Would that it were so. Unfortunately it is being pushed by Ken L, and
he doesn't seem to pay much attention to public opinion.

Public opinion it seems to me is generally in favour. Its more
a case of a load of standard issue Nimbies down the bottom end
whinging about it because it might make driving Jemima 500
yards to school a bit harder. For the people of Southall and
onwards to Uxbridge it would be a godsend given the
generally lousy public transport in that corridor.

B2003

"Boltar" wrote in message
oups.com...

Public opinion it seems to me is generally in favour. Its more
a case of a load of standard issue Nimbies down the bottom end
whinging about it because it might make driving Jemima 500
yards to school a bit harder. For the people of Southall and
onwards to Uxbridge it would be a godsend given the
generally lousy public transport in that corridor.

B2003

Have a look at this from the Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...846599,00.html

'......Transport for London embarked on a massive consultation exercise,
produced 500 pages of data, interviewed 16,895 people and printed 440,000
brochures and questionnaires in 11 different languages.
The findings were as clear as a thumb's down from the emperor in the
Colosseum: 70 per cent of respondents did not support the idea.'

Paul

OK, I take your postings to mean that you are in favour of the tramway scheme.
To understand your point of view please confirm you have no vested interest in
the project other than a potential user of the tramway. I would then be
interested to hear why you feel that such a huge investment should be made and
what you perceive to be the benefits of the tramway. Are you not in the least
bit concerned at the loss of unique shopping outlets and the demolition of
generally architecturally interesting and sound buildings that still have many
years of useful life?

David Bradley



On 30 Oct 2005 12:56:20 -0800, "Boltar" wrote:

Would that it were so. Unfortunately it is being pushed by Ken L, and
he doesn't seem to pay much attention to public opinion.

Public opinion it seems to me is generally in favour. Its more
a case of a load of standard issue Nimbies down the bottom end
whinging about it because it might make driving Jemima 500
yards to school a bit harder. For the people of Southall and
onwards to Uxbridge it would be a godsend given the
generally lousy public transport in that corridor.

B2003

On Sun, 30 Oct 2005 17:41:09 +0000, thoss
wrote:

Would that it were so. Unfortunately it is being pushed by Ken L, and
he doesn't seem to pay much attention to public opinion.

Public opinion (or a noisy section of it) will object to ANY proposal.
It's easy to block, hard to achieve. Ken is a doer. Rather like
Thatcher was. I rarely agreed with Maggie and sometimes don't with
Ken. But I admire both of them for actually getting things done.

In article , Colin
McKenzie writes
The reasons for choosing tram over trolleybus were never, in my view,
very good. They were mainly: trams are better at attracting people out
of cars, and will make it politically easier to achieve the necessary
demolitions and reductions in capacity for other motor vehicles.

The main reason for choosing trams over trolleybuses for any given
scheme is capacity. My vague memory is that the Cross-London route would
require 40tph or 130tbph to provide the same capacity; presumably the
same applies on the Uxbridge Road.

But I'm not sure there's any actual UK evidence that trams attract more
people out of cars than trolleybuses - how would you obtain it?

Again, IIRC, when Tramlink opened the shopping centre in Croydon saw
something like a 30% increase in visitors with a *decrease* in parking.

--
Clive D.W. Feather | Home:
Tel: +44 20 8495 6138 (work) | Web: http://www.davros.org
Fax: +44 870 051 9937 | Work:
Please reply to the Reply-To address, which is:

In article , Clive D. W. Feather
writes
The main reason for choosing trams over trolleybuses for any given
scheme is capacity. My vague memory is that the Cross-London route would
require 40tph or 130tbph to provide the same capacity; presumably the
same applies on the Uxbridge Road.

That implies that a trolley-bus can carry only 30% of a tram's
passengers. Why not bigger trolley-buses, maybe bendy ones?
--
Thoss

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005, thoss wrote:

In article , Clive D. W. Feather
writes

The main reason for choosing trams over trolleybuses for any given
scheme is capacity. My vague memory is that the Cross-London route
would require 40tph or 130tbph to provide the same capacity; presumably
the same applies on the Uxbridge Road.

That implies that a trolley-bus can carry only 30% of a tram's
passengers. Why not bigger trolley-buses, maybe bendy ones?

For the same reason we don't have bendy-buses the length of a train - the
presence of a track. The track guides the vehicle, at every point along
its length, over a very precisely defined path, with no input from the
driver. This makes it possible for a long, bendy vehicle to take fairly
sharp corners extremely safely.

ISTR the idea of a bus guided automatically by a signal from a cable
buried under the road, a sort of 'virtual tram'; that would presumably
allow much longer buses. I don't know if this is a real technology or a
pipe dream, though.

tom

--
see im down wid yo sci fi crew

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 31 Oct 2005, thoss wrote:

In article , Clive D. W. Feather
writes

The main reason for choosing trams over trolleybuses for any given
scheme is capacity. My vague memory is that the Cross-London route
would require 40tph or 130tbph to provide the same capacity;
presumably the same applies on the Uxbridge Road.

That implies that a trolley-bus can carry only 30% of a tram's
passengers. Why not bigger trolley-buses, maybe bendy ones?

For the same reason we don't have bendy-buses the length of a train -
the presence of a track. The track guides the vehicle, at every point
along its length, over a very precisely defined path, with no input from
the driver. This makes it possible for a long, bendy vehicle to take
fairly sharp corners extremely safely.

ISTR the idea of a bus guided automatically by a signal from a cable
buried under the road, a sort of 'virtual tram'; that would presumably
allow much longer buses. I don't know if this is a real technology or a
pipe dream, though.

I believe the technology exists to have optically guided trolleybuses,
i.e. following something painted/otherwise marked in the road. A more
pipe-dream style idea has the buses actually following the trolley wires
themselves, subject to needing to maneouvre around obstacles and into
stops. The idea was that pulling into stops could essentially be an
automated procedure depending on the extension of the overhead arms and
feedback from a Kassel kerb at the stop (a specially designed kerb which
helps to guide vehicles to a suitable distance for level boarding).



--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London

Clive D. W. Feather wrote:

In article , Colin
McKenzie writes

But I'm not sure there's any actual UK evidence that trams attract
more people out of cars than trolleybuses - how would you obtain it?

Again, IIRC, when Tramlink opened the shopping centre in Croydon saw
something like a 30% increase in visitors with a *decrease* in parking.

Yes, granted - but we don't know what would have happened with a
trolleybus scheme - it might have been even better. Unfortunately for
science, I can't see a tram and trolleybus route being introduced
simultaneously in comparable locations to allow the direct comparison.

You could always promote trolleybuses as trackless trams.

Colin McKenzie

Colin McKenzie wrote:
Clive D. W. Feather wrote:

In article ,
Colin McKenzie writes


But I'm not sure there's any actual UK evidence that trams attract
more people out of cars than trolleybuses - how would you obtain it?


Again, IIRC, when Tramlink opened the shopping centre in Croydon saw
something like a 30% increase in visitors with a *decrease* in parking.


Yes, granted - but we don't know what would have happened with a
trolleybus scheme - it might have been even better. Unfortunately for
science, I can't see a tram and trolleybus route being introduced
simultaneously in comparable locations to allow the direct comparison.

You could always promote trolleybuses as trackless trams.

Indeed, memory suggests that in parts of the US (Philadelphia spring to
mind) they are sometimes called "trackless trolleys" where "trolley" is
a common synonym for "streetcar" or "tram" (for those of us brought up
that side of the atlantic in the last 40 years, we all remember Mr.
Rogers' Trolley).

Robin