New Technology? Earlier this week, fbb noticed that one of the headlights on the limo was faulty. He well remembers, back in his youth, that “motoring tips” articles advised the driver to “keep a set of bulbs in the glove box – for emergencies”. fbb never did but neither did he ever have an illumination emergency. Then along came “sealed…
• Class 730s start running for LNWR (BusAndTrainUser) • London Underground thefts rise by 83% in a year (BBC News) • The world’s first railway station identified (Rail Engineer) • 1976: The Train Station with No Trains: Video (BBC Archive) • Greyhound Stations Go Extinct, Travellers Left Out in the Cold (Streetsblog USA) • Milan contemplates city centre car ban…
Variable-price parking is a new way of valuing urban real estate and incentivizing residents to make different transportation choices, advocates say. Finding free or inexpensive curb parking in a crowded, expensive downtown feels like hitting the jackpot. But these parking spots offer drivers too much of a bargain, according to Donald Shoup, an author and distinguished research professor in the…
A Bit Of A Surprise We are well used to the multiplicity of manipulations in the big bad world of bus business. Recently we have seen the dramatic expansion of McGills and, on a smaller scale, the purchase of Ensign by First Bus and, perhaps a bit weirder, the take-over of Dartline by GoAhead. Is the breaking news from Baslow…
Subsidies Don’t Last For Ever What has happened over the last few years way out west has to be one of he more impressive developments in the UK bus industry. C ornwall C o-ordination C osts Way back when, the Great Western Railway and the National Bus Company (this is 1929!) merged their interests in the West Country to form the Western National…
How Did We Manage Without It? In 2023 we are blessed with loads of technology at the front of a bus and in the so-called “back office”. Technology is for ever evolving and the humble ticket machine is now a Sophisticated computer and printer all in one. How things have changed for the better? Or maybe for the more expensiver?…
Our annual quiz continues. 2023 seems to have provided sufficient questions for roughly the same number of questions as is usually asked. This year, there are no ‘trick’ questions in the sense that in none of them have we deliberately tried to mislead you. However, some of the questions may require a bit of lateral thinking and looking beyond the…
• London Underground tops 4 million journeys in a single day (IanVisits) • First passenger trains run to City of London using digital signalling (Network Rail) • The Mont-Blanc Express from Switzerland to France (The Guardian) • How Singapore restricted cars on its island: Video (Urban Mobility Explained) • North America’s Sleeper Train Problem: Video (CBC Creator Network) • Dubai…
Tunneling is an important technology for modern civilization, as a tunnel is often the only reasonable way to create a direct path between two points. When the Hoosac tunnel was completed in 1875, it turned a difficult, 20-mile railroad route along “precipitous grades” into a direct 5 mile route, connecting Boston with the Upper Hudson Valley. Large infrastructure projects such…
Successfully Sophisticated? One of the strange things that has spread through today’s rail industry is rip-off fares for trains (sometimes buses or trams) for journeys from City to Airport. Stockholm is no different. A rlanda A irport The airport was opened by King Gustaf Adolph in 1962. Plans for an airport rail link between the central business district of Stockholm…