Edmunds.com | Inside Line | Auto Observer Your Account | Help | Directory
You are here:
![[F]](http://a332.g.akamai.net/f/332/936/12h/www.edmunds.com/media/townhall/webxicons/site.gif){kind=small}
Forums
Automotive News & Views Are automobiles a major cause of global warming?
7975 messages, Last post on Mar 18, 2010 at 9:51 AM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
|
Replying to: gagrice (Jul 08, 2008 6:36 am) |
|
|
Replying to: vchiu (Jul 09, 2008 8:00 am) I would like to go along with the high speed rail to join the cities. It just does not make any financial sense. I did a quick calculation on taking a trip from San Diego to Florida via rail. At todays fares it is about twice what it would cost for the two of us to drive our Sequoia at 15 MPG round trip. Not to mention 4 nights on a train with no shower each direction. Can high speed rail ever be self sustaining? There is talk of a high speed train from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. Why on earth would I want a penny of my tax dollars spent to help LV get more gamblers from LA? Right today I can fly cross country and rent a car for less than 20% of the cost of rail travel. I don't see it becoming feasible. We do not want the massive debt that Japan has built up with trying to do all those things you mention. They are multiple times more over extended than the USA. Then you have proposed $450 billion in R&D. It would just become more corporate welfare. WHO can you trust with that kind of money floating around? I say reward those that come up with new inventions. Don't pay some one to sit and surf the web. On going to the Moon. We were in a race with the Soviets. Today it would take a lot longer to go to the moon than it did in the 1960s. Wednesday, December 6, 2006 NASA offered a blueprint Monday for sending teams of astronauts to the moon by 2020 and building a permanent base there by 2024. An editor of NASA Watch explains the plans. GWEN IFILL: Now, let's talk money. Is there a national appetite for what it will cost? I read somewhere today $125 billion to get the first landing by 2018. KEITH COWING: Well, that's the question, isn't it? Last year, when the initial version of this was brought out, the very first question from somebody from NPR was, and we're all there waiting to ask it, was: How much will this cost? And we were told that it would be $104 billion to get one mission back there. Well, that was then; this is now. And you really can't get NASA to come up with a number. And it's not -- well, I guess it is they don't quite know what it will cost because an aspect of this architecture is that it's open-sourced. They're looking for a participation from other nations. Now, how much of this would be done by, you know, Europe, for example, or by Russia is to be determined. But NASA is looking to offer the sort of basic infrastructure, how to get people and hardware there, but they still haven't figured out exactly how they're going to do it. And therefore, they're a little shy about giving you a number, and $104 billion, $130 billion, it could be higher. Nobody quite knows. Don't hold your breath on seeing a man on the moon this Century. Too much red tape that was not around in 1960. No incentive on the part of tax payers that are struggling to buy gas for their cars. They want to do what with my tax dollars? |
|
|
Replying to: gagrice (Jul 09, 2008 9:24 am) They are developing a 1 acre sized flying ship that uses a combination of jet engines and helium to take off and land vertically so no more need for airports. Also it can land directly at warehouses, etc. to discharge cargo. Helium provides most of the lift and the engines are used to take off, land, and steer. Top speed of about 200 mph. Feel free to post a link.
|
|
|
Replying to: houdini1 (Jul 09, 2008 12:46 pm) http://www.aerosml.com/ml866/cargo.html
|
|
|
Replying to: gagrice (Jul 09, 2008 1:06 pm) |
|
|
Replying to: gagrice (Jul 09, 2008 1:06 pm) Not to rain on anyones parade, but the first time they crash 60 tons through a warehouse roof, all the regulatory agencies will come out of the wood work to close the barn's doors. (so to speak) |
|
|
Replying to: vchiu (Jul 09, 2008 8:00 am) Independent thinking people usually don't appreciate being treated as such on mass transit and trains & prefer the intimate privacy of their own vehicles. When the existing rail facilities are not self supporting why should they be expanded at non user tax payer's expense? Build more freeways, highways, & honor the automobile. |
|
|
Replying to: euphonium (Jul 09, 2008 2:02 pm) So most Europeans "don't mind being transported as human cattle" then I guess. I bet you would have a challenge if you called European mass transit users "not Independent Thinking People" to their faces. They call themselves "smart" for using mass transit. In Europe, mass transit has been nearly perfected. It's cheap. It's fast. It saves time. It saves money. It opens up the roads for truckers and business drivers who MUST travel the roads. "Appreciating the intimate privacy of your own vehicle" seems to be the American way. Almost 1/3 of the commuters in this country drive alone in their own car to work every day. Does that make it the "good for the most people" way to travel to work? ABSOLUTELY IT DOES NOT. It means that 97 million Americans are wallowing in their independence and not caring about the good of the many, just the good of their own little selfish selves. P.S. Very funny. |
|
|
Replying to: euphonium (Jul 09, 2008 2:02 pm) Some people just do not realize that in our society not everyone just drives 20 miles directly to work, sits there for 8 hours and then drives home. Many, if not most of us, actually have to be out and about while working. It is very difficult to ride a train from job site to job site or while making sales calls or calling on clients, etc. or any number of other things that some people do to make a living.
|
|
|
Replying to: houdini1 (Jul 09, 2008 2:36 pm) Where in my post was I being "ill-mannered" specifically? I never said that 100 percent of Americans who drive alone ARE ABLE to use mass transit. Many millions of them cannot do so because of other obligations. But you know as well as I do that MANY MILLIONS of them COULD use mass transit, and just choose, for mostly selfish reasons, not to do so. Speaking the truth is sometimes misidentified as being ill-mannered. |
|
You are here:
Forums
Automotive News & Views Are automobiles a major cause of global warming?
