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Straddling 3D Super Bus for a Greener China
Dian L. Chu, Economic Forecasts & Opinions
With its rapidly growing rural-to-urban population, China is in the midst of a massive transportation infrastructure upgrade in order to maintain the country's economic growth and development.
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| Graphic Source: China Hush |
Xinhua reported Chinese railways transported 160 million passengers in July, up 12.8% from one year earlier, sending the January-to-July passenger count to 976 million. China also has the world's largest high-speed rail network with 6,920 km of tracks and more than 10,000 km in new tracks being laid.
The current major public transits in China include subway, light-rail train, Bus Rapid Transit (BRT), and normal bus. The latest addition to the lineup of Chinese public transit system could be the new straddling "3D super bus" (????), proposed by Shenzhen Hashi Future Parking Equipment Co., Ltd as a cheaper, greener and fast alternative to ease traffic jams and air pollution.
Discovery News describes it as "a huge bus that operates like a train on wheels," and is tall enough so vehicles lower than 2 m can go through under. According to China Hush, the bus can speed up to 60 km/h carrying 1200-1400 passengers at a time. It costs about 500 million yuan to build the bus and a 40-km-long path for it, about 10% of building equivalent subway. It is said that the bus can reduce traffic jams by 20-30%.
Environmentally, each bus can save up to 860 tons of fuel per year, reducing 2,640 tons of carbon emissions. It is powered partly by solar panels on each bus, but it's powered mostly by electricity. Beijing’s Mentougou District reportedly will launch a pilot program in the near future.
According to Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, China now tops the U.S. as the no. 1 in CO2 emissions. As China strives to cut its carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by 40-45% by 2020 compared with the level from 2005, as pledged last November before the Copenhagen Conference, this is just one of the many new initiatives we could expect coming out of China.
More data and statistics are needed to fully evaluate this new system. However, at first glance, it could mean more traffic accidents waiting to happen, but gets A+ for green effort and innovation.
(The presentation in Chinese by Shenzhen Hashi Future Parking Equipment is available on YouTube.)
Dian L. Chu, Aug. 8, 2010
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Many here evidently are losers short ES who discredit any evidence of economic growth.
This is what happens when there's not enough people around you saying "uh, no".
I would soil my pants if that thing came rolling over me.
The groupthink you describe is, virtually, the entire mainstream "sustainability" community right now. The consequence, the public and observers...more cynical, disbelieving, and outright pissed.
For good reason.
For more of this crap, check out sites like www.inhabitat.com
"I would soil my pants if that thing came rolling over me."
Of course,,,,,it would be the very first thing that had ever straddled you.
(Just kidding, couldn't avoid that obvious pun.)
Ummmm.... Some restrictions may apply.
http://www.google.com/images?hl=en&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&num=20&lr=&as_f...
Interesting idea...
Yeah sure & they also claim to have troop transport trucks that can leap across gullies. LOL
So traffic can keep passing under it as it stops to load/unload? And when it is time to roll again we can count on the traffic courteously stopping so it can go? And how many times will the bus driver take off and smash cars that didn't clear out from under it?
Well, I think the idea is that traffic doesn't need to stop if the bus wants to start going, as long as it doesn't change lanes.
Looking at this it is an interesting idea to expand vertically, rather than say add more lanes, but of course there are issues that need resolving, such as how would it deal with turning.
Still, I'd say it is more promising when people are looking for smart or cheaper solutions than, say, attempting to finish a subway line in New York City 30 years after starting and at god knows what cost (ironic given cuts to personnel and routes).
To take the non-existent middle class workers to their non-existent offices in existing completely empty corporate centers? Sure, buy that in a heart beat!
What marks a top in markets?
Utterly idiotic ideas that smart (?) people take seriously.
If I wasn't before, I'd short China, what an hubristic monstrosity.
Remember, on a dollar- for- dollar basis peak oil took place in 1998.
!!!!
Not soooo fast, you young whippersnapper!!!
Evidently you've never seen "photos" of Uncle Mao swimming across the Yangtze -- with a horse on his back, yet....
It's like the 1970's all over again: "The Big Bus" (1976)
Man oh man!!!
The Big Bus couldn't even touch......Super Train!
http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009/05/08/watch-supertrain-express-to-terror/
Magic bus.