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NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

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Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#291

Post by simmonmt »

brnt wrote: post #194
ars wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in a dedicated garage area in each apartment building NY has a lot of row houses, there's no room for a dedicated garbage area. And the alleys are not wide enough for a garbage truck. Before criticizing a place, at least understand it first.

People in row houses can't walk to the corner of the street? That's how it works in much of the Netherlands, underground bins spread over suburbia, which is like 90% row house. Works fine. I wish we had it here (still need to put my bin/bags out on the designated day).

By row house do you mean something like this? https://goo.gl/maps/XTDwyAZy6GoqPRXt7

That's 4-5 stories of ~4 apartments per floor, times however many of those buildings fit in the 900ft/247m length of a block. There's nowhere near enough space on the corner (here's the corner: https://goo.gl/maps/aszPHqrQVGftcqTCA) to collect that much garbage, much less to do it three times a week.

Yes they could build big underground containers. Yes they could reduce the amount of garbage generated. But both are massive projects far beyond "why can't they just".

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#292

Post by [deleted] »

mabbo wrote: post #123
legitster wrote: post #11

> “ With current technology, full electrification isn’t possible now for some parts of our fleet, but we are monitoring closely and really hope it will be,” Gragnani said. We are really letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. At this moment in time, Plug-in hybrids are the superior technology for nearly every application. I don't understand why they get so overlooked by consumers and manufacturers alike.

Plugin hybrids have the worst of both options as well as the best. They have to carry with them an entire gas engine, plus large electric motors, plus a huge battery. That's a lot of mass. This makes them inefficient as gas vehicles, and less efficient as EVs. Take a look at the Toyota Prius Prime, considered a great PHEV. It's got almost the same gas milage in combined city/highway driving as my 2012 Honda Civic (ar…

[deleted]

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#293

Post by Manuel_D »

wolverine876 wrote: post #235
Manuel_D wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's largely irrelevant. Having walked around Manhattan and seeing people leaving trash out, garbage trucks are going to be overwhelmingly active on side streets and not the major thoroughfares. The potential charging time gained from overhead lines will be minimal. Furthermore, most garbage trucks have mechanisms to load and unload garbage which would prevent them from mounting trolley poles.

Good point about the side streets, but you could still electrify where the trucks drive most often and not everything. The trolley poles could be mounted to the cab, it would seem.

The issue is that garbage trucks drive serve each street equally often, for the most part. There's no streets where garbage trucks drive more often. It's not the situation that 20% of streets generate 80% of garbage that needs to be picked up [1]. It's block after block of townhomes and mid-rise apartments that are leaving out trash bags. Overhead lines inherently lend themselves to consolidated routes, but garbage disposal is the polar opposite of that.

1. High rise apartments generate a lot more trash, but they already have bulk garbage disposal systems and thus aren't part of the problem of picking up garbage bags off the street.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#294

Post by woeirua »

mrmckizzle wrote: post #56

I'm surprised, I thought the electric engines would supply more torque. Thereby making it easier to plow snow.

Pushing snow is hard work. Harder than towing a large payload, so it makes sense to me that electric garbage trucks that might last a full day of garbage collection will fail to last as long while pushing around tons of snow. Just a simple matter of physics here.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#295

Post by noselasd »

jaywalk wrote: post #95
nickpp wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Garbage is a difficult issue everywhere. Part of the entropy problem of the universe…

I can't think of another major city where there are piles of garbage bags on the sidewalks everywhere.

Tokyo ? Business there place their garbage bags out on the sidewalk in the evenings, garbage trucks scoop them up early in the morning.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#296

Post by factsarelolz »

wolverine876 wrote: post #201
factsarelolz wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NYC also has a ton of fraud perpetrated by gov employees. https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/seventeen-new-york-city... https://www.reuters.com/legal/bribery-fraud-charges-are-dism...

NYC government is huge; is that really a "ton"? Private business also has fraud.

Government Officials defrauding their constituents is another level higher than private business fraud. Just my opinion though YOMV.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#297

Post by quantified »

LarryMullins wrote: post #88
quantified wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that it needs to go first. It's visible and it's possible for a small number of decision-makers to decide and have an impact over a larger swath of infrastructure. 1000 vehicles can be the result of 10 people deciding, not 1000 people deciding.

"Critical infrastructure" is critical because it has some job more important than being a billboard for a cause. If you can make it a billboard without compromising it's primary function, then great, but obviously EV garbage trucks isn't such a case.

EV snowplows isn't a case. I'd be interested if any discussion of electrifying included plowing.

One thing that's clear: until battery-powered EVs are able to handle real muscular work (snow removal, hauling, plowing, etc.), diesel engines will be purchased, maintained and fueled by all levels of authority. Exactly how will roads be maintained without graders, pavers, etc.?

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#298

Post by walrus01 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #89
chitowneats wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It never ceases to amaze me that the self styled "Greatest City on Earth" can't come up with a reasonable solution for its garbage.

> never ceases to amaze me that the self styled "Greatest City on Earth" can't come up with a reasonable solution for its garbage The status quo is sanitary and efficient. All things considered, New York’s garbage problem is on par with its snow problem. Well managed enough to work, but annoying enough around the edges to be fun to bicker about. If you live in low-density New York, your experience mirrors suburbia; h…

> The status quo is sanitary and efficient.

Are we talking about the same NYC? Visit Manhattan in mid July/August. Bags of garbage leaking juices and oil out onto the street into a huge greasy spot where the designated collection spot is near the curb. The whole city smells like a toaster oven roasted ballsack.

Then combine that with all the cumulative liters of urine per day from dogs and humans all throughout the city.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#299

Post by yodelshady »

edgyquant wrote: post #202
wolverine876 wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why default to privately owned? Public services can be cheaper, more reliable, and you have more control than if you pay someone else to maximize their profit. NYC government has tons of experience and expertise in managing something like this.

>Public services can be cheaper No they can be subsidized with tax money. That doesn’t mean cheaper

No, they can be cheaper.

Sod off with this, I've seen someone literally hospitalised because of an army of private sector contractors we've had to deal with finding ingenious efficiency savings, powered by ideologues like you. Now our costs have tripled.

Oh, and guess f*king what; now several other suppliers are bankrupt, taking their already mostly-worthless support contracts with them, because they never invested a cent in resilience, and, get this, are blaming us for giving them that power. The same power they were so adamant, just like you, that they were so good at wielding. Their only efficiency ever was stripping all resilience, not inefficency - deliberate resilience.

The private sector is made of goddamn children at times,

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#300

Post by Dylan16807 »

moffkalast wrote: post #254
iancmceachern wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's brilliant. They need to do both: Drive a big truck around the city streets pushing a plow to clear them of snow and ice And Drive a big truck around to collect garbage It's much more efficient to do both at the same time, use the same trucks and skilled labor to run them. It's a classic two birds one stone situation

Actually hold on, we can also put people on these trucks. They can also serve as busses! And wait, attach a trailer and they can also replace semi trucks! Just use one truck to do all city related things, how neat is that? /s You can just go on, making it less and less efficient each step.

Thankfully the physical requirements to turn a garbage trunk into a snow plow are minimal. And it's more inefficient to have an idle fleet for huge parts of the year than to use slightly awkward plows.
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