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Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

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Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#201

Post by tensor »

tomatocracy wrote: post #174
tensor wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pearson airport in Toronto has ones that accelerate up to a fast speed. People who can’t use them can either walk beside them or hire a small electric golf cart. There is no reason to ban them just because a small portion of the population can’t use them.

Not sure but I think I read a while ago that they were removed due to unreliability (it's a while since I've been there myself). It was very clever how they did the acceleration/deceleration - the "tiles" of the walkway fit together in such a way that each could slide on top of the next one, and at the two ends the tiles would gradually slide closer together (decelerating) or further apart (accelerating).

They were still there pretty recently when I was there. All escalators are a pain for maintenance though. Sure it's cheaper to force people to walk but that's not the point.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#202

Post by maxglute »

Between futurama pneumatic tube, and walkalators, are there any other proposals for infra scale "pedestrian" mobilitiy. Faster/less walking seemed like one of those things futurist urbanists use to waste time speculativing now, now we've settled on escooters and exoskeletons?

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#203

Post by delichon »

WorldMaker wrote: post #199
delichon wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 1940 when he wrote this Heinlein was a New Deal Democrat supporter of Franklin Roosevelt. He was an active progressive who had recently worked on Upton Sinclair’s socialist “End Poverty in California” campaign. His libertarian shift was twenty years in the future, in his fifties.

Heinlein's alleged libertarian shift. In the 1940s Heinlein was mentioned as a Social Credit supporter which implied he was always on the libertarian side of Socialism. Social Credit was the American party killed/disrupted by the red scare that believed in a UBI and universal health care. His posthumous published but first written novel "For Us, The Living" is even a wonderfully naive paean to UBI and credits a Socia…

Thanks for that scholarly and thoughtful comment. The intro to The Roads Must Roll is an example of that complexity. It starts with a labor union meeting arguing for the workers to strike, and then a counter argument that could be an unacknowledged contribution from Ayn Rand. And this was from the presumably progressive early Heinlein.

I'd like to be there for a debate between 1940 Heinlein and 1980 Heinlein. I wouldn't be surprised if that event is scheduled for the Howard family reunion at the end of time and Time Enough for Love.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#204

Post by WorldMaker »

delichon wrote: post #203
WorldMaker wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heinlein's alleged libertarian shift. In the 1940s Heinlein was mentioned as a Social Credit supporter which implied he was always on the libertarian side of Socialism. Social Credit was the American party killed/disrupted by the red scare that believed in a UBI and universal health care. His posthumous published but first written novel "For Us, The Living" is even a wonderfully naive paean to UBI and credits a Socia…

Thanks for that scholarly and thoughtful comment. The intro to The Roads Must Roll is an example of that complexity. It starts with a labor union meeting arguing for the workers to strike, and then a counter argument that could be an unacknowledged contribution from Ayn Rand. And this was from the presumably progressive early Heinlein. I'd like to be there for a debate between 1940 Heinlein and 1980 Heinlein. I would…

Which, to be fair, is also a Socialist utopia couched into a lot of Libertarian jargon/perspectives (to well beloved to mock extremes such as the way that society handles, say, the "Extreme Libertarian" approach to the incest taboo).

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#205

Post by Loughla »

bayindirh wrote: post #129
Loughla wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The things I took away from reading Niven was transfer booths. The world has homogenized because information and people were transmitted instantly one from corner of the globe to another. Ooohhh boy.

If you want to see this idea taken to the next level, you should read Dan Simmons' Hyperion Cantos. ;)

I have a tattoo of the tree ship yggdrasill.

The consul's tale should be required reading for anyone working in the tech field.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#206

Post by Loughla »

eszed wrote: post #101
Loughla wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The things I took away from reading Niven was transfer booths. The world has homogenized because information and people were transmitted instantly one from corner of the globe to another. Ooohhh boy.

I loved the conservation of momentum "hack" for those teleportation booths. Go on, everyone who hasn't read it, see if you can guess how he dealt with that.

I love the ring world series until all the furry porn. He really should've stopped before coming up with rishing.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#207

Post by cyberax »

pasc1878 wrote: post #157
cyberax wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the 1900s every city was walkable. Most cities had trains of some sort for the majority of transport and bikes or horses for the last mile. Not the "last mile". The _only_ mile. Cities were so walkable that London had multiple distinct local accents because people were living their entire lives in one neighborhood, venturing outside only for special occasions. This changed only with the invention of electric tra…

In London trains came in 30-40 years before electric trams. So trains were the driving force. See the Underground for an example. Might even be 70 years see the London-Greenwich railway for the first instance.

The early trains did not significantly change the situation, they were more useful for trade and long trips. They were not frequent enough for daily commutes for the majority of city residents.

London and Paris were real outliners, with the early adoption of steam-powered subways. Mostly because they had to due to their size, but it really was the tram that initially allowed the working-class city population to commute freely.

It's also interesting that it coincides with the significant boost in productivity, and also with general improvements to workers' rights.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#208

Post by bayindirh »

Loughla wrote: post #205
bayindirh wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to see this idea taken to the next level, you should read Dan Simmons' Hyperion Cantos. ;)

I have a tattoo of the tree ship yggdrasill. The consul's tale should be required reading for anyone working in the tech field.

I consider the whole Cantos as a great book on ethics and empathy.

Funnily, every syncthing node on my network has a Farcaster folder.

Maybe I should read it again sometime.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#209

Post by rbanffy »

pyrale wrote: post #121
bryanrasmussen wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so assuming inner sidewalk moving at 100 mph, next outer at 95, and each moving at 5 per less, when big muscular terrorists placed on s-100 carrying a big cardboard box filled with nails and throw it as quickly and hard as possible so that the box of nails open up over s-75 at what velocity are the nails raining down on pedestrians on s-75?

Pedestrians would likely not be hit, because few would want to walk there with a 75mph headwind in the first place.

The headwind wouldn’t be that bad because the people ahead of you are dragging some air with them.

Now I want to learn to use the CFD kit and figure out what it’d be.

Re: Paris had a moving sidewalk in 1900, and a Thomas Edison film captured it (2020)

#210

Post by gcanyon »

rkomorn wrote: post #175
jazzyjackson wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even with a job I'd rather spend an hour on a train than 35 minutes in LA traffic. (30 minutes... I guess I'd prefer the stress + a little more time for breakfast. But I'd put a 2x multiplier on not having to drive myself)

Having spent lots of time in LA traffic, I'd be surprised if an hour on a train didn't get you significantly farther than 35 minutes in traffic. Used to take an hour to drive 11 miles down 101 to downtown vs 25 minute on the B line.

Hello, fellow LA traffic sufferer! I used to do the 210 to the 2 to surface streets to Century City, and the 210 to the 118 to the 405 to Santa Monica. There was no transit that was going to tame those beasts :-) but a commuter motorcycle in Los Angeles is a wonderful thing.
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