Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

gothamist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

321–330 of 579 posts

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

#321

Post by twobitshifter »

xenadu02 wrote: post #37
Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been saying this for years. I just don't understand it. A car that can drive ~40 miles on pure electric that has an ICE for longer trips would satisfy the needs of everyone. For like 90+% of people, it would mean never using gas for their commute while also eliminating range anxiety. I'm especially surprised about the lack of plug-in hybrids for semi trucks. I'd think having a little extra electronic torque woul…

This more than doubles the complexity, increases weight, has much lower battery capacity, and still sticks you with the maintenance work required for the ICE. Plus gas is a very volatile mix that degrades; you must run the ICE regularly to ensure the tank gets cycled.

It doesn't have to double complexity. Look at the BMW i3 Rex - it used a basic range-extending generator and was ahead of its time. The weight savings of the Rex vs. a larger battery are significant. Most EVs carry around a battery that they'll only use 10% of on a typical day.

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

#322

Post by chimeracoder »

specialp wrote: post #312
brnt wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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).

The Netherlands has absolutely nowhere approaching the density of NYC. Even Queens has a density twice that of Amsterdam, and Manhattan 7x. If you see NYC on garbage days the streets are lined with mountains of bags. Each corner would have to have a virtual mine shaft to hold 1000s of bags of garbage. Also contrary to movies, Manhattan has almost no alley ways either. There's no space for anything. Even when it snows…

> If you see NYC on garbage days the streets are lined with mountains of bags. Each corner would have to have a virtual mine shaft to hold 1000s of bags of garbage.

Or, you know, a commercial-sized dumpster.

The trash is already taking up space on the sidewalk. Putting a dumpster to contain it would save space, by keeping it contained.

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

#323

Post by j33zusjuice »

jeffbee wrote: post #258
brnt wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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).

This is also how they do it in Zürich. You walk your garbage down to the corner. Recycling is the same way. The only thing that gets picked up from houses is paper and cardboard. In NYC, in very dense areas like of Manhattan, I would expect it would make sense to put a container in the bottom of every building, but in rowhouse areas it is reasonable to expect the occupants to walk down to the corner. The main thing i…

And neither of those things happen in the USA. We kicked England out like 250 years ago, and our general belief is that Europe hasn’t had a good idea since they chose to colonize the Americas. Reasonable people think this is stupid, but we have a lot of unreasonable people here.

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

#324

Post by chimeracoder »

wolverine876 wrote: post #186
some_random wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Garbage is absolutely not as big of a problem as it is in NYC though. You don't get to blame the fact garbage collection is awful on entropy when other cities very visibly do not have the same issues.

Do you live there? It seems pretty effective IME.

> Do you live there? It seems pretty effective IME.

I live in NYC, and I'll go on the record stating that NYC's trash collection system is an absolute disaster, because the city has long-refused to use containerized trash collection (the way every other city in the developed world does), and instead tells people to dump trash bags on the sidewalk 3-5 times per week, where they sit for 12 hours at a time before being picked up.

This is not an effective system at all. It exists only because elected officials have not wanted to give up a few free parking spaces every block in order to allow for containerized trash receptacles.

Thankfully, there's a pilot program on one block in midtown Manhattan to "trial" containerized trash collection. It began a few weeks ago, and is scheduled to last one year. Hopefully that will be followed by a wider rollout.

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

#325

Post by djtriptych »

petermcneeley wrote: post #309
djtriptych wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, a union rep is quoted in the article, which was weird. His statement was also a little weird. The conclusions and the math involved don't really add up for me. They laid the groundwork for a fight against _any_ conversion to electric vehicles by warning the city council about the possibly prohibitive cost of installing a charger network... I'm not sure it's too outlandish to postulate that the union would act i…

Perhaps the union organizers think this but it doesnt really make much sense given that the trains (subway) in NYC are the first thing I would automate and apparently still have drivers. Automating trash pick-up in NYC is probably harder than L5 autonomous driving.

It's hard now, but this is a 20 year plan to replace the fleet. Already a budget item for the city, and, possibly, the frontline for union concerns about automation.

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

#326

Post by tobsterius »

wolverine876 wrote: post #255
jrockway wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN's take on NYC is very confusing. Everyone has "obvious" answers to problems that residents don't even consider problematic, and oh by the way, they've never left their town of 600 people.

I remember a debate here where people were claiming how lawless NYC was for allowing people and services to double-park to load/unload. They should park in a loading zone! You must recognize the general GOP-led campaign that democratic-run places like NYC and CA are nightmares. It was Trump's theme for the 2020 GOP convention, but was overshadowed by Coronavirus. I think it spreads here too. NYC (and CA) need to take…

For what it's worth, NYC has been designating some parking spots on city blocks in largely residential areas for local deliveries, so UPS/Amazon/FedEx trucks don't have to double park and hold up traffic. I'm sure it was due to the pandemic, where online ordering became a lifeline for many.

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

#327

Post by novok »

grumple wrote: post #284
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.

As someone from a dense city with generally smaller roads than NYC (Philly), I think that's untrue. If NYC wanted to do it, it could be done. In Philly, trucks make it down alleys where the roadway is half the size of the truck. Or they wheel the dumpsters down the alley to the corner. That doesn't mean every alley is suitable, but you can put the dumpster on the main road where you put the trash, or do as our Europe…

There are barely if any alleys in most of NYC.

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

#328

Post by trog »

RC_ITR wrote: post #303
ecshafer wrote: post #70

Battery operated garbage trucks don't sound like a great idea, at least for all day use. With the push for EV I am not sure why we aren't seeing a push for the installation of streetcar power lines, these already exist and are used for busses. If we have a garbage truck that has the battery capacity for say 30 minutes, then it could be on the power line for the majority of the time. This would limit battery waste as…

This, This, This. We think "Well gas cars transport their own energy source, so electric cars must too" and that will probably be one of the things future generations laugh at us for (in the same way older generations thought flapping wing costumes could generate heavier-than-air flight). Hydrocarbons are an extreme outlier in terms of energy density (vs. weight) and the fact that we are trying to replicate that mode…

> and if we just made it so that our vehicles could plug into electricity at all points of their journey, then EVs are basically solved.

One thing I have often wondered is how often they'd need access to electricity if they had a small battery to cover for the times they're not connected.

i.e., do they need to be connected at /all/ points of their journey? Or just often enough that they can get enough of a charge to make it to the next point? e.g. if there was induction charging at stop signs or traffic lights, would that be enough for a majority of trips?

This seems like it should just be a bit of a game of statistical coverage of charging points, time spent at them, speed of charging, and so on.

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

#329

Post by to11mtm »

fencepost wrote: post #107
ecshafer wrote: post #70

Battery operated garbage trucks don't sound like a great idea, at least for all day use. With the push for EV I am not sure why we aren't seeing a push for the installation of streetcar power lines, these already exist and are used for busses. If we have a garbage truck that has the battery capacity for say 30 minutes, then it could be on the power line for the majority of the time. This would limit battery waste as…

Garbage trucks are probably one of the best places for it actually, because they stop so frequently. Unfortunately the article is about plow trucks instead which have a very different use case - New York just happens to use the same vehicles for both so they have a smaller fleet that's not as well suited to either task. For garbage trucks you have stop and go movement so EVs eliminate idling. Given the size of the tr…

Around here, a notable number of Garbage trucks are LPG or some variant [1].

Having driven a Hybrid 'Truck' (really more of a ute[2]) for just under a year, I can say that EV plows will likely show their deficiencies when you need them the most [3].

[1] - On the whole, this is still better than doing nothing with it and just allowing it to vent, or burning on-site (which, sometimes you do see at local landfills.)

[2] - The Maverick -does- do a decent job IMO of showing what's possible with a small purpose-built hybrid truck or truck-like thing; However manufacturers that make bigger EVs are likely reluctant to build a truly 'minimum viable product', as it will bite into fleet sales of larger EV/Hybrids introduced.

[3] - Recently, we had sustained sub 10F temps. My overall mileage went from 35-42MPG to 25-30MPG.

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

#330

Post by lostlogin »

akira2501 wrote: post #307
fencepost wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Garbage trucks are probably one of the best places for it actually, because they stop so frequently. Unfortunately the article is about plow trucks instead which have a very different use case - New York just happens to use the same vehicles for both so they have a smaller fleet that's not as well suited to either task. For garbage trucks you have stop and go movement so EVs eliminate idling. Given the size of the tr…

> so EVs eliminate idling. The vehicle, when stopped, has other functions to perform. It has hydraulic lifters and compactors that need quite a bit of power to operate. It's a working platform, not a simple garbage transportation mechanism. Even to the extent is isn't for transportation, see how far away the dump is from your home. That distance has to be covered twice at least once a day, and possibly as much as 3 t…

Somewhere as densely populated as NY is surely best served by those rubbish bins that empty into a trash vacuum tunnel.

Massive upfront cost (infrastructure and NY seems to be a bit fraught) and also likely expensive to run, but with high population density it’s got to be better.

However this would then have a fleet of snow trucks that weren’t used 99% of the time, as the rubbish was mostly sorted.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_vacuum_collection

Post reply on HN