700k a year. 🙃
We fixed the transit problem over a CENTURY ago. Trains are literally the most cost-effective and efficient way to transport anything between 5-2000 miles.
And for local commutes below 10km? Guess what! There is : Small Road Trains (Trams) and Big Underground Trains (Metro). People and cities will go through so much mental gymnastics only to overcomplicate 100 year old technologies when these already exist.
Trains are the best. But australia has given up on them
@@ranjithpowell6791 You never know. Reality might intervene and make them reconsider...
Love trains, but as e-bikes go 25kmph (20 mph in US) , 2-15 miles is quicker on ebike than train, and no walk to the station...
I love trains, but in reality, trains are often times slower and more expensive than other modes of transportation.
Light rail is trumped by cars and bikes, HSR by planes.
I saw a quote somewhere recently that said, "Electric cars arent here to save the planet, theyre here to save the car industry." I felt it was very apt. I definitely feel more dedicated bus lanes and cycle lanes would be a huge improvement, at least in America, anyway.
We need both. Globally cars are not going away soon. Locally public transport and human mobility may be better, but internal combustion must end in cities too.
@@jaxvoice718 Not necessarily, just having people who necessarily want or need a car would be enough, after all, the emissions of a car are usually low
In addition, electric cars still have to solve the problem of lithium batteries, a highly polluting material.
What I care about more is not relying on fossil fuels. We'll probably always need fossil fuels but I'm hoping not to rely on them.
@@armandoventura9043 The emissions from cars are not low, they are massive. Land transport comprises 1/9 of all emissions globally. Compared to the pollution from ICE vehicles, both in use and in producting the fuel, EVs are low impact. EV batteries are recycled.
@@jaxvoice718ars will still be needed. But a large chunk of people will not need car ownership if public transportation is well implemented. Maybe a few rentals for traveling to remote places or moving.
Also, lead acid batteries are recycled, but for lithium batteries they rarely do because it is much cheaper to mine and make new ones
*15 years ago my city [Burgas Bulgaria] ripped up every road* narrowed them, widened the pavements and put in dedicated bike and scooter roads - NOT lanes, separate roads and they put on masses of extra busses at a flat rate of €0.75 pre-ride no matter how far you go
It has utterly transformed the city. I no longer have a car - just don't need one even though I live 7km outside the city. Even my rich neighbors leave their SUV's here for days and use public transport, its just quicker and easier.
The center is booming -all thos e people previously stuck in cars miserable are walking and buying coffee and food and other stuff.
This year our high speed rail connection opens and then I can go anywhere in Europe
Wow I never heard of this. It would be an awesome case study for one of the urbanist CZcams channels. Or you can make a video about it yourself! 😊
@@kb_100 - It would be a really good case study. If you google "Burgas Bulgaria city center" everything you see was roads for cars when I moved here, then we had 3 years of utter hell and chaos, now 80% of the city is for people, bikes and scooters.
I owned a Mercedes CL500 coupe, when I moved to the city it just sat outside until the tires went flat, then the brakes seized on and I could not move it, in the end I gave it away cos the council put an "abandoned car" notice on it. Cos its just WAY easier to use the bus.
Meanwhile, my country (Belgium) sees bus lines reduced when they aren't being used enough, completely missing the point.
Never heard of it neither, but happy to learn this. 15 years ago is a long time ago and quite early/novative at that time! Proud of Bulgaria and Burgas for having done this!
@@guyvannifterik - I found out yesterday that sadly some cities have gone the other way and become more pro car. I guess this is the downside of having a governmental system where the mayors have a LOT of actual authority and power...
I used to be wooed by these techno transport solutions, but eventually and thankfully I woke up. Good urban planning, walkability, bikeability, and public transit are the cheap and available ways to improve transportation, quality of living, and environment.
One of the only and most reliable wacky transportation solutions was the High-Speed Rail project in California that was supposed to be built in 2016 or so. Same with the Northeast Maglev that was supposed to accommodate residents from Washington to the other big cities along the North Atlantic. It's more affordable than spending on a impractical hyperloop.
That's what China did.
@@spookysenpai7642 HSR isn't wacky lol.
@@XMysticHeroxi think they used "wacky" ironically.
@@spookysenpai7642maglav isn't that great, to integrate or power consumption.
Trains, metros, trams, busses are the best way to get from place to place.
Because for them it's not about fixing anything. It's about tax dodging, advertisement, or diverting attention from actual functioning alternatives. Musk's Boring Company is a prime example of doing all three in the most obnoxious way possible.
When Musk first started Tesla I was a big fan. First in the market usually gets the biggest market share. Then he did Space X. Huge success. And then came the Boring Company. But one by one each of these have soured. Tesla doesn't have the biggest market share in EVs, it the regular auto companies that do. And Teslas are built poorly. As the video showed, the Boring Company was just gimmick for Musk's Teslas. What a disappointment. And then he bought Twitter and took it private so he could literally have his own fiefdom in the internet. He's a pretty good engineer, but he knows very little about actual business. He's just a lot of hype.
@@rabbit251 Musk didn't start Tesla, that's one of his lies.
@@rabbit251 You seem bitter. You said that Tesla don't have the biggest market share of EVs????? REEEEEALLY? In the U.S., IT HAS THE BIGGEST EV shares of any other company that produce EVs. Sure, ICE cars have the biggest share, but it is slowly being eroded away by Tesla vehicles. In Norway, EVs are dominating sales vs ICE vehicles. Several years ago, that wasn't the case. Do you really think that the EV market share is like a light switch where Tesla can magically produce 10 million vehicles from 1 million vehicles in a year just like that????? IT TAKES TIME to go from a million to 10 million JUST LIKE ANY OTHER INDUSTRY. Tesla vehicles have become CHEAPER ALSO over time. Since when have ICE vehicles have become cheaper????? IT actually have become more expensive over the years to buy, and own.
@@1flash3571 I stand correct about Tesla sales. But a friend of mine had a Tesla and he had so much trouble. The car was really poorly built. I looked into Tesla and they have terrible customer service, terrible deliveries, and production is rather shoddy. EVs currently make up about 3% of vehicles worldwide. Musk isn't focusing on the company anymore and instead is playing with his new toy Twitter. So I am not just focusing on just one company, but on Musk overall, which is where he is, everywhere. He's a smart guy, but doesn't have great business sense.
Of course. Because actual solutions requires public interest and the pooling of public resources and only a government can do that. So that means the rich will be more limited in their power and have to pay higher taxes to provide for the public good.
I love how the solution to all transport problems is always just trains but no one wants to admit it
Cause it isn't. Why don't you want to admit that?
@@Tschacki_Quacki Train is cost effective, low carbon emission with the least accident and human life lost.
@@Tschacki_QuackiTrains and bicycles. There, happy now?
No one in America perhaps. The rest of the world is very happy with trains.
@@Riorozenever heard of a freight train?
Insane that companies in the USA are trying things like hyperloop when they don't even have ordinary high speed rail
Most US cities do not have enough population density to pull off HSR, let alone hyperloop. US is better off with point to point air travel or driving as there are more demand in point to point than hub based air or train travel.
@@maggiejetson7904That in itsself a problem. The American Dream features a great big house for a single family set on an even larger yard, ideally with a white picket fence out front. That's what people want, but it's horribly inefficient on infrastructure. All infrastructure - such a low population density means many suburban areas take more to maintain than they pay in taxes. It just takes too many meters of road, cable and piping per-resident. And makes mass transit impractical: A stop would just have too few people within quick walking distance to be worthwhile.
What US urban planning really needs is *more* density. No need to put up tower blocks everywhere, but something more like Europe: Smaller houses, duplexes, five-over-one buildings. Houses that don't have four times their own area in lawn mandated by the city government. And loosen up the zoning regulations to permit small businesses and retail in residential areas, rather than making people drive across town every time they want a bottle of milk.
USA got money for war but can't even feed their own poor yet demand Africa to accept gays and trans meanwhile denies Americans healthcare as a human right....
Hayaaaaaaaaaaaaa USA such a world bully throwing rocks out of a glass house
I think part of the problem is they are being blinded by their own affluence. They only travel in private vehicles (be it jets or limos) so they can't see that public transport would be better, because that would mean rubbing elbows with the plebeians
Often even city planners and elected officials don't use the public transit in their cities either. Which is why they make bad decisions and typically prioritize car infrastructure because that's what they know and use personally. At least this is the case in North America.
No they are not blind or stupid they simply make money off the automotive industry , selling cars and maintaining roads with tolls is much more profitable than creating public transport infrastructure.
@@kb_100 idk about that. I'd bet that in many European countries with good public transportation the average politician doesn't use it. It's just that in Europe public transportation isn't usually potrayed as a poor person's option who can't afford a car
Their idea is not wrong, and in low interest rate era not bad for trying things out. I think it would work better in Asia however, like between Beijing and Shanghai, with continuous hyperloop traffic instead of airplane.
Techies simply can’t comprehend that public transit is already plenty inexpensive to build and run while also being able to provide great speeds.
I got tired of hearing all the “trains are too expensive” arguments which led to me doing a video on the cost to build and run a light rail line vs a freeway.
The light rail was $500 million cheaper to build and the cost to use the freeway was equal to the cost for LA’s ENTIRE light rail and bus system!
It’s just no contest from a cost and emissions point of view.
Agreed. Dunno how much it was subsidized, but the local tram pass was roughly $25 a month in Augsburg Germany years ago when I was there. And a train ticket to a Munich was ~$5. I spent maybe $40 a month total.
Meanwhile our car cost $130 in insurance, $80 in gas, plus ~$250 a month on average for the actual car so far over 8 years. Not even counting tires and oil changes.
$40 < $460. :P
And we all have seen the reports of gas taxes covering as little as 40% of the road infrastructure in some places so it's obviously heavily subsidized as well.
They know, its only that it dont attracts venture capital
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5227013/#:~:text=Squeal%20noise%20is%20the%20wheel,by%20the%20moving%20wheel%20flange.
Neat, Imma watch it
Although trains,buses etc are better solutions if they are implemented right, they are still only cheap for the users because of subsidized.
In locality they still wast value time because they are only a couple time slots tru the day to get in the bus, making cars a lot more competitive even if still more expensive cars are still a better option in general, railway worker in the capital of my country are always on strike, giving public transport a worst rep and a lot of frustration from commuters.
Way too many of the tech-bro solutions to traffic problems really just seem to be a distraction to prevent governments from building high speed rail. Or any kind of transit or cycling solution, for that matter.
Musk said that directly. He essentially said -- I talked up the hyperloop in an attempt to stop or slow down California's high-speed rail. I knew it wouldn't work but I sell cars and anything that makes fewer people drive cars is bad for business.
@@nuke___8876 Exactly. He owns a company that sells cars, obviously he's not going to invest in another company that would cannibalize profits from that. But creating hype around some impractical BS is perfect for distracting politicians, because they're concerned about re-election, and something that looks flashy and cool is better than something "boring" like an already well-established technology.
High-speed rail is stupid and a waste of money. What's needed is a public transport service for local trips.
@@nuke___8876wow, that's horrible. Can you give me an article about that, I would like to know more
@@andreafarina385- don't hold your breath waiting for a reliable source for that quote.
Trains, buses, subways, and trams have all been around for at least one century by now. They work, we know how to build them, plan for them, and how to operate them. And they are by now reasonably cost and energy efficient.
Of course we should keep looking for new or improved ways of getting people around. But when a new technlogy is presented, it is always worth just comparing it to trains, buses, subways and trams.
Don’t forget the trolley bus 🚎 and that the systems is safe, efficient, regulatory approved, tried and tested technology.
Bikes have been around for over a century too
@@TheTrailRabbit Yes, so has cars, but neither qualify as means of mass transportation 🙂
I am lucky enough to live in a city with pretty decent mass transportation - a extensive network of buslines, a very useful subway, commuter trains and two tram lines. Still personally, I go by bike where I need to be for of the year (there are always a few weeks to a couple of months where its is just to cold, to slippery to safely use a bike) so I am well aware of it as a means of transportation :)
And new tech can be used to improve present mass transit, just not in the flashy ways. Like using AI to find the most cost effective and passenger supportive schedules on a line or route. Having free phone apps to let people plan their best route with transit. Tech can totally help, it's just not the whole answer.
@@CortexNewsService not even. A cohesive schedule that people can use their brains to plan around would be much better.
Would honestly love to hear more hype around trolley buses. They can be a cost-effective way for cities to implement non-polluting public transit on a large scale.
Eastern Europe was doing it for decades now and it works. I am very familiar with Vilnius and their system. 21 routes that cover pretty much the entire city. Where the volume of passengers is bigger, routes converge, and the wait times are never longer than a few minutes for the most bustling stations, with more remote areas on the outskirts that have little traffic are supplemented by regular bus service.
And you really can get anywhere and everywhere.
I really think these are a great idea, especially electric trolleybuses with batteries, that way the “ugly” and expensive wires only need to be fitted to main roads which aren’t exactly pretty anyway, then the buses can charge up on main roads and still take smaller roads to stop near houses. In my town most of our streets are to thin for dedicated tram lanes but they would work for trolleybuses, since we already have a massive bus system run by polluting diesel buses. The only issue would be double deckers, if we have wires at normal bus height we can’t run double deckers on main roads. But I think it would still be a better solution than hydrogen and battery electric buses, although the former at least has a place in a transit focused future.
They only work if they get priority over individual transportation or they'll just get stuck and not being able to fulfill the scheduled times
@@justanotheryoutubechannel I've been in towns with "ugly" wires and if done right you eventually won't notice them. But really, if you're already installing wires might as well go the whole way to electric trams. Rail is more effecient with steel on steel compared to rubber on road which creates a lot of friction. With wires they also dont need to carry the weight of the batteries (which tend to be very heavy) so that's extra saving.
@@tomlxyzThey don't have to have priority over regular traffic in all cases. It can sure help, but it's not needed per se. E.g. in my old hometown there are no dedicated bus lanes and they run without delays during the day. During rush hour, sure, buses might run 3-4 minutes late, and it would take you a couple minutes longer to reach your destination, but that rarely mattered since they run every 7/8 minutes. Worst case, you wait 5 minutes.
Though that might not be applicable to the US where the sprawl is insane.
Honestly, I believe e-bikes could make a HUGE impact on transportation, with a modest investment in fully connected cycleways. Cycling infrastructure is much cheaper than car and mass transit infrastructure, and people will voluntarily choose to cycle when there are safe routes. A majority of household trips are well within an easy bicycle or e-bike trip distance.
That doesn't work in many parts of the US because distances are too far. Try looking at what avg. commutes are for people in different large metroplexes. No one in their right mind would want an e-bike for those types of commutes. It's either mass transit or a vehicle that you sit in and drive, protected from the weather. With an air filter, air conditioning, etc.............................................
e-bikes are for small communities where you typically go less that 2 - 3 miles to do ANYTHING. In a lot of places where I live you might have to drive 10 miles just to get food. Yeah good luck with that when it's 105 degrees F outside or you have one of those heavy storms sweep through that dumps 8 inches of rain/hour.
Car companies definitely don’t like you. 😂
@@khoanguyen0001, transit and active transportation (walking, cycling) are very clear, proven solutions to the local transportation contributions to climate change, and the fossil fuel companies and automobiles companies are certainly fighting hard against any transition to sustainable alternatives to cars. It’s not at all surprising to me that the recent US climate legislation included huge subsidies for electric cars, but relatively little for transit, and nothing at all for bicycles and e-bikes.
I have an ebike and before that just a non electric bicycle and have always been a bicycle commuter. I have a juiced brand ebike and i think that's the kind in the background of the first interviewee.
I agree. Got my e bike and started using it to commute back in Jan. Hoping to turn into a single-car family as a result in the coming years (car miles driven has already plummeted!).
I am convinced that the hyperloop hype was designed to shut down rail projects (by blocking right-of-ways in high traffic locations). This lets Elon Musk sell more cars.
It literally was, and it isn’t original. The auto makers have been bidding for transit projects for a century. They also bought and killed streetcars all over
Musk's biography writer Ashlee Vance has said he wanted Hyperloop publicity to get CAHSR cancelled even if the tech wasn't viable.
Can RU just nuke US?
I do think hyperloop has potential, to be faster than air travel, but the problem is to be cost effective you have to make sure it is highly utilized and to do that you have to connect only large cities far away (so the faster than air speed matters) but not too far away (so it doesn't cost too much more than air travel). The smaller cities won't make it with their utilization and they are likely better off with train in short distance and air for long distance.
@@maggiejetson7904Underground cars will never be faster than air travel. High speed rail is already competitive with air travel in many regions, and will only improve with maglev. For long distance land travel, maglev should be used in the future when construction costs come down. Of course motor and airline lobbies will try to prevent this at all costs.
Yep. These are not ideas for fixing transport.
They are methods for profiting from transport.
Literally what I was about to say, these idea help sell a product, not fix transit.
The way we do that is to offer real alternatives to cars like buses, light rails, regional, and rapid transit(metro) services.
Since all of them have higher capacity than high ways and the cars.
What do you think cars do?????
@@avacadomangobanana2588not fix the transport issue lmfao
@@LatencyProblem idek what I was thinking this dude has the same POV I do 💀
Do you know how the world works? Someone needs to make money doing it. Or it won’t get built.
I follow a lot of urbanist channels, and the answer always comes down to trains, metros, trams, and busses to support rail networks.
On the topic of trains, if you are an EU citizen you can sign a petition to connect all EU capitals in a high speed rail network.
Edit: CZcams deletes my comments with links. You can google for "petition hsr eu" and it should point you to an official website from the EU
Thank you for sharing this! I signed the petition and im going to tell my friend about it
Yup that's right.
I think trolley-busses like in Eastern Europe are a great solution. All electric... tried and tested technology.. and the new ones even come with small batteries so they can cross streets when you don't want electric lines (like at tourist sites).
American cities were built with streetcar lines. When the streetcar rails were paved over, trolley buses served the area for a short time. They are definitely a viable option.
Thousand times yes
Too bad the fossil fuel propaganda has been making them look "untrendy" 😞
Yes, in Budapest, they also provide an opportunity to exercise when passengers have to push them. But that aside, they are great. Or trams.
Thing is that the Overhead Wires for Trolleybuses are much more complicated than for Trams. Not only do you need two Wires instead of one (small Disadvantage), but every Intersection becomes mindboggingly complicated, as crossing Lines must be insulated from one another. Furthermore, the Trolley Shoes are guided by the Wires, hence the Wire must be uniterrupted straight. Meaning to say every Junction also needs liitle "Wire Switches", similar to Rail Switches. Trolleybuses might have their limited Niches, but mostly you're better off just building a Tram right away, as Trolleybuses mostly combine the Disadvantages of Trams and Buses, while actually making the Tram Disadvantages even worse.
The biggest changes will be policies that allow and encourage density where people are able to walk to the things they need everyday. Elimination of parking minimums and much of single use zoning. Allow housing other than single family homes to be built.
it's wild how few rules would need to be changed for a lot of issues to start solving on its own but it's not done. What you've listed would both reduce traffic jams and make housing more affortable (by not enforing urban sprawl)
I knew I liked DW, but by bringing this to the mainstream you guys are my hero
DW is not mainstream, it's a pro-establishment lefty rag.
Did you know that all trolley buses in london were electric up until de 50s? I find that discouraging. They were discontinued because they needed cables since batteries weren't as efficient but it was the perfect system that was replace by gas buses and diesel underground. The problem here is looking at the future instead of getting back what was great in the pass.
Why do they suck at lots of things? Impossible wealth convinces people they are geniuses who can do anything (and causes them to forget how much luck and help they received)
That's particularly true for tech because in most other fields you first have to prove something works before you can release it onto the masses
That Vegas "commercial for Teslas" I think hints at one the more deeply entrenched systemic issues for why we don't have better transit options. The dominant companies in our economy have a vested interest in keeping things the way they are. More efficient transit does not grant them higher profits, so they will not give up their control. Creating a culture of non-complacency to these factors is important if we want to see human-centric and climate-friendly changes implemented.
Has Musk's boring tunnel actually delivered on the promise of being a more efficient transit system, or more affordable I guess not. It hasn't even delivered on the promise of being a workable transit system🙂
@@thatkanpuriaguy8177- was that the promise? Or was it an attempt to solve a specific problem for a convention center of how to move people from set of convention halls to another?
Do not blame these two short tunnels for not solving a problem it was never intended to solve.
As for the cars not being autonomous (yet), please give me your best shot on why that is case. Is it due to government restrictions, or technological limitations?
@@JanBruunAndersen it was pilot to with a promise to drive vehicles on a platform at a speed of 140 mph. What it achieved was a joke. There was no platform in the final iteration. It just allowed teslas to go through tunnel at 40 mph🙂 So compared to the media hype it generated it didn't deliver on its lofty goals, overshot both the time and budget. Go listen to Musk's interview and his baseless promises. 🙂
As for autonomous cars, it is both due to technological pitfalls, crashes, and reasonable government restrictions that came after teslas crashed. The traffic system is not Musk's private wealth, it is a social system. If Musk's autonomous system is not feasible is all kinds of transport infrastructure, then it is incomplete and dangerous. The cars aren't meant to driven around close circuit tracks, they are meant to perform in real world. I guess Musk is genius enough to know that🙂
@@thatkanpuriaguy8177 - I know that electric cars are capable of reaching 60 mph in 2-3 seconds. Do you really want those Tesla's in the LVCC tunnel to go full tilt and accelerate up to 140 mph only to slam on the brakes when the short tunnel comes to an end??
"the traffic system is not Musk's private wealth" - what traffic system? The LVCC tunnels?
It's kinda strange that they even keep cars at the LVCC loop. One might as well ditch the expensive part of the setup and just have people walk through the tunnels. They're a direct route from A to B without obstacles, which was the problem of moving crowds at the LVCC to begin with.
Walking, Cycling and public transportation are really the only transport systems we should ever use in a perfect world, am example of very good cycling infrastructure is of course Amsterdam. It's faster to cycle than it is to drive, cycle culture is dominant with most people either walking or cycling to short distance destinations. The short answer is if you make something convenient and change the perception of something people will undoubtedly choose to use it.
The entire Netherlands has an excellent cycle path network: 22,000 miles/ 35.000 km in total.
Yes! but with at least some minor concessions given to those of us with disabilities, of course. I don't want to be eternally trapped indoors 😊
@@maleahlock Mobility scooters and micro cars are available for the disabled and elderly. Both use the cycle paths. Of course, adapted cars are also available, with thier own parking spots.
@@mardiffv.8775 Yep The Hague, Rotterdam, Amsterdam are probably the best known for it though since they have more developed infrastructure and have high cycle rates compared to driving.
A fit all one solution, I don’t think is ideacall, that’s one of the reasons people have against the “green” transitions, some arguments of the opposite side are valid imo, electric cars although “greener” because of the pollution stays mostly on the source, they are still very bad environmentally while some that buy them feel morally superior to others
*_Two Colombian cities mentioned in less than 10 seconds _**_12:21_**_ and for something good, it's like a dream, I think it's the very first time I see something like that in a foreign video_* 🤔🤗
I believe the better urban planning and future planning is more impactful than any new technology. Eventually, the planning and changing people's perspective to transportation (opting out of car) and developing cities vertically would be a chance to it.
I agree, but cities do not have to vertical. 5 story apartments will fine. See Amsterdam, Paris and Barcelona. Concrete modern apartment buildings make people depressed. The classic architect style makes people happy.
@@mardiffv.8775And it is more than enough density for public transport to work
10:50 can you imagine the noise polution of such flying taxies if they became popular?
Can you imagine the fatalities when one inevitably crashes?
@kb_100 oh yeah... nothing like car crash ABOVE your home right?
@@zolniu your home, school or hospital! The possibilities are as unlimited as the modes of failure of the flight controls.
IMO, more than transit tech, the goal should be to rethink our cities. Amsterdam, you mentioned it, is a great example of a city that undertook quite a transformation. The 15-minute-city movement in the US, even facing quite a resistance from the car-centric crowd, has a good point: The future of transit might be less transit and more walkability/bikeability.
@@logans3365 To me it seems many Americans who object to that idea want to live in a quiet suburban area with no other people hanging around.
And why do they want that? Because (their) cities are loud.
But cities are loud because of all the cars who need to drive in and out from city to the suburbs
15 minute cities on paper sounds good until you realise that the people in control hate you and want to have complete control over you.
Its amazing how so many ideas can be impractical with simple but huge issues... like a hyperloop - keeping the tubes void of air would be very difficult, expensive, and easy to fail from a small leak or damage.
or solar freakin' roadways. Roadways made of GLASS is just one of the red flags
OceanGate moment waiting to happen right there
Hyperloop was intentionally designed to fail. It was to distract from a working public transport system so cars could continuously be sold.
@@tomservo5007 never understood why not just advocate on putting solar panels on all roofs instead? That's mostly unused space that no traffic runs over, wearing it down (but also casting shadows regularly)
@@tomlxyz solar panels on roofs is already really common.
and (probably) will be the norm in a couple of years, at least in The Netherlands and probably a lot of Europe.
but the power those panels produce is for houses, businesses and industry not for powering traffic.
best thing would be to try to get as close to 0% personal car and only have emergency, delivery and business vehicles (like the plumber or electrician) left.
everyone else should be able to use either walking cycling or public transit to move around.
those modes of transport are way more efficient. make those all electric and produce the power at either offshore wind parks or solar panel parks somewhere in the rural area's.
the USA has plenty of ground unfit for many things and could use that for renewable energy production.
in Europe we should share all power (at least the EU) so Northern Europe would produce a lot of wind power and Southern Europe a lot of solar. and we can distribute that to each other as needed. (and maybe have nuclear power to ensure the grid is always 100% provided with power.
Ebikes are a real game changer. I’ve had an ebike for years now and it takes me everywhere in the city faster than a car ever could, because I don’t get stuck in traffic nor do I get tired. I used to live in Porto, a super hilly city, and the ebike made the hills a breeze, whereas a normal bike was a real struggle and untenable for almost everyone. I park wherever i want and the extra electricity cost can be rounded down to zero. Maintenance is extremely cheap and biker insurance was 30€ per year.
The only issue is peak winter, in Porto because of the deluge of rain which requires annoying to equip extra gear, and in Kraków because of salt on the roads which damages every component - so then i take the tram or uber - but a town in Finland has already solved this issue, we just need their solution (compacted snow paths) to spread to more cities.
Trams are also great, but we need way more of them, and buses could be great but because they get stuck in traffic and are generally neglected in every city I’ve been in, they tend to operate far below their potential.
High Speed Rail. Why, because steel wheels on steel tracks have the least friction and therefore are easiest to move. It's why they had sand stations on earlier rail lines, to act as friction.
Finally a big channel is picking up this problem. Great video!
“Why tech billionaires suck at fixing transport”. Because they don’t use it?
So nice to see Colombia being mentioned for something positive every once in a while! I can attest that Medellin's public transport is awesome and truly has revolutionized the city. It also has a very good public perception in spite of all its flaws, thanks to the tangible impact that it has had on the people. As a result, its become very appealing to advocate for better public transport in the political scene, and thus the city keeps investing on these massive projects that are truly innovating.
Instead of investing into a real metro or designing cities better- they give boatloads of $ to Elon to make another highway, but underground 🙄
The loop was 4x cheaper than the next best proposition and Boring will pay for every expansion from now on. I dont see how it hinders any other plans, nor why it is bad for anyone.
@@theipc-twizzt2789Because the number one rule of urban planning is “building more roads won’t fix it”. Building more lanes on a highway solves the problem for 3-6 months but then those lanes become just as congested as the others and traffic is worse than when you started. The same goes for underground roads. Unless there is some way of limiting access to these roads, they will also fill up with congestion. The only real solution to eliminating traffic is eliminating cars from the road. That means building mixed-use and high-density neighborhoods that don’t require a car for citizens to buy groceries or go to work. It also means prioritizing buses and light rail over cars so that public transport is actually useful instead of being stuck in traffic with everyone else.
@@victoriarotramel2274 builiding more lanes doesnt fix anything, that is correct. A tunnel however is no simple lane. Its a fast point to point connection without all the problems an additional lane would cause (there is no merging lanes, no traffic lights and no signs that would require you to slow down or stop).
Regardless, that goes besides the point:
- As of now, acess into those tunnels is limited to shuttle cars only. Internal combustion engine vehicles will never be allowed because ventilation adds cost
- No taxpayer money is required, so it does no harm anyways
- These tunnels are prototypes for a machine, that can tunnel significantly cheaper and faster -> this is the important part here. Using cars driven by humans is merely an intermediate step. You can put anything you like into those, eg autonomous electric busses.
- right now, capacity is sacrificed for convenience (as there is no waiting time and no required stops before each passengers destination). This can be changed with larger vehicles however.
@@theipc-twizzt2789
What if you linked all the electric busses together, and maybe had some kind of apparatus to keep them powered without the need for individual engines? Perhaps even a track so you don't have to worry about tire maintenance. Would be pretty efficient...
@@drksideofthewal If you do that, you loose
"there is no waiting time and no required stops before each passengers destination"
I think e-bikes will be a huge mode of transportation in the future, especially in Asia. I think they will be an improvement from the current situation with the number of motorbikes, being more affordable and creating less pollution.
Great video. Finally mainstream media applying some critical thinking to these technogrifts.
Diesel trains, commuter trains, electric trains, passenger trains, freight trains, light rail trains and more.😢
Biilionaires: Governments should interfere in private businesses as little as possible to foster an environment for innovation
Also Billionaires: We'll have those sweet government contract and subsidy dollars thanks!
I think more frequent busses and cheaper, faster connecting rail. Bike paths are also great.
The mode of transport that you didn't show, are the trolley buses that are in use in many large cities. They are more efficient than busses with batteries.
Also far more limited than buses with batteries.
@@marcinwolny2209 Not really, busses usually drive on predefined routes. Also, it's possible to equip a trolley bus with a battery to make it independent of wires for a time and charge the battery during driving.
Thanks for the insights. 🍀 Trolley buses are cool yet they require still a lot of new infrastructure especially in densely populated cities. Improving energy storage and regenerative braking systems, and increasing operational range for off-wire operation seem to be some of the other challenges too.
@@quinto190 The problem are all the regular road work that happens in any city all the time. With trolleys and trams they break down and need to be replaced with busses every time. Busses can just take another route.
@@Carewolf Trolley busses can manage a lane change... and trams often have their own part of the street, so mainly the intersections can be more difficult. But as I mentioned, there are many cities that deal with this since a long time, urban planners can ask there how they do it.
somehow some of the smartest people earth chose to invest in a technology over 100 years old that never worked.
JUST BUILD TRAINS
I live in the Netherlands and we have an ultra high tech solution to inner-city transport problems. It saves money, space and energy and it's now spreading to major cities around the western world, including Paris, London and New York. If you want to know more, we call them "fietsen", or bicycles in English.
Private investors are interested in growing their money, not improving societies. That is why a robust public sector needs to exist.
Then you have no clue about the history of usa. This is the only country on earth that was built by merchants.
@@harukrentz435shit country
just invest in public transportation, my god...
You can't solve transport problems without taking planning into account. High density (not skyscrapers) mixed use cites are a must.
Yes...mixed use is an important component in solving the transportation problem, something we see in other parts of the world, but not so much in the US.
@@davidwill1320 Exactly, the US has to strict zoning laws preventing mixed use.
Absolutely changing zoning laws to allow or even demand mixed use development in inner city and suburban areas is a must for changing car dependency for communities.
If there's one thing that urban studies and planning have taught us over the last 60 years, is that cities are an extremely complex environment in which traffic problems are always fixed by a mix of innovations, logistical improvement, and planning (of course), and not by a single technological improvement or a sensational idea. For this reason, these bizarre innovations are doomed to fail when put in practice.
Thank you for not being afraid of naming the issue open and clear.
Thanks for spending the time to create and share this content awareness/perspective
Thank you DW for maintaining a down to earth view of reality!
I too work in vehicle design and manufacturing, and it pains me to see how these tech-gurus convinced even the most experienced professionals in my field how their "pie-in-the-sky" solutions are what they should invest their efforts on.
Funny thing is none of these tech-gurus ideas are actually new. The main concept of vacuum or semi-vacuum tunnels for land transportation for example can be traced back to Robert Goddard who launched the idea as early as 1904!
So much for these tech-geniuses, people never ask why weren't these ideas put into practice in the first place over a hundred years ago.
I too think people should stop calling eVTOLs "flying cars". They are not. They are electrified ultra-short-range helicopters that will probably need 6 hours to recharge and hardly brake-even the investment.
Much like the folk story of unethical tailors selling underwear to the oblivious king. These snake oil salesmen dream of great IPOs, huge investments through SPACs, and they keep feeding nice Powerpoint slides that will have oblivious incompetent investors and CEOs believe only the smartest people can see the potential on these slides.
What people who are not familiar to our field fail to realize is that the main difference between the Tech industry and Transportation industry is the cost! Most tech companies make huge profit because paying a programmer to write a software is much more cheaper than paying an army of engineers, assembly line workers, and third party suppliers to build a car, a train, or an airplane. Also if your iphone fails, all you need to do is reimburse a low cost manufacturing unit to an annoyed customer, but if a vehicle fails, it can even cost the lives of the passengers, so that product testing is orders of magnitude more expensive to ensure safety.
Technobros do not take a metro. Most of these projects are like "just add one more lane for the rich".
The ultimate reason why none of these solutions will work is that transport needs to be run as a public service, not as a for-profit enterprise. You put money in, you get transport out, as opposed to the other way around.
For public transport to be utilised widely enough to make a difference to the climate it needs to be cheaper, faster or more convenient than private transport (and ideally ticking more than one of those boxes). Without major public funding, that is just not possible.
The largest blocker (at least in the UK), is the perceived political consensus that services need to be profitable, instead of the service itself being of value. IE. The value of an effective, cheap public transport network isn't in generating profit, but in its effect of enabling the rest of the economy to function and make profit and generate taxes etc.
After working 3 days a week from home office I see how much time I save (even though my commute is short 15-20 minutes). I now just need a grocery store with a good webshop solution that deliver to my area and I would reduce greatly how much I drive.
So part of it is also avoid unneeded travel.
Great, but why do you not go by bike to the grocery shop 3-4 times a week? Cheaper and exercise.
@@mardiffv.8775 True. I should have done that at least in the summer months. Its quite a few kilometers, but not undoable. But in the snow in winter no thank you 😆
@@Zachry86 I can understand you. You can always slip and slide with a bike. That is why I cycle on 3 wheels. Yep, a bike trike. I even cycled on the ice for fun.
I want tiny, walkable, tree canopied little towns of one to two hundred people, where we do our best to have everything a person needs within 3 miles! Every inch of town should be well-loved. Grow food in every spot in town it can be grown on, and food all around the outer rim of town🌳😊🌳
"The Real Solutions Company" anyone? Fantastic job, as always. Thanks, DW!
Biggest room for improvement is definitely rail + eBikes. Rail for city to city + ebikes for city transit.
The next step would be to lower speed limits dramatically and enforce them since people would no longer have to take long trips by car.
Then vehicles could get lighter while maintaining safety doubling the effect of less loss to drag.
EX: Model Y Est
75 MPH interstate: ~347 wh/mile
55 MPH highway: ~208 wh/mile
40% smaller battery goes the same distance. Now for simplicity, image that the vehicle could weigh 40% less and still be as safe due the lower max speed.
Now we're down to ~175 wh/mile. Slightly less than half the energy used for the same distance by just going the US national speed limit from the 70's.
This of course would be a long term transition since these cars would still have to drive around 6000lb behemoths that probably shouldn't be legal in the first place since they do squat to maintain the safety of anyone not inside the emotional support vehicle.
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What a lot of people like to mix up: What’s good for a business and what’s good for a economy. Not exclusively but also in transportation. A good public transportation system hardly good for any profit oriented business. But it is very important to a functioning society and the economy, because all the external costs of car dependency outweigh the costs of good affordable public transport by far. Roads, air pollution, climate change etc. But the best for short travels still is the bicycle. One the infrastructure is there it is easy and cheap to maintain and there are close to zero externalities.
Before I worked at the arena in Portland. After they put in a light rail and a stop at the arena, the train was packed before / after every event. Ticket sales rose and restaurants around the arena saw a huge increase in business as people didn't drive and didn't want to get on a crowded train, they went to drink. Early morning hours the train was as packed headed to downtown same as the roads. The mass transit system there helped a lot and makes a good profit. Light rail, subways, etc. all work in other countries. Why is it that only the US can't make it work. The US basically just isn't as great anymore.
There's a lovely scene in the 1988 adaptation of Legend of the Galactic Heroes where one of the main characters gets stuck in an enormous traffic jam. He asks a nearby traffic cop what happened: "Someone input some bad code into the central traffic computer" and thus all the autonomous cars came to a halt.
I’m glad you mentioned Uber Bus, a project I worked on. You missed the innovation there though, using smart phones and clever algorithms to plan routes and vehicle schedules based on rider preferences in ways that weren’t possible before the smartphone era. I don’t place much faith in the flying car stuff but can see tech-enabled ride sharing maybe by autonomous car becoming a key future form of public transit.
Shared electric motorbikes and public electric bikes works awesome in Barcelona
Developping biking paths is really a necessity. Very glad you also mentionned Medellin's cable car system, it works magic and helped a lot of people living in favelas to get to the city center and have access to public services, jobs, etc. Works fine in other cities from what I've heard
A huge opportunity is in urban planning. I live in a small village in a small 2 story flat and I have a supermarket and other shops within 5 minutes walk of my home. That is literally ILLEGAL to build in most of America, where in suburbs only single family homes and no shops whatsoever are allowed.
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One more lane of traffic is one more lane whether it's above or below ground. There are always diminishing returns to adding lanes, above and below the surface.
Tech billionaires are not urban planners or transport engineers who have actual skills and knowledge.
But imagine if they spent even a fraction of that money on a team of urban planners and then listened to what they suggest. Glorious. Angels would sing.
Titanic 2-0 rich people
Trams and trains.
- A steel tracks last a long time.
- Low rolling resistance.
- Cheap to electrify.
- Does not need batteries.
- New technology makes them really quiet.
- Kills way less animals than cars.
- Easy to get materials to build, does not require exploitation and uncomfortable dependencies.
- Can actually be automated and self-driving (unlike cars).
- Infrastructure is more compact, saving habitats.
- Solves traffic.
- Can go up to 300kmph.
- Can replace flying.
- More comfortable than flying.
- Can transport massive amounts of cargo.
I could go on, but only problems it has is bad planning. Which is a bit more feasible to expect than hoping for a miracle tech.
The tech company "solutions" can be summed up as "a train but worse, a subway but worse, a taxi but worse"
You had me at "why tech billionaires suck"
10:16 The traditional helicopter design is cheaper, easier to control and more energy efficient than multiple small rotors.
Yeah but the autorotation means any crashes will be less entertaining for the CZcams crowd.
@DW great reporting! I love it that you provide a lot of quantitative analysis. Way to go DW!
„Oh, you reinvented the train?“ „No, it’s a fixed-track-multi-pod!“
I want traditional rail trains.😢
Se a cápsula do hyperloop vazar dentro do tubo à vácuo, as pessoas podem morrer devido a queda de pressão brusca?
Efeito contrário ao que ocorreu na cápsula do OceanGate.
Not to worry, the Hyperloop will never be built.
My city (Brisbane) has a Veloway 1 which parallels Motorway 1, but once you leave it, you're on your own. It's a great spine but with no real ribs.
Fort Lauderdale? In Florida? For a transportation TUNNEL? Easy to drill the Miami limestone, I guess, but the vehicles might have to be submarines :/ That's a level of crazy I hadn't expected to see... but then again, it's Fla.
I want to keep all the trains all year and every year.😢
Great reporting with a right focus! Thank you for spreading awareness! Solving traffic is not a technical problem, but a political one.
In my opinion the solution to most if not all transport issues is the U-Bahn: Just build the damn train underground, when above ground is not enough space. The only exception would be the Wuppertaler Schwebebahn, since it is easier to put the train above a river than below a river (and that thing is already build and works really well).
For all those that have a car and want to keep it over park and ride at a reasonable cost. If you can just park your car outside the city and drive some kind of train within minutes into the city for about as much as parking would cost within the city, that is good enough for most people. Parking in a city can often even cost 5€, so it's not like you have give those train tickets for free.
No one thinks e-bikes can be sexy? You should go to Amsterdam
Tech bros think they can do anything but reality is hard. Yet we still think Gates or Musk is going to solve our energy, food or transport problems. We cannot afford to share in their delusions
Trains are underrated they really are, I've always been fascinated by trains there is something so mystique about them. They can link you anywhere. I'm proud to say I use train and light rail for university and work!
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The reason most of these things are destined to fail is because they have an effectively impassable barrier of needing to be profitable while being a public good. We take for granted that our road infrastructure is not profitable, and is the direct competition, so it's silly to think that an alternative will be profitable. Transportation is a public good and should be funded as such. Trains and busses cost money that will not be compensated fully by fares, just like roads cost money that will not be compensated fully by registration fees and gas taxes.
The problem is any game changing innovation in public transport needs lots and lots of money and it's not that profitable, so Silicon Valley approach doesn't work there.
I agree and I hope most people understand that building public transport (including bike lanes) and investing in the public good, can’t be done exactly like running a company, the efficiency of a company and company structure is good but to expect huge profits is hindering public infrastructure projects to get of the ground.
Yeah, if we could stop waiting for billionaires to save the day, that would be great. Nationalize public transportation and remove the profit motive.
TL;DW the single biggest hurdle ends up being the network not the invidual vehicle, the actual infrastructure e.g. roads, tunnels, tracks etc. This is generally a public good paid for and usually maintained by governments with taxes. No billionaires wants to, nor can find an effective way to bypass or monetize this.
They're not urban planners, they're just tech bros who just want to create futuristic tech the way they want!
California High-Speed rail.
As big of a fan as I am of e-bikes as a real solution to the under-5 mile trip that is so much of daily travel, I have to vote for the classic catenary overhead power line and trolley poles. If we make the commitment to deploy this venerable tech, buses and trucks can be readily deployed using it for no tailpipe emissions and little to no battery weight. Also, really excellent torque for acceleration. No problem with hills either.
Indeed Zac Appleton, trolleybuses have 1 advantage over streetcars; they can switch lanes when the bus lane is blocked by an accident. And swirl back into their own bus lane. I live in the Dutch town of Utrecht, which has a tram line to Nieuwegein and IJsselstein. The trams have regular accidents and then the line is blocked.
Adding a charge to do LITERALLY the same thing.
Absolutely DISGUSTING
why do so many people seem to think that large societal shifts come suddenly all at once rather than incremental steps with occasional pitfalls?
I want to keep all the Amtrak trains all year and every year.😢
The solution is not ONE transportation method, but a whole network of different methods (addressing different transportion needs): airplanes, trains, overland busses and ships for large distances; metro, tramways, busses, taxi, rideshares, bikes and whatnot for in-city transports; individual cars where nessessary; lorries and trains/ships for goods and so on.
I could go on with dozens of other methods.
Buses are the best imo . With dedicated transit lanes they can be just as fast as a train for short distances, and unlike trains, they don’t require building expensive infrastructure.
Even though lots of the techy billionaire transit solutions (potential solutions) are likely to be just hype, they are helping to change our way of thinking about transit and also about mobility options. We need to have conversations about alternatives to single occupancy vehicles (cars). I am continually optimistic about Portland Oregon's streetcar system. It is continuing to expand on existing roadways, and is just as fast as cars drive yet without the stress and worry. Very good video, I am happy that we are acknowledging that car dependency is not in our best interest.
That conversation isn't being had by those billionaires though. All of their solutions are single-occupancy vehicles, or at the very most vehicles that seat a small group. I've seen them disparaged as 'pod people' for the fixation. These are transport options as desired by the elite: Cost isn't a problem for them, but they absolutely will not share an enclosed vehicle with the commoners.
No I do not want hyperloop I want all the trains and Amtrak and Amtrak trains in the US and USA all year and every year.😢
Great vid…, excellent to see some honesty
Bro, Hong Kong has one the best transit networks, you can get from one end at luo wo, to the city's main hub Central in around an hour
i think this is the best infotainments i've ever seen on youtube: honest, well researched and nicely put together factual information. thank you!
Happy to be helpful. Thank you! 🌸
No need to qualify it. Tech billionaires suck, period.