Dirty Air

When things sometimes don't seem to make a lot of sense, one looks for solutions.  Scanning the headlines this morning shows a plague of disaster.  Wild fires exploding with tretcherous violence.  Meanwhile, in the State Capital; legislators declare finacial disaster onto it's citizens.  Amazing how the bad air generated from natural disasters is used as a claim that the darkened skys are a product of mankind's efforts.  Another marketing lie in the process of corrupt political practice.

Public Transit

The US has become a technological embarrassment in the world of transit.  As science teaches that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, financially; man's greed in the political realm lines the pockets of the politically connected at the cost of stealing from its citizens.  

Twenty years ago China was a relatively poor country.  Corporate profiteering enabled the Chinese economy to increase.  This post a commentary to transportation, not an epithet to business.  The intent of the post is to make the accusation towards US politicians of stealing progress and success from citizens they represent.  

The latest in world news places China far beyond other countries, especially the USA; in modern public transportation.  In the 1960s, two physicists were awarded grants for magnetically levitated (maglev) transit vehicles.  Although the technology has grown to its fourth generation, only Japan is utilizing this technology, adapting the 2nd generation into building the world's fastest train.  

While California had the opportunity to utilize the 300mph German maglev train technology, the engaged political figures opted for the 200mph European heavy steel wheel train due to their personally lucrative financial benefits.  Meanwhile, China opted to grant the German maglev technology opportunity and allowed the first high speed maglev train its public operation; opening the 19 mile line in 2004.  

Since China's move to advances in public transit, it now hosts its own maglev technology, and this technology is growing:  chinadaily.com.2017-03/01

The status-quo of corrupt politicians is detrimental to its citizenry. 

It's 2017, the future is already here

It's already close to the end of the second month of 2017.  Where are the flying cars and cities in space?  In the 1950's, the future was promised to be futuristic.  Somebody lied.  

Instead of a prosperous world of robot assisted convenient advances, we find ourselves caught in a trap we weren't even aware of.  The automobile caused its car culture to be completely dependent upon it.  There is an inherent problem to a civilization who's foundation is wholly unsustainable.  The design of all urban growth has been captured and suppressed by the automobile.  Dependence to the automobile in every aspect of its culture has halted transportation expansion.  Magnetically levitated personal transportation devices are no more closer to development than they were 70 years ago.  Phones, television, computerization and other technologies have made significant advances over the past few decades but, the automobile is only safer to drive.  Age and increased use wears a heavy toll to the deterioration of roadways.  

It's time to expand transportation into the future and go beyond the unsustainable limitations of the automobile.     

New US Transportation Secretary

'Let's go with promoting the status-quo' would seem to be the new administration's slogan for the upcoming Secretary of Transportation (Elaine Chao is transportation pick).  There is a tremendous lack of vision in establishment politics but, lots of room for the tradition of useless politically motivated pork barrel projects.  What tragedy will be burdened on the American public with more vision-less politicians adhering to political enrichment?  It is a sad and tragic step for the head of US Transportation to be one embraced in political corruption instead of holding a vision to know the economic value of efficient transportation.

One has to follow and participate in the advanced transit industry to understand the industry.  Maglev technology is a necessary part of successful US transportation.  Automobile centric land-use design is un-sustainable, repairing America's road infrastructure is as useless as a band-aid to repair a broken neck.

On a positive note: a seed has to die for it to transition into a living plant.  The US transportation infrastructure is on its death bed.  Perhaps this political appointment will result in the final death blow to the US transportation infrastructure and the result will be a new life to efficient growth with modern transportation technology.

High Speed Rail Curious

To the proclaimed cost of $68billion as the price tag for California's escapade into the past with the proposed 200 year old transportation technology, its promoters are still clueless on how to attain the money for it.  With the change of political regimes, who will now support CA's proposed HSR?  If there was a lack of $40billion and a vision to have the government pay the first $18billion, what is to happen now that the $18billion is soon going to disappear?   Dan Walters has an enlightened view with his article in The Sacramento Bee .

The Toll of Sprawl

A recent article posted at cnu.org/publicsquare raises questions about mankind's evolving intelligence in regards to transportation.

The leading cause of death in the US (according to the CDC)  is heart disease, followed by cancer, then chronic lower respiratory disease, with the fourth leading cause of death as unintentional injuries.  Of the 136,000 accident deaths in 2015, 38,000 were by the automobile (Newsweek) .

This raises a question.  As mankind population expands, has it always been normal for mankind to die as a result of the mode of transportation?  When the only form of travel was walking, was it normal to trip and fall, killing the traveler?  Then, as animals were used as a common mode of transportation, was it common for people to fall off the animals to their death?  

The question expands: is it common and acceptable for transportation to cause death?  Has transportation always been a common source of death?  Why then are train deaths and airplane deaths as a percentage of miles traveled so much less than the automobile?  

The conclusion of the unanswered questions is that the presumption shows more examples of the automobile being unsustainable.  In a related study, financial aspects to automobile wrecks were found by the NHTSA in 2014 to show an annual economic loss of $836 billion.  

A society based on an unsustainable foundation will collapse.    Philosophically, in a realistic way; the nature of growth is to expand.  The course of automobile politics has stifled advances in transportation innovation.  The automobile centric land-use design is unsustainable environmentally, economically and socially.  This political procedure has to end for mankind to grow.  It is the nature of man to grow and explore.  Confinement harbors restriction and control which is the nature of slavery.  

It Is Time For Innovation

In a recent transportation newsletter this statement was made: “The Hudson Valley is a centrally located region with abundant fresh water that could absorb millions of new urban residents. By 20th century thinking, this would mean more highways and parking lots to accommodate auto-dependent living. Nobody wants major urban growth. People prefer green valleys and hills with low-density development. So Cuomo’s staff aren’t even thinking about this, let alone devoting planning resources to an APM-centered future.”  Since; “Nobody wants major urban growth. People prefer green valleys and hills with low-density development” how can this type of urban growth continue?  The statement that followed “Nobody wants major urban growth” proves a very problematic conclusion that government planning staffs are doing the opposite.  How is this legitimized?  In the world of government, politic's campaign contributors are considered the players and receive favors for their contributions.  These favors are free deeded properties, grants and zero interest loans. 

California legislators have drawn attention to their environmentally strict policies while the status-quo of deteriorating infrastructure is a malignant cancer.   Rather than purifying the quality of the State’s well-being, it has caused a malicious growth of financial favoritism which diminishes its citizen health.  Under Governor Reagan the CA EPA was established to provide protection to the environment.  All public jobs are now required to adhere to a EIS (Environmental Impact Study) with a maximum 300-page report (EIR, Environmental Impact Report).  The politicians have twisted the significance of this report to make the inclusion that if the project is unable to comply with environmental requirements, due to a myriad of reasons, then it doesn’t have to comply, upon the approval of the project’s governing body.

As an example; CA HSR project spent over $800-million to produce a useless and incomplete 12,000 page EIR.  The project was ruled by Jerry Brown to be exempt from CA environmental rules and regulations.  His friend and husband of CA’s Senator is the largest single shareholder of the firm that held the EIS contract.

The travesty is damage done to the decaying infrastructure.  Automobiles are fundamental to urban growth in the automobile centric design.  Within the government planning agencies there is a self- gratifying term used called: “Smart Growth”.  Lipstick on a pig.  When planners use this term they consider themselves smart.

    

Outside the spheres of the government’s malignant tumors is a tool called innovation.  It is time for a revolution in thought, creativity and fairness.  First task: modern transportation.