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Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

latimes.com

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Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#101

Post by hanniabu »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #84
reaperducer wrote: post #64

Interesting, considering just a few decades ago bundling old tires and sinking them into the ocean was considered an environmentally-friendly disposal method. It was believed that the tires would create reefs, encouraging sea life, and at the same time take care of on ongoing tire disposal problem that occasionally led to catastrophic fires. I wonder what other modern "environmentally friendly" things we're doing now…

that could well be fine, because those tires aren't abraded into small particles the same way?

Nature can erode anything with enough time, rubber is no competition.

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#102

Post by mikepurvis »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #73
manigandham wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can separate the issue better by saying intercity and intracity. Getting from your home to a location is usually not much more time than getting from your home to a station. This makes trains unviable for most inner-city travel outside of some lightrail in dense urban areas. For intercity, trains quickly start competing against airlines which are better for most domestic travel because the US is so big.

Subways are one of the most effective inner-city travel systems available. I'd consider that a train system.

I'm always reminded of this when I visit Toronto— the last time I was there, my partner and I were going to see a small concert in the west end, and I groaned as Google Maps told me it would be a 40 minute trip by TTC, including the walk at both ends.

Usually we would have taken the subway, but for whatever reason I was feeling lazy this time so we drove. It was almost a half-hour trip across downtown through the tail end of rush hour, and then ten minutes of circling the block looking at parking lots and garages that were already full, and then another ten minutes of walking back to the venue from the street parking we finally found several blocks away.

And no, the solution is not "build more parking", the solution is to further incentivise mass transit use. For example, in this case, I probably would have been dissuaded from driving if Google Maps had not only incorporate traffic delays into its estimate, but also highlighted that the apparently plentiful nearby parking lots were all likely to be full at the time of my planned arrival.

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#103

Post by hinkley »

hanniabu wrote: post #96
hinkley wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was just floored when the BPA problems arose and all these people I knew were trading in one plastic bottle for a different one. I'm switching to glass and stainless and everyone else is buying more plastic . Just... don't understand why we learn so slow.

I've always been leery of metal containers because I'm sure there's some unsafe machine oil/lubricant in there from the China manufacturing plant it was made at and wasn't completely/properly washed. Even after washing it at home I'm sure you can't get everything out.

I can do you one better. During that time frame, Kleen Kanteen made a big mea culpa, because initially they claimed that their canteens were BPA free and then they found out they were lining them with... you guessed it, BPA.

I tend to use glass for anything other than water. Anything without a neutral pH can make your container more reactive, no matter what it's made of. I put tea or coffee into a double wall stainless, but only occasionally.

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#104

Post by Steltek »

zaroth wrote: post #87
dragonwriter wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would be if the negative externalities of autos were priced in; trains aren't viable in America because autos are subsidized via substantial non-internalized negative externalities.

That is not why trains are not viable in America. Trains are far more heavily subsidized than autos, for example, on a per-passenger mile basis. Studies that account for the full bore of taxes which apply to personal vehicles (sales tax, excise tax, gas tax, registration fees) show that cars provide significant net income to government far exceeding infrastructure outlays. I think that trains being less fuel efficien…

TIL gas taxes paid for Boston's Big Dig. What states actually reap a surplus from personal auto fees?

Meanwhile, are you including in your thought process any of the following?

- Public land permanently dedicated to roads, highways, parking lots, etc

- Parking minimums in zoning codes

- Police resources dedicated to traffic enforcement

- Wars of aggression fought to preserve oil prices

- Oil industry subsidies

- Innocent deaths and crippling lifetime injuries caused by automobiles

- Massive declining public health due to sedentary lifestyles (sitting on your butt in a driver's seat)

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#105

Post by WillPostForFood »

jumpingmice wrote: post #90
hannasanarion wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is arguing that there needs to be a subway with hourly service between Denver and Boise. There is no excuse for the coasts, south, and midwest not to have better train service. If you exclude Alaska and the Mountain States, the US has the same population density as Europe.

This is often overlooked by people with superficial understanding of American geography. Ohio has the same population density as Spain, and a higher per-capita GSP, but none of Ohio’s cities enjoys rail service of any kind.

Setting aside whether is is reasonable to judge the density of the US by only measuring dense areas, Ohio does have rail service. Amtrak serves Toledo, Cleveland, and Cincinnati. And there is heavy and light commuter rail in Cleveland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RTA_Rapid_Transit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ohio_railroads

You are on to something though, in that Columbus, the largest city in Ohio, and several of the other major cities are not served.

The major cities of Columbus, Akron and Dayton do not have Amtrak service. Columbus is the largest metropolitan area in the U.S. without passenger rail service. Columbus last had service with the National Limited in 1979. Dayton (which lost service in 1979) and Akron (which lost service in 2005) are the eleventh and twelfth.[2]

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#106

Post by kube-system »

reaperducer wrote: post #68
hinkley wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came up in conversation when I took my car in that up until recently they were using little bits of copper in brake pads for... noise control? heat? I can't recall which. But that's been outlawed now, presumably due to potential for metal toxicity (any mineral you need in your diet is also lethal at higher doses). We're leaving powdered copper at every stop light.

Weren't brakes made of asbestos at one time?

Canada banned asbestos brakes this year. Brakes are still exempted under US asbestos bans. Manufacturers and repair shops avoid them for obvious reasons, but they're not illegal.

https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-2006-05-04-06050400...

https://canada.autonews.com/article/20180107/CANADA/18010983...

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#107

Post by mikepurvis »

jjtheblunt wrote: post #83
jumpingmice wrote: post #35

Imagine all the problems that would be solved if someone invented a car with metal wheels, maybe one that can hold hundreds of people, goes really fast, is quiet and efficient....

just made me think the efficiency depends upon the utilization, so it's high when many ride and low when not.

But it doesn't take many mass transit riders to make that vehicle more efficient than a single-occupancy car.

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#108

Post by hinkley »

reaperducer wrote: post #68
hinkley wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came up in conversation when I took my car in that up until recently they were using little bits of copper in brake pads for... noise control? heat? I can't recall which. But that's been outlawed now, presumably due to potential for metal toxicity (any mineral you need in your diet is also lethal at higher doses). We're leaving powdered copper at every stop light.

Weren't brakes made of asbestos at one time?

There's another thread that claims that was 50 years ago.

I believe a lot of the stopping power comes from ceramic cinders in the pads. Those showed up in high end bicycle brake pads about 25 years ago, and I think they were old news in high performance cars before that. I have a fuzzy recollection that they trickled down into mid-tier vehicles not long after that. 2000-ish?

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#109

Post by jellicle »

umvi wrote: post #44
luckydata wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the last mile problem can be solved in a million different ways: bikes, taxis, uber, walking, buses... Eliminating car culture is non optional if we want to save the planet.

It's easy to say "use trains" when you live in a highly dense area. But America-the-continent is massive and not very dense on average. I'm not convinced trains would be viable economically like they are in Japan.

82% of the US population lives in urban areas. Most Americans look out their front door to see a dense metropolis with thousands of people per square mile.

The upshot of this is that quite a modest train network could easily serve 50%+ of Americans. Once that's done, then you can come back and complain about how it's hard to run trains to that one guy who lives in a shack somewhere, and I'll agree with you.

Think of it like the interstate highway system. Yes, not every single American has a highway running to their door. But a heck of lot of people make daily use of the system and 100% of the population benefits from it.

Re: Car tires biggest likely source of microplastics in California coastal waters

#110

Post by [deleted] »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #80
luckydata wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the last mile problem can be solved in a million different ways: bikes, taxis, uber, walking, buses... Eliminating car culture is non optional if we want to save the planet.

The last mile problem can only be solved by eliminating single family detached homes. You can only reduce the amount of energy required to move bodies so much, at some point you have to start reducing the distances traveled.

[deleted]
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