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My dumbass coworker said that we should use AI to click the “next” button for us on our OSHA guideline training.
Trains and bicycle infrastructure
Holy shit
I love trains but the issue with them is not money, it’s NIMBYs. China can build all the railroads they want because the government can just toss people out of their homes to build the tracks. In the west we can’t do that because of property rights etc.
With enough money you could just tunnel under/bridge over/buy up the densely populated areas
You can’t though. People have the right to refuse to sell. See the whole saga with trying to get Mr Acker (played by Barry Corbin) to sell his house in Better Call Saul. If you don’t have the legal power to force someone to sell then they can hold out as long as they want.
There’s also the issue of supply and demand. If you’ve got a ton of money and you’re willing to spend above market prices for many different properties you need to buy along a route then the market price will skyrocket as people learn and start to hold out for more and more money. The usual way developers get around this is to quietly acquire the land at market prices without drawing attention to it but that can take years and years because most properties are not up for sale at a given time. Try to make an offer to someone who isn’t actively selling and you risk them going public and exposing your whole scheme.
You could probably walk from east coast to west coast while the train stands still, while never touching the ground and having periodical spots to eat and drink (in the restaurant wagons) and to sleep in comfort (in the sleeping compartments). All of it for free too because they don’t know what to do with that amount of money.
Gets even better when you count work-hours in a full economic net over direct implementation costs.
Can’t spell train without AI
trAIns
Just saying
The subway trains in Singapore is automated, no driver.
TRAiNS
Just saying
Or public transportation in general. Making cities more walkable. Helping with housing. Helping with food. Helping with medical or student loan debt. So many things
Probably too many trains at that point.
Better than not enough
Up to a point.
No such thing.
We wouldnt ever get to Safe space travel
“We don’t even need all of these trains!?”
Shhhh, you’re gonna love it. We put a train on your phone. Windows is now powered by trains.
Getting on board, but as I’m looking for my seat a giant anthropomorphic paper clip starts shoving me and shouting that I’m using the train wrong
Trains are not profitable or generate an Ai bubble of investments. Duhhhh
I dunno, train bubble has a nice ring tho…
Get on board the train bubble before it leaves without you!
No need to imagine, that has already happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_Mania
A total of 6,220 miles (10,010 km) of railway line were built as a result of projects authorised between 1844 and 1846—by comparison, the total route mileage of the modern UK railway network is around 11,000 miles (18,000 km).
Wow. Must have been nice having such a solid foundation to expand upon. Meanwhile in the US:
There is no such thing as trains. Now get back in you gas guzzler, sit in traffic for 3 hours each way on each day, consume more gasoline to enrich the corporate overlords, and run over as many kids as you can because you can’t see them in your behemoth.
-The political establishment
Fuck yeah! Damn those environmental pansies! I’ll even hang a ton of flags on the guzzler expressing my obnoxious political-opinion so I can own the libs. That’ll teach 'em.
-The morons
Making me think of the hemp fuel powered car with a hemp fiber composite body stronger than steel, that got suppressed (or at least, “shelved”). Not to mention other clean fuel car innovations, and so on. But instead, we get the same old two evils false dichotomy bs. We can have individual autonomy and clean efficient transport.
… Reminding myself of that Bakunin quote:
We are convinced that freedom without socialism is privilege and injustice, and that socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality.
the total route mileage of the modern UK railway network is around 11,000 miles (18,000 km).
Public transit in the US is trash, but the country is so much larger than the UK, that we still have like 15x that here.
It’s fair to say the direct comparison between UK and US doesn’t add up. But, Europe as a whole is roughly as big-ish as the United States. They have a really well-developed rail system and they are better because of it.
According to Google (so maybe it’s wrong), the European Union has a total of 124,864 miles as of 2023.
It says the US has a total of 136,729 miles.
So if we’re going purely by length, which admittedly is not the only factor, then the US still edges them out.
I do imagine that many of those miles are in disrepair, but I still think it’s important to remember just how large and spread out the US actually is. Laying down that much track is an enormous undertaking
I do imagine that many of those miles are in disrepair
Actually most of it is in good working order! The FRA regulations require a certain standard of maintaince for trains to be allowed to roll down the track so railroads will either abandon trackage or keep it maintained. Yes some sidings and branch lines will see lighter maintenance but they will still be maintained to a relatively safe standard until they are abandoned and no longer used by the railroad
I don’t think trains would require so much energy :)
Are the trains all maglev?
And each get to go around in them to anywhere on our own when we want, like our own personal luxury private jets?
Surely we can get creative to have trains require so much energy.
But it is being used for train
-ing AI models.
