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Penn Station is much more than a transportation center. As the heart of the Northeast Corridor rail system, it has the potential to link downtown to downtown along the Eastern Seaboard in a way far more economical, expedient and environmentally sustainable than air travel.
But while the governor’s recently announced plan is a step toward this goal, more must be done. What we propose in addition is a completely new commuter station on the site of Madison Square Garden
— nytimes.com
The proposed plan for Penn Station's redesign comes by way of Vishaan Chakrabarti, founder of the Practice for Architecture and Urbanism. Previously, Chakrabarti was the director of Manhattan's Department of City Planning under former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, where he also... View full entry
Airbus appears to be serious about its "Vahana" project, aimed at creating an autonomous passenger drone network, and thinks testing can begin as early as 2017. [...]
Airbus is also working on a drone delivery service [...] and plans to start testing it at a Singapore university by mid-2017. The cargo-laden vehicles fly automated routes in "aerial corridors," then drop them off and send delivery notifications to customers.
— Engadget
Airbus engineers are dreaming up no small endeavor as laid out in the company's Future of Urban Mobility vision: "Imagine landing at a major international airport after a long flight in an A380. Instead of suffering through a 90-minute taxi ride in the megacity’s gridlocked traffic, you hop into... View full entry
Starting later this month, Uber will allow customers in downtown Pittsburgh to summon self-driving cars from their phones, crossing an important milestone that no automotive or technology company has yet achieved. Google, widely regarded as the leader in the field, has been testing its fleet for several years, and Tesla Motors offers Autopilot [...] But none of these companies has yet brought a self-driving car-sharing service to market. — Bloomberg
Related stories recently in the Archinect news:Google, Uber, Lyft, Ford and Volvo join forces to lobby for autonomous vehiclesA look at the history and future of the American commuteNew study finds ride-sharing apps like Lyft and Uber have no effect on drunk-driving fatalities View full entry
“In The Unlikely Event” by artist Janet Abrams digs into the nature of the fantastical International Airport typology — “a significant species of monumental urbanism, perhaps the archetypal City State of our time”...Created in 2013...ITUE is an ambitious large-scale ceramic installation that showcases the Top 30 of the world's busiest international airports as terra cotta ceramic bas-reliefs, which Abrams molded individually by hand. — Bustler
Arranged like ancient fossils at a natural history museum, In The Unlikely Event (ITUE) is part two of Abrams' ongoing "A Natural History of Technology" case study series. In ITUE, each airport stands as a physical architectural expression of its home country's ambitions to compete in the... View full entry
Today the highway serves as the main artery connecting the “Last Frontier” with Canada and the northwestern U.S., bringing tourists to Alaska cruise ships; food, supplies and medicine to remote towns; and equipment to oil fields and mines that are the region’s lifeblood...
“Communities are unable to reach each other, it’s harder to get goods there,” [...] Thawing permafrost isn’t “just an inconvenience, folks; it’s a change in the way of life.”
— Bloomberg
More on Archinect:Global warming is redrawing national bordersRussia considering plans for a 12,400-mile superhighway linking London and AlaskaObama changes the name of tallest mountain from Mt McKinley to DenaliWhy American infrastructure funding keeps facing such an uphill battle View full entry
Just months after its spectacular design was unveiled, the Transit Explore Bus had its inaugural run this week on 300 metres of specially constructed test track in Qinhuangdao [...]
The vehicle, which goes up to 60km/h (37mph), runs on tracks with passenger spaces standing two metres above the road so that two lanes of cars can pass undisturbed underneath, helping to alleviate the notorious traffic jams of China’s biggest cities.
— theguardian.com
More transportation News on Archinect:China plans to build an underwater "space station" in the South China SeaTake a look at the rapid urbanization of China's Pearl River Delta'Jet-like' maglev pods are coming to Abu Dhabi's Yas IslandBjarke Ingels Group + AECOM join forces with HyperloopAerial... View full entry
On issues related to the funding, mass transit, biking, and the environment, the two parties have staked out dramatically different views about how they envision the future of the nation’s transportation system.
Democrats are proposing an expansive increase in federal support for transportation investment, with a focus on building access to opportunity, bolstering access to non-automobile modes, reducing the impacts of climate change, and maintaining the role of unions.
— The Transport Politic
Republicans, on the other hand, propose no increase in federal spending (though Mr. Trump may disagree), an elimination of the federal role in funding non-automotive transportation, an emphasis on pollution-spewing modes and energy sources, and a reduction in the role of unions.For more on the... View full entry
skyTran’s computer-controlled, 2-person “jet-like” vehicles employ magnetic levitation technology instead of wheels.
The patented high-speed, low-cost, elevated PRT system built at the NASA Ames Research Centre, will have cars zipping above traffic along magnetic lines from one destination to another across the island, a statement said.
— designmena.com
More transportation news on Archinect:Hyperloop hopefuls turn to 'passive' maglev technologyWould self-driving cars be useful to people living outside urban cores?Aerial cable cars proposed for ChicagoWorld's first fully autonomous taxi service will arrive in Singapore later this yearWomen-only... View full entry
The government of Russia has announced a desire to build a 70km Hyperloop line on its Pacific Coast to link the port of Zarubino with China’s Jilin province, but wants China to help fund it. The link would be part of Russia’s plan to develop a series of transport corridors between its Primorye region and northeast China...The project’s cost has been estimated at about $500m...the ministry would try to interest China in co-financing the link as part of its Silk Road grand strategy. — Global Construction Review
More on Archinect:'Hyperloop as transportation’s new girlfriend: mysterious, unencumbered, exciting, expensive.'Bjarke Ingels Group + AECOM join forces with HyperloopHyperloop hopefuls turn to 'passive' maglev technologyMIT and TU Delft emerge victorious at Hyperloop competition; Elon Musk drops... View full entry
So a lot of us own or lease cars...But when the talk turns to autonomous cars – and it always does – I sigh. Our overcrowded highways really could use a break from human stupidity, and that human factor is behind nearly all of the fatalities and injuries and property damage we see strewn across our roads every day. Get rid of the human behaviour to save the human body! This is where autonomous cars make sense; but not all the world is a crowded, urban highway. — driving.ca
More on Archinect:What are the ethics of self-driving cars?A look at the history and future of the American commuteGoogle, Uber, Lyft, Ford and Volvo join forces to lobby for autonomous vehicles View full entry
The pilot program is limited to about 25,000 employees of companies including Walmart and Adobe Systems... Waze will match riders with drivers already heading along similar routes during the morning and evening rush hours. [...]
Waze Carpool is charging riders just $0.54 a mile, which is also what the IRS recommends companies reimburse their employees per mile for business-related travel. “Waze Carpool focuses on covering costs, not generating an income,” the company explains.
— qz.com
Google purchased Waze, the Israeli GPS-based navigation system with real-time travel details submitted by users, in 2013 for $1.15B. With a fleet of already operating autonomous vehicles, Google stands to leverage its Waze transit data in big ways for an autonomous taxi service that could hit... View full entry
“What we’re seeing right now is what I saw in 1996,” said Mr. Lloyd, a former president of sales and development at Cisco. “We all had I.P. routers and everything was done a certain way. At Cisco, we said, ‘You can carry that over the Internet,’ and everyone said, ‘No.’ But those high-speed networks made the Internet possible.” Hyperloop, he said, “will do to the physical world what the Internet did to the digital one.” — Allison Arieff – nytimes.com
Allison Arieff (editorial director at SPUR and former Dry Futures judge) has some questions for Hyperloop One (formerly Hyperloop Technologies) after a propulsion test demonstration in the Nevada desert. While the company has managed remarkably fast developments in its tube technology for such... View full entry
Deutsche Bahn, a German-based railway and logistics company that transports about seven million train passengers every day ... plans to operate fleets of autonomous vehicles that could be ordered via an app, much people already do when they order a ride-hailing service like Uber. These driverless cars would be used to pick people up and bring them to public transit stations, solving the so-called “last mile” problem. — fortune.com
More news on automated vehicles and public transit:Google, Uber, Lyft, Ford and Volvo join forces to lobby for autonomous vehicles"In LiDAR We Trust" – Poking the subconscious of autonomous vehicles with special guest Geoff Manaugh, on Archinect Sessions #43Beverly Hills wants to provide... View full entry
Not content to merely redefine skyscrapers, football stadiums, and the agency of the architect, Bjarke Ingels Group is now leaping into the realm of transportation, joining up with Hyperloop to "transform the future of public infrastructure." Bjarke explained it thusly: "Traditionally, the work... View full entry
"Utilizing a passive levitation system will eliminate the need for power stations along the Hyperloop track, which makes this system the most suitable for the application and will keep construction costs low," [...]
"From a safety aspect, the system has huge advantages, levitation occurs purely through movement, therefore if any type of power failure occurs, Hyperloop pods would continue to levitate and only after reaching minimal speeds touch the ground."
— theverge.com
Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (not to be confused with Hyperloop Technologies Inc., a peer company also hoping to realize Elon Musk's hyperloop vision) published a statement yesterday announcing the company had licensed "passive magnetic levitation" technology to power their Hyperloop... View full entry