Anything but trains.
I thought they ate the onion but somehow this appears to be an actual serious study. I can’t imagine how uncomfortable a bus going 140mph would be. At that point the engineering required to keep the road in appropriate shape is likely more expensive than just using rails…
Once again, the Onion has predicted the news before it happens…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNixDlRoMvA
Trying to turn I5 into the autobahn with a 140 mph bus lane would result in so much chaos and destruction that honestly I’m all for it.
There is 0 chance that the average American drivers liscense having brain could comprehend this concept.
Most people can’t even keep an actually reasonable following distance, or understand the concept of a passing lane.
This is a literally comically stupid idea, its a B movie plot element from an 80s scifi movie.
Fuck it -> Do it for the lols.
This is a literally comically stupid idea, its a B movie plot element from an 80s scifi movie.
physics need not apply
So… that shot actually largely did rely on the laws of physics.
They really did jump a bus.
They just CGI’d out the ramp that got the bus’s nose up, and CGI’d out part of the landing zone, to make up a jumped gap that looked more impressive.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=NPhNIS69ayQ
This was back before you could just CGI generate an entire scene like this… you had to actually do a lot of it for real.
See if you can spot which exact shots/cuts/parts of shots are real, and which are fake, in that sequence.
Trying to recall the movie but from the 70’s or 60’s. Something like atomic bus
Do you mean The Big Bus (1976) ?
Oh hell yes!
The reason for busses is simple and seems to be ignored by literally everyone.
The private property between SF and LA keeps increasing in price so the costs for the project are in the billions before anything is even built. The signing of the land is in the billions. Now build a rail in Trump’s economy and it becomes nearly impossible to succeed at anything rail.
Busses builds an audience that can be used to later justify rail to get buses off the road. Americans hate big trucks on the road but there they are anyway. It’s a slow burn turn to morph the car brain into train brain.
The private property between SF and LA keeps increasing in price so the costs for the project are in the billions before anything is even built.
Damn, if only eminent domain existed
Even with eminent domain though you still have to pay market value. Edit: Not that they shouldn’t do it. It would still be worth it in the long run
Governments can have a funny way of determining market value based on whether they like you or not.
Just point to a row of buildings and declare “slum clearance”. Suddenly, you can get them for a steal.
psssst! … trains…
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!
Build a train you fucken cowards
🚂🚃🚃🚃
Wow, 140MPH! That’s … still 84MPH slower than the fastest trains in Europe, and 127MPH slower than the fastest train in Asia (Shanghai maglev).
These stupid fantasies are still a pale shadow of what the rest of the world has already managed to achieve. Just finish building the fucking train already!
Not to mention that’s quite a dangerous speed for a bus
Hey, if that bus drops below 55, we got a way to deal with that.
Shanghai maglev
Communism Killed 10 Trillion People, though.
So we have to stick with cars
[Insert image of Chinese EVs]
No, idiot. American cars only.
They should explore eminent domain and build real transit.
But what if there aren’t enough minority neighbourhoods to bulldoze?
The farmland between LA and SF isn’t minority neighborhoods. But my comment was more an off the cuff dismissal of this ass-backward bus idea than an actual policy opinion. Here’s a real policy opinion: Stop making excuses and run the fuckin trains.
There you have your problem: That farmland belongs to rich white people.
Aye, that’s a bit of a pickle.
But I find pickles delicious.
We already did that then tore it all out and let the railroads keep the property and money they schemed, scammed and straight up stole.
Land isn’t an issue for high speed rail in CA (anymore), so… high speed busses with dedicated lanes is extra silly.
Y’all, they’re building a high speed train, but it’s mired in problems, and if the economy crashes, it will be decades before it’s completed. This would be a medium-term solution that’s easy to build, and easy to take down when it’s no longer needed.
These “high speed buses” don’t even exist in theory. So it would just be plain old regular buses. You can have these now.
So trams are not on their mind ?
There are already rails between LA and SF. Why not use them?
Because it takes 8+ hours.
I was being rhetorical. There is infrastructure that can be developed here.
A lot of it is commercial rail that nobody wants to disrupt
They’re currently building high speed rail, but it’s 14 years from opening by current estates.
Was supposed to be done by now, it’s been a shitshow, but it seems to have improved in recent years.
You’re fucking kidding me. Schrodinger’s Onion
This bus proposal is basically a ‘back to the drawing board’ plan. How can you get people to travel between SF and LA faster than driving, and maybe cheaper than flying, especially if jet-fuel prices stay high.
It’s going to follow the existing roadways. What the original high-speed rail project could have done, instead of jogging far inland: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Route_of_California_High-Speed_Rail
Given diesel fuel costs, they’ll probably end up with EV, perhaps with overhead cabling. And to avoid expensive ‘self-driving’ buses, maybe they’ll put down ‘guide lines.’ To be able to go faster than cars, they’ll have their own lane, or use center divider areas. And to avoid pollution and wear and tear, instead of rubber tires, they’ll go with metal wheels. But to prevent damage to the roads, maybe they’ll have to swap the guide lines with hard metal, protective lines…
Meanwhile, elsewhere: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail_in_China
Does “under controlled conditions” include the blizzards over the Grapevine that occur almost every winter?
