
China to build giant buses that cars can drive under - garply
http://www.engadget.com/2010/08/02/china-to-build-ginormous-buses-that-cars-can-drive-under-video/
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stcredzero
Are those really busses or are they trains? This scheme looks cool, until I
try to picture what happens during turns. Remember that "large vehicles make
large turns." One way to think about it is that "turn radius" of the from
wheels is much larger than for the back wheels. It's more complicated than
that, but it's the gist.

EDIT: Watching the video now. The "bus" is divided into many sections which
need to "snake" around turns. This fact is fudged a lot -- many of the
illustrations also show vehicles that do not have joints. Judging from the
size of the bending joint sections, the minimum turn radius of the bendable
trains looks fairly large.

~~~
jerf
This strikes as feasible, assuming total computerized control of _all_ the
vehicles, both the "bus" and the cars trying to drive under it. Humans will be
smashing the sides of that bus with frightful regularity, though.

And by the time you have that, there are probably way better ways to deal with
traffic than this sort of crazy contraption. Even if this ever becomes
practical I have a hard time seeing it ever being the best use of money.

Segmenting the bus enough to give it a safe turning radius will make it seat
very few people. (And note I don't say "decent" or "cost-effective", I said
_safe_. If cars are driving underneath, the "bus" must also turn _exactly_
like a car.)

Nifty concept, pretty pictures, much less practical than the only-barely-
practical-if-that trains that don't have to stop that got posted four or five
times a few months ago. But worth noodling around with; I don't fault the
designers too hard, I fault the credulous media.

~~~
stcredzero
_Humans will be smashing the sides of that bus with frightful regularity,
though._

I'm pretty sure Houston drivers would be. They can't even deal with light rail
on city streets!

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV2rdGX4JYc>

~~~
adolph
Based on my own observations I take it as a given that people regularly break
traffic rules. Car-car smashes happen with frightful regularity too. It isn't
a Houston-only issue.

The reasons for this may be carelessness or disregard--reasons don't really
matter. The behavior exists and rules/signs don't appear to mitigate very
successfully (especially strange signs and irregular rules you don't see
anywhere else).

Carelessness and disregard are part of the human condition and why defensive
driving is great. It follows the robustness principal of "Be conservative in
what you send; be liberal in what you accept."

Unfortunately, the performance envelope of Houston's passenger train precludes
defensive driving on its part. It can't be a good street-citizen.

~~~
stcredzero
Having lived in Houston for 7 years, I'd say we have a much bigger problem
with the car drivers not being "a good street-citizen." I wouldn't say it's
Houston only, but there is a lot of it here. There's a lot of just plain
pinhead disregard for physics and common sense here.

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hugh3
I've never been to Houston, but I've been to a lot of US cities, and I've been
to China. I find it hard to imagine that the drivers in Houston are worse than
the drivers in China.

~~~
stcredzero
I've heard first hand descriptions of driving in China, Italy, and Pakistan.
In Pakistan, they have problems with people obeying stop lights!

This all just supports my point. If Houston drivers are pinheads that feel
like they can cut-off a train that out-masses their vehicle by a factor of
ten, what are Chinese drivers going to do about these massive tunnel-things
going around when they have to drive underneath those things? It's begging for
a lot of accidents, I think.

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gaoshan
Given the nature of traffic in China the one angle they don't show in the
video is the one that matters most... what happens when vehicles in front of
the bus straddle the lane, blocking it?

They line up neatly coming from the back because they physically have to but
anyone who has seen the traffic in China knows that cars will not get out of
the way or obey the lane markers and are quite likely to abruptly (even at
risk to themselves or their vehicle) cut the thing off from the front in order
to squeeze in front.

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antipaganda
The same way we solve all of life's problems: Giant spinning blades!

Or, y-know, fines. And a bored cop sitting on the top of the giant bus with a
crane.

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Create
Think of it the other way around: cars don't drive underneath, but the _bus
drives above the stationary cars_ in the congested metropolis.

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cglee
The congested cars in China aren't neatly stacked in their lanes.

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jacquesm
Neat idea but it violates the 'kiss' principle on several points.

I'll believe it when I see it, in spite of the fact that 'building will
commence soon'.

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MC27
It is simple in a way. It's an alternative to building another deck on top of
the road for light rail to run along. Probably cheaper and less devastating to
communities that it runs though.

~~~
jacquesm
Not really, building another deck on a road (assuming that's the right
solution for a given topology) is well understood technology wise. Adding a
completely new, untried infrastructure for a vehicle class that nobody has any
experience with will add unique challenges that may be difficult or even
impossible to overcome. In practice, for instance, how would you deal with it
if one of these monsters broke down? What will you do when a car has an
accident with another car underneath one of them in such a way that you can't
move it without further risk to the occupants?

How will the drivers deal with a vehicle that is in their perpetual dead angle
? How will the driver of the 'urban train' see the vehicles he's moving over
and make sure that none of them get crushed at intersections in case traffic
somehow got blocked?

China has some history of 'grand announcements' which are then not followed up
on, and a few that they did follow up on that failed fairly spectacularly.
We'll see if this one works out, I'm sceptical but who knows, maybe it will
work.

The three gorges dam is also still holding up in spite of lots of nay saying
so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.

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thatfatcat
I don't think that it's such a great idea.

ACCESIBILITY: In crowded cities you need people to get in and out of the bus
quickly, meaning lots of doors and very few steps. Also let's not forget wheel
chairs. How could an elderly person climb all those steps to get out of the
bus? How about someone with a baby in a buggy?

INFRASTRUCTURE: Yes, it's cheaper than a subway, but that's the only
advantage. When this bus makes a turn, at least some part of the traffic must
be stopped. Cars will crash into the bus without doubt. The bus stops will be
expensive to build.

SUGGESTION: Spare two lanes and build a light rail, separated from the traffic
by fences solid enough to prevent cars from landing on the rail. Make all
intersections with regular traffic at different grades (overpass or
underpass). It's a proven technology, no accesibility issues, cheap stations,
completely separated from the rest of the traffic (because of this it can
become completely automated).

~~~
cabalamat
Why not just build the light rail over the highway, like they do in Bangkok?

~~~
GFischer
I hadn't read about the rail in Bangkok, looks cool:

<http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/bangkok/>

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whakojacko
I wonder what their turning radius is? How will they turn around at the end of
the route (I would imagine probably just switch back like a train). Thanks
China for another crazy but awesome idea.

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ww520
It's a cool innovative idea. Now it's the execution, which probably won't be
easy. Vehicle design and construction will be different from norm. Road design
and regulation will be different. Kudos for coming up with the idea.

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chaosmachine
This looks dangerous. Two lanes of traffic competing for limited space under a
moving bus? Imagine what happens when a car underneath hits the side and goes
into a spin.

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gojomo
If both 'layers' of traffic are moving, not sure this is any better than a
double-decker bus. Certainly, it has less route flexibility, if it requires
special rail/roadway support.

My hunch is that computer-driven cars are the real transport innovation we
should be concentrated on. When a region can go 100%-auto-auto, it will
increase road capacity and eliminate congestion, without tearing up roads with
massive new (and inflexible) rail construction.

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KoZeN
There must a transport revolution going on in China. It instantly reminded me
of this video:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9Ig19gYP9o>

These trains that never stop seem a lot more feasible than the buses. Granted
it would require a massive amount of work from an infrastructure perspective
but it seems like such a brilliant solution that would make public transport
infinitely more appealing.

~~~
natep
This was posted to HN before. The comments on that were basically, it's been
done before, and wasn't economical/safe. Keep in mind, you still have to spend
energy to accelerate the cars, and there are a lot of safety issues introduced
by the extra complexity.

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rmundo
This concept was brought up in one of the Patlabor anime movies, except
instead of buses, it was police/fire/ambulance/emergency vehicles that could
move over congested traffic to get to an accident scene more quickly.

Kudos to the Chinese for being willing to try it out, but the concept existed
at least in 2001(if it was Patlabor 3) or 1993(Patlabor 2)

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julius_geezer
I ride the bus to work most days. A lot of the drivers like to gun the engine
when they can and stop quickly. This is annoying in a low-slung bus and would
be scary in one with a high center of gravity. Much of the route has old,
beautiful trees along it--not much change for them.

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rsheridan6
How is it driven? It looks like it would be a disaster if the bus weaved left
or right by a few millionths of an inch.

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snorkel
Adds a whole new level of enforcement to the left turn only lane.

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motters
An excellent idea, maximizing use of the available road space.

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warmfuzzykitten
US to build giant pickup trucks that SUVs can drive under.

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TheSOB88
Odd that all the CGI people in the movie are white.

~~~
byw
Probably stock models that came with the animation software.

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Ardit20
Maybe one day, say the year 3000 cars will be driving under cars, under cars,
under cars. We can only go up to the skies.

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Ardit20
I guess hackers don't like predictions so much. Who is to say that such wont
be the time in one thousand years. Are we going to dig down to earth instead,
rather than find more effective ways to use the very finite space on earth.

They did not start building high buildings for no reason. Why would the
solution be any different if a solution one day our roads needed?

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balac
this is so beyond cool...

