They usually only use the horn at crossings. Automated trains are grade separated. The SkyTrain rolls through Vancouver all night and you can hardly hear it.
The only reason trains are not self-driving is humans designed the whole system in a too complicated way. Trains had all the ingredients for safe self-driving for decades.
In the US a few decades ago the big rail companies were given the ultimatum to upgrade their safety infrastructure or have a national speed limit of 79 mph imposed on them.
Because you can make every kind of excuse, when it comes to privately owner corporations, but you quickly run out of them, when improving public systems.
We’ve already seen it countless times, how the American government gives money to someone, to complete a project, but completely ignores any binding contracts, so all that money literally just goes into someone’s pocket instead
Corruption is a problem. It doesn’t help that one of two major parties doesn’t believe government can work, and they’ll make every effort to prove it.
“See, if you don’t give any funding to public transit it doesn’t work. And if you gut the regulatory agencies, then there’s all sorts of corruption. Better privatize it, and I have just the guy to sell it to.”
I remain irritated we’re spending so much money on self driving cars instead of buses, trains, and improving our living spaces to support them.
Like you could spend billions to try to get self driving cars to work, and get part way there. And you’d still have a car-first dystopia.
Or you could spend billions to deploy buses and make walkable neighborhoods. Well understood, many good side effects.
If the tech bros really wants self driving transportation we can give them that:
Self driving subway, goes 75km/h in the city center, fully electric, convenient, consistent, safe.
Trains are way easier to make self driving too, we’ve had autonomous trains since the 60s.
Trains have even more obnoxious horns though.
They usually only use the horn at crossings. Automated trains are grade separated. The SkyTrain rolls through Vancouver all night and you can hardly hear it.
The only reason trains are not self-driving is humans designed the whole system in a too complicated way. Trains had all the ingredients for safe self-driving for decades.
In the US a few decades ago the big rail companies were given the ultimatum to upgrade their safety infrastructure or have a national speed limit of 79 mph imposed on them.
Guess which they did?
Because you can make every kind of excuse, when it comes to privately owner corporations, but you quickly run out of them, when improving public systems.
We’ve already seen it countless times, how the American government gives money to someone, to complete a project, but completely ignores any binding contracts, so all that money literally just goes into someone’s pocket instead
Corruption is a problem. It doesn’t help that one of two major parties doesn’t believe government can work, and they’ll make every effort to prove it.
“See, if you don’t give any funding to public transit it doesn’t work. And if you gut the regulatory agencies, then there’s all sorts of corruption. Better privatize it, and I have just the guy to sell it to.”