Grumpy GreebJoined: 20 Aug 2005Posts: 5329Location: flavor country
gr8noise wrote:
Chicken shit.....
PAVED roads were made for bikes not cars.....
fucking A, man... fuckin' a.
derrickito
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 12:43 pm
now with 50 percent more EVILJoined: 22 Jul 2005Posts: 10566
there is a company that makes raised air tube systems for bikes, ive seen their site before but cant remember it
i think it was just a concept though. the idea was that tubes would have air being pushed in a certain direction, it would decrease drag and increase travel times on a bike (faster moving air in your direction means faster moving bike in that direction)
i cant imagine a town actually building the things only for bikes though. maybe in a super friendly european bike town, but even there i would doubt it. just cant imagine someone building that kind of large infrastructure just for bikes
i can imagine a car free city, and ive seen it in practice in a few small places (whistler) and it rocks.. but it's hard to imagine a city pulling it off widescale
I've checked out car free theories and city designs and stuff a lot over the years. The bike tube idea has always stuck in the back of my mind.
Compared to the price of building roads and rails, the whole bike tube thing is downright cheep. Toss a simple on/off ramp every 10 blocks, a couple of electric powered wind turbines somewhere in the system giving you a constant 20mph tail wind, steady grades, super smooth roadway, and a ride from west Seattle or ballad to downtown just became a 15 minute ride, any time of the day, in any weather, for anyone who can move. Heck, even my dad on a 'bent could do it.
In a future where energy and material prices are several times higher then they are now, but people still want personal mobility (as apposed to mass transit), something like this might actually be viable.
I firmly believe that before I die I'm going to see American cities swarming with bikes. The bicycle is one of the truly greatest inventions of mankind, it's day will come.
the dreaded ben
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 1:38 pm
Grumpy GreebJoined: 20 Aug 2005Posts: 5329Location: flavor country
i dunno bikes are ok, but i fear one day they will rise up against us, taking the glory tubes for themselves.
mark my words, humanity will rue the day.
dennyt
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 1:49 pm
rocket mechanicJoined: 02 Aug 2005Posts: 2708
There could be "moving sidewalks" with handrails in the tubes so you could skitch up the hills.
Imagine the crashes... :)
Torch
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 2:14 pm
TerranceJoined: 24 Jul 2005Posts: 1637Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands
dennyt wrote:
There could be "moving sidewalks" with handrails in the tubes so you could skitch up the hills.
Imagine the crashes... :)
how could anyone crash while skitching on someone? i can't imagine that happening AT ALL.
_________________ "the only difference between me and a madman is that i am not mad."
- Salvador Dali
sekai
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 2:30 pm
Joined: 25 Jul 2005Posts: 1466Location: on the lake
i was just thinking the same thing. imagine the tail wind, in a packed tube it would be a total domino effect. you kids have fun in your tube, i'll stay below with the cars. i read some ones take on the rnc critical mass in nyc this summer. the ride started and it took 2 blocks of walking the bikes before you were able to ride. one guy asks the other "is this what it would be like if everyone rode a bike?" other guys was like, fuck dude this sucks.
megafauna
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 3:02 pm
Joined: 06 Oct 2005Posts: 250Location: first hill
did you read that in chainbraker zine?
trashtalker
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 3:09 pm
Joined: 06 Oct 2005Posts: 78Location: Redmond
I think I saw it on evening magazine or something, and can't find it on the internet, but this is close to it. You have a bicycle on a raft and you travel across the water on it. I think everyone that travels across the water should have that. Then pop their bike off and ride the streets.
So the image below is not what it is but the 'wheels' of it are similar. Someone probably knows what I am talking about.... but hey.... I may just be drinking again! :)
I'm talking actual, real solutions for transportation in the post industrial free-energy age. It's not some infinite hypothetical future, we'll be seeing the beginning of it within the next 20 years. We'll be living it in 40 years.
People are libel to crash no matter what they're doing, driving, walking, or riding. There's no reason in a bike-tube type setup why the slow can't just keep to the right. Heck, there can even be marked lanes. If people crash... well that's one of the reasons why the roadway is very smooth. Heck of a lot safer/cheaper then bumping cages on the freeway.
As for dealing with hills, there's a dozen different ways to approach the problem.
the dreaded ben
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 4:15 pm
Grumpy GreebJoined: 20 Aug 2005Posts: 5329Location: flavor country
SofaKing wrote:
I'm talking actual, real solutions for transportation in the post industrial free-energy age. It's not some infinite hypothetical future, we'll be seeing the beginning of it within the next 20 years. We'll be living it in 40 years.
i hope it's all madmax style with tina turner and thunderdomes, and none of the postman's patriotic mail carrying pussy bullshit.
Aaron
Posted: Thu Oct 20, 2005 4:15 pm
Joined: 25 Jul 2005Posts: 4645
One thing, there just isn't the space for more separated bike paths/lanes. Part of the existing roads would have to be taken in a built city like Seattle. That or green space. I vote to keep the greenspace and use the streets. Wide shoulders and or sidewalks work well. As Peak Oil's effects become clear (no more cheap gas) people will switch to bikes like nobody has ever seen. I am having my busiest fall ever!
One thing that would be cheap and perhaps get more people to bike is a covered bike way. There is one down near Boeing field by the Museum of Flight. It is just a covered sidewalk to keep people dry when walking from their cars in the parking lot to the building. It goes on for a quarter mile at least. Think how many more people would take up cycling. But really the bike is just about perfect. Just get a poncho or rain jacket and some fenders and you are set.
Do we really need more infrastructure? If more people bike, then that means fewer cars. The lot of you all are my personal heroes!
iro1751
Posted: Fri Oct 21, 2005 5:07 am
Joined: 25 Jul 2005Posts: 723
Just to clarify. . . I was using "sarcasm" with the title of this thread. . .
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