Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
.. .
derek wrote:

Professor Unwin, I assure you that around here I can show you stone
(most likely millstone grit) walls that have deflected (The stones
have bent it's not that the all the motor joints have broken and the
wall is just a collection of stones in formation) by about an inch in
a 5 foot run under their own weight and the weight of the stones above
them.

I'm wondering what sort of engineer he is (service 'engineer'?) Any
engineer worth his salt knows that rock and glass both flow. On one
degree course that I know of engineering students were monitoring the
changes in the glass of the building that they worked in. Knowing that
glass and rock will deform and flow under pressure is essential for
civils. If they can't design around the known characteristics of the
material then they are **** all use to anyone.

--
Having problems understanding usenet? Or do you simply need help but
are getting unhelpful answers? Subscribe to: uk.net.beginners for
friendly advice in a flame-free environment.

The last time I did a structures design was many years ago, and it consisted
of a reinforced slab over a large underground chamber.

As I said my specialisms are traffic engineering and drainage engineering
and if you know more about these topics than mysled I would be very
surprised, as yet you havent shown any evidence to show that you are in
either way so your opinions are purely that, and not based on any study or
fact. You cant even talk the talk, never mind walk the walk

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"Paul Weaver" wrote in message
.. .
everyone knows the theory of public transport, however you are forgetting
the disadvantages of bus use, that's what puts most people off.


I dont think everyone does know the theory of public transport judging by
this NG comments so apologies for teaching you to suck eggs

Not forgetting the disadvantages at all, we all know that a bus does not
have the same attributes as car travel, but it can also be said to some
degree that cars do not have some of the qualities of public trasport. For
example in a town centre, parking can be a problem, not if you use the bus.

There are many issues revoloving around the reasons for why people choose
not to use public transport. The key is to identify these and redress them
to attract people back to them. No mean feat

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"derek" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 8 Nov 2003 13:33:26 -0000, "iantheengineer"
wrote:


"Paul Weaver" wrote in message
. ..
On Fri, 07 Nov 2003 22:23:48 +0000, iantheengineer wrote:

It doesnt need to for most of the commute

Ahh, so the bus splits into 72 parts at each end?

No not at all, and I would think that the theory behind it is obvious,
the
key to bus usage is modal interchange,

Is that your name for what we call a bus stop?

It can be but in its loosest and at the lowest level. a bus stop is
interchange between walking and the bus ride, but many forms of interchange
are being developed, such as cycle carrying facilities on buses and cycle
lockers at train stations to enable the change from say the bus to the cycle
to complete the last part of the journey

ie facilities to allow transfer from
opne mode of travel to another.

you mean you ride the bus to the bus stop, get off and walk the rest
of the way home.

I think I have answered this point above

Fotr the most part of the commute menay
people are travelling in the same direction however upon reaching the
very
last section of the journey and at the very start of the journey we all
live
and work in slightly different places, but we use the same main
corridors.
In cities, it is generally the case that most people can walk from their
bus
stop to their office. Complications arise for people who work to site
etc,
but for the most part many people are 9-5 approx and stay office bound.
IF
you carry out any o-d survey you will see that certain routes are
trafficked
by people from the same areas going to the same areas, and it is for
these
that public transport works.

Buses may be OK if you work in the centre of a city and live in a
suburb of that same city near to an arterial road to the city centre
and are lucky (the bus stop being near to your house). If you live in
one suburb and work in another you can forget about PT.

I agree but it is only because all of the other people are using cars as
well that makes the provision of PT unviable

The main problem with public transport is the
effective routing.

You're wrong there the main problem with public transport is the
dreich people you have to share your space with. The last time I used
a bus there was a man in a dirty shabby mac sat next to me, smelling
of wee, his face covered in sores, and a "dewdrop" glistening on the
end of his nose like a pearl.


True this is a problem but not an entirely insurmountable one

In order to make it profitable a bus must collect x
punters to make the service profitable,

cloudy thinking, what has profitability to do with it? It is the
function of the bus to pick up and carry passengers. The bus must pick
up passengers - period, or it might as well stay in the depot all day.


Why operate a service in the deregulated system if it isnt profitable???

No company would, ask any community transport group who have to fill in the
gaps that PT is missing

in order to do this sometimes it is
necessary to protract the route to serve a certain catchment

Second thoughts you're right, a public transport system that didn't
have to pick up passengers would run much more efficiently. Another
example of the travelling public being unreasonable.

and by doing
this it incurrs delays compared to the direct route of using the car, but
,
by many people using their cars they create delays through traffic
congestion. Bus lanes assist to redress this balance a litlle, but at
present do not provide sufficient advantage to make the bus seem
attractive.

Correct, it would take *some* doing.


I agree we have a long way to go with the public transport system, but we
have to start somewhere. The fiirst issue is to get them efficient and
on-time so that people can rely on them. Secondly to make them more cost
effective to give cheaper fares. Thirdly to improve the quality of the ride
and interchange facilities, this includes having to sit next to Mr Dew drop
who hasnt washed this week.

If these issues were resolved and I had a bus available for my journey to
work I would use it.

DG

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"NM" wrote in message
m...
iantheengineer wrote:

"NM" wrote in message
m...

iantheengineer wrote:


How fast would urban public transport be with no cars
on the road? (and no vans, cycles, taxis etc. if that helps).



Is this a question, is it not obvious enough.

It will be exactly the travel time + the stops for pick up/drop off,

without

any delay occurring due to congestion, and there would be no need for

bus

lanes!

Without busses and bus lanes there would be even less congestion.



How many cars does it take to move 72 people, at say 5 seats per car 15,
okay and what area does a car take up 5.75m by 2.5m roughly so 14.4m2
times
15 = 216m2, and what area does a double decker take 12.9m long by 2.5m =
32.25m2, hmm I need say no more.



Take off your rose tinted's and actually look at your average bus,
usually about 5 or less passengers, I went from Cheltenham to London by
coach the other day, there were as many passengers as I could get in my
car with seats left over.


Okay many routes have this, but it is purely because the services are not
reviewed. If the PT companies are operating like most businesses, they will
supply to satisfy a demand, and in the case you are talking of demand was
low. Perhaps thsi was a small blip and it normally has more passengers, but
the bus will not continue if they have no passengers unless under some sort
of subsidised agreement.

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"Nick Finnigan" wrote in message
...
"iantheengineer" wrote in message
...

"Nick Finnigan" wrote in message
...

Under the assumption that there are no cars, vans, bikes
would there still be congestion? Assume the usage is the
same as the total passenger km as on an urban bus route
at the moment, and whatever bus frequency is optimal
(which I expect to be at least 30 buses in the peak hour).

Its an unanswerable question as it depends upon link and junction
capacities
so each location is different.,

You can not say whether there would be congestion
when the only traffic on the road is buses?
Or you can not say whether the PT travel speed in
ideal conditions is any better than it is at the moment?

but it is fair to say that the throughput of
people would be greater so congestion would a lot less than it is at
present

Well, I hadn't mentioned throughput, but what would
you expect the maximum PT throughput per lane to be?



Per lane the maximum throughput of a lane for buses is 900 vehicles per
hour. This is purely a lane capacity in pcu (passenger car units) that
relates a bus to equal 2 passnger car units. An average lane has a capacity
of 1800 pcu, although this depends upon width gradient and alignment.

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"derek" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 8 Nov 2003 14:02:15 -0000, "iantheengineer"
wrote:


"Clive" wrote in message
...
In message , Grant Crozier
writes
With a bit of luck in eighteen months time the UK will be governed by
a decent party with a man at the helm who knows what he is doing .
First of all, they've got to find one.
--
Clive


Not the conservatives then


Not unless the NHS, Education, Railway chickens come home to roost for
Labour or there's another monumental cockup like Foot & mouth.

Are you a betting man?

DG

I cant see the cons getting in this time, people still remeber the Thatcher
days and it is this that is keeping labour in power.

Although Labour seemed to have lost support over the Iraq invasion so who
knows

God help us

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

On Sat, 8 Nov 2003 22:43:22 -0000, "iantheengineer"
wrote:

You're a TRAFFIC ENGINEER?

God save us all.

Okay Paul what are your views and ideas

Seriously?

Let the market decide. It will anyway.

All this modern interference wastes resources.

Transport engineering is about facilitating choice, not restricting
it.
--
Paul Smith
Scotland, UK
http://www.safespeed.org.uk
please remove "XYZ" to reply by email
speed cameras cost lives

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

In article , derek wrote:

Buses may be OK if you work in the centre of a city and live in a
suburb of that same city near to an arterial road to the city centre
and are lucky (the bus stop being near to your house). If you live in
one suburb and work in another you can forget about PT.

Really? I live in one suburb and work in another. (I will admit both are
in Greater London, but I don't think this changes the base assumptions
of these arguments.) PT works just fine for my commute.
It's a little slower than driving would be, but not bad at all. I can
either use two bus routes or a train and a bus route.

Niklas
--
For my birthday I got a humidifier and a de-humidifier...I put them in the same
room and let them fight it out.
-- Steven Wright

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"iantheengineer" wrote the following
in:

I cant see the cons getting in this time, people still remeber the
Thatcher days and it is this that is keeping labour in power.

Me neither. Michael Howard? Ha! They'd have better luck if they brought
Maggie herself back.

--
message by Robin May, but you can call me Mr Smith.
Hello. I'm one of those "roaring fascists of the left wing".

Then and than are different words!

Britains Crap Roads, Answers wanted
 

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
.. .

I'm wondering what sort of engineer he is (service 'engineer'?) Any
engineer worth his salt knows that rock and glass both flow. On one
degree course that I know of engineering students were monitoring the
changes in the glass of the building that they worked in. Knowing that
glass and rock will deform and flow under pressure is essential for
civils. If they can't design around the known characteristics of the
material then they are **** all use to anyone.

If they were looking for flow in soda-lime glass at ambient temperatures
they were in for a long wait. It will bend, and it does suffer from stress
corrosion if stretched under load below the breaking stress, which
ultimately can lead to failure, but flow it will not unless you heat it to a
temperature at which it has an appropriate viscosity.

Note that many plastics have glass transition points below ambient
temperature, and behave like glasses below that temperature.
--
Terry Harper
http://www.terry.harper.btinternet.co.uk/