Ironically, I think that the actual range of electric cars is less affected by being stuck in traffic jams than IC vehicles
Unless it is hot or cold, at night, plus everyone charging their phones.
Ironically, I think that the actual range of electric cars is less affected by being stuck in traffic jams than IC vehicles
Yes, the internet and online accounting software has massively reduced my travel and my clients' travel. I run a small accountancy practice. 20 years ago, we'd have at least yearly meetings as standard with all clients, and all clients would be travelling to our offices to drop off their "books". Now, with email, online accounting software, etc. we can go many weeks without a single client coming through the door and without leaving our offices. We have clients all over the UK and many overseas who we never even speak to, not even by phone, as all support is done via email and we have real time access to their computerised accounting records so there are no "books" to pass between us anymore. Today is Thursday, and not a single client has even phoned us this week, yet we're getting dozens of emails every hour.
Yes, of course there's still a time and place when meetings are required. What we need to change is the habitual behaviour of just assuming a meeting is needed simply because it's what we're used to. From my experience and observations, I'd say we could all halve the number of long-distance meetings/travel at a stroke without any detrimental effects at all.
Our business insurance firm used to send someone up from Leicester to the Lake District every year to have "renewal meetings". The poor guy used to get to about four or five accountancy practices in the day, approx 30 minutes at each, with the rest of the day spent driving. What a monumental waste of time, money and CO2 emissions. Just why? A few years ago, they changed it and now do telephone calls instead. The same guy tells me he can now do 10-15 renewals per day. There's absolutely no difference between him asking my client numbers over the phone as there was face to face. He now does the paperwork to be e-signed instead of wet signature. I can't even see why he insists on a phone call - it could be done fully via email. If I have any questions/claims/issues etc we communicate by email throughout the year.
I don't knbow how EVs manage heating and ventilation/cooling but I assume that heating relies in part of heat given off by the battery when working. Maybe that will drive better insulated vehicles and better ventilated cooling systems as well.Unless it is hot or cold, at night, plus everyone charging their phones.
Whilst I reckon going by train, long distance, is preferable than by car, even an EV.... They do have so many advantages, and very few draw-backs, quite apart from them being infinitely better cars to drive anyway:Unless it is hot or cold, at night, plus everyone charging their phones.
Perhaps you are very young, but if you think announcements = project delivery from a desperate government, you might be in for a surprise.
Do road building projects have to demonstrate a BCR in the same way that rail projects do?
Do road building projects have to demonstrate a BCR in the same way that rail projects do?
If you compare how many long distance journeys currently made by road that are transferred to rail, to how many new (maybe shorter) journeys are added to new roads, you would have to define what you regard as 'benefit'.I'm a big fan of rail travel and I don't drive. But you can't seriously suggest we'll get the same benefit from HS2 as from 350 miles of the road network?
If you compare how many long distance journeys currently made by road that are transferred to rail, to how many new (maybe shorter) journeys are added to new roads, you would have to define what you regard as 'benefit'.
Closing roads wouldn't necessarily reduce emissions. How would you decide which roads to close?
IMHO the best way to reduce emissions to make all vehicles electric and build some nuke stations.
Closing roads wouldn't necessarily reduce emissions. How would you decide which roads to close?
IMHO the best way to reduce emissions to make all vehicles electric and build some nuke stations.
Roads require maintenance, that maintenance results in emissions. As an example the Highways England emissions from their assets is 330,000 tonnes a year.
Therefore if we can reduce the account of road space we need by using better use of the road surface that we have it would reduce the amount of maintenance required.
The other thing to bear in mind is that an EV car will (assuming it is driven for 150,000 miles) will result emissions of ~75g/km. Whilst a cycle (even an electric one) would result in a lot less emissions.
By people cycling they require less triad space, for those who can't cycle of they can go by bus or train they take up less roadspace than if they drive.
As an example, transport planners (when working out capacities) assign vehicles a value relative to a car. A bus is counted as two cars, so a bus carrying 15 people is more space efficient than two cars with 5 people in each. However most buses can easily carry 50 people and most cars have an average of not quite 2 people. Which means that the now people who walk, cycle and use public transport the less roadspace we need to maintain.
By removing cars from being a good option for key journeys you reduce the likelihood of people owning a car (or at least owing a second car in a household).
EV cars will reduce our emissions, however the best way to reduce emissions is not to use a car unless there's no viable option (this could include walking short trips).
Good luck with that one. Away from the inevitably pro-rail views here, the society that has evolved in the last 50 years has encouraged car use with out of town shopping, retail parks, business parks and housing estates in open countryside with no public transport, which we are stupidly still constructing. For many families with children, public transport is unlikely to ever be a "good option", but until we stop building housing, retail and employment areas with poor transport the car will be around for a very long time. Closing roads and putting extra traffic elsewhere will only add to congestion and pollution. Much traffic is goods being delivered as well as trades people going about their business. You will always need a decent road system to allow trade and business to operate efficiently , and being anti-road is unlikely to help convince people to get rid of their cars.By removing cars from being a good option for key journeys you reduce the likelihood of people owning a car (or at least owing a second car in a household).
This is all rather simplistic.
Railway maintenance also results in a lot of carbon emissions. I would guess that a kilometre of twin track railway generates much more carbon through maintenance than a 6 lane motorway. You don’t need to tamp a motorway, for example.
Your EV figure of 75g/km is a figure over the life of the ‘asset’, assuming a certain carbon mix of electricity generation. It would be interesting to see the carbon footprint of a new 4 car EMU on the same basis.
Developers will continue to build these estates that have neither local facilities nor sensible transport provision for as long as local authorities give them planning permission. If there was a refusal to pander to their requests, they would then begin to get involved in co-ordinated planning of communities, (or exit the business because the quick buck was,no longer there to be made.Good luck with that one. Away from the inevitably pro-rail views here, the society that has evolved in the last 50 years has encouraged car use with out of town shopping, retail parks, business parks and housing estates in open countryside with no public transport, which we are stupidly still constructing. For many families with children, public transport is unlikely to ever be a "good option", but until we stop building housing, retail and employment areas with poor transport the car will be around for a very long time. Closing roads and putting extra traffic elsewhere will only add to congestion and pollution. Much traffic is goods being delivered as well as trades people going about their business. You will always need a decent road system to allow trade and business to operate efficiently , and being anti-road is unlikely to help convince people to get rid of their cars.
Good luck with that one. Away from the inevitably pro-rail views here, the society that has evolved in the last 50 years has encouraged car use with out of town shopping, retail parks, business parks and housing estates in open countryside with no public transport, which we are stupidly still constructing. For many families with children, public transport is unlikely to ever be a "good option", but until we stop building housing, retail and employment areas with poor transport the car will be around for a very long time. Closing roads and putting extra traffic elsewhere will only add to congestion and pollution. Much traffic is goods being delivered as well as trades people going about their business. You will always need a decent road system to allow trade and business to operate efficiently , and being anti-road is unlikely to help convince people to get rid of their cars.
One person talking meetings are better done by sending out a PDF. You can read a 30min speech in about 10min.One person talking meetings are easy on conference calls.
They are a mess when multiple people are talking at once, which is often needed if multiple groups are trying to solve an issue. Much easier then to be round a table.
In aware there's always going to be a need for roads, however there's a few points o would like to make:
Roads can be used a lot more efficiently if rather than 2 to 14 people (car) in a 12m length of road there's 2 to 80 (bus).
Whilst there's still a lot of housing development happening in open countryside, these developments tend to be much denser than the housing of even the 80's let alone of the 60's, dense development works better for public transport as there's a larger market in a smaller area. As an example, without increasing the amount of land used where I live there are developments adding about 150 dwellings within 300m of the train station (with more to come). Whilst at the same time another development is adding 550 dwellings within 1 mile of the same station, whilst another developer has been trying to get a further 700 homes also within a mile of the same station. (This is all in addition to the 200 homes built in the last 10 years, this isn't a large town as at the last census it had a population of less than 9,000 people).
Whilst a nearby station is looking like it's likely to gain 5,000 homes over the next 20 years, with scope to increase this to a total of 10,000 in years to come.
Also nearby there's a new development (3,000 homes) which could with some forethought (i.e. a new station and either a small length of electrification or battery trains) could see rail connected to it.
However in all those cases it's increasing the business case for bus provision and they will all improve walking and cycling facilities.
Where developments are larger and remote from facilities they tend to provide facilities like schools and shops. As well as trying to enhance non road links (like public transport and cycle facilities).
Even smaller developments will do things like improve bus stops, improve cycle facilities and improve existing crossing facilities. As well as indirect improvements, like making local shops more viable (either existing or for people starting up new business) so people have a choice.
I'd also suggest that large out of town shopping is starting to be in decline, or at least those which are thriving are likely to be attracting people from much closer than perhaps they did in the past.
This is partly due to the density of development meaning that they can serve the same number of people without those people having to travel as far. It is also down to people being more conscious of the travelling which they do, which is highlighted to them by the level of congestion in the roads if nothing else.
Closing roads probably would cut emissions even including from congestion if it simply forced people to stop travelling because the experience is so damn awful. It would also create terrible dislocation, pollution and congestion in local communities who find themselves being 'unbypassed'.Roads require maintenance, that maintenance results in emissions. As an example the Highways England emissions from their assets is 330,000 tonnes a year.
Therefore if we can reduce the account of road space we need by using better use of the road surface that we have it would reduce the amount of maintenance required.
The other thing to bear in mind is that an EV car will (assuming it is driven for 150,000 miles) will result emissions of ~75g/km. Whilst a cycle (even an electric one) would result in a lot less emissions.
By people cycling they require less triad space, for those who can't cycle of they can go by bus or train they take up less roadspace than if they drive.
As an example, transport planners (when working out capacities) assign vehicles a value relative to a car. A bus is counted as two cars, so a bus carrying 15 people is more space efficient than two cars with 5 people in each. However most buses can easily carry 50 people and most cars have an average of not quite 2 people. Which means that the now people who walk, cycle and use public transport the less roadspace we need to maintain.
By removing cars from being a good option for key journeys you reduce the likelihood of people owning a car (or at least owing a second car in a household).
EV cars will reduce our emissions, however the best way to reduce emissions is not to use a car unless there's no viable option (this could include walking short trips).