A good friend of mine just lost her uncle to COVID. First person in our circle we know that has died from it. Odds are there will be many more, but this first one hits hard.
Plus the net gain on lives saved by less driving accidents. It was odd going from deserted highways for the lockdown to the first week of full opening. Saw 3 major highway crashes the first week or so back. It was odd to see something again that used to be so common but was nonexistent in lockdown.
I've been on an anti-car crusade for years. I can't wait until we've got awesome mass transit, pedestrian plazas, and self-driving electric cars in all our cities. Fuck driving.
It's more of a climate goal than a transit goal, but we need to electrify our rail system. Electric locomotives are simpler, cheaper, easier to maintain, and have a better power to weight ratio. The only reason we don't use them extensively is because (outside of a few exceptions) our rail lines aren't electrified, so you need a diesel locomotive for most trips.
Electricity is the key because we can generate it several ways, and we can get better at generating it over time. Theres only a few ways to get gasoline, diesel, etc and adding more isnt a great idea.
I still maintain that nuclear is a great way to get efficient power. The only problem is that when it goes bad, it goes very bad. Also, storing spent rods is becoming more of a problem with limited places the bury then. Solar farms would be excellent and there is plenty of open space in this country to put them.
Lol a Disney World fantasy. I’ll let you city dwellers deal with the reprobates slashing each other over mask and amber lamps.
The real challenge with nuclear is the cost. They take years to build and the $/kwhr isn't competitive with fossil fuels, and isn't even really competitive with solar anymore. If they're used for something other than baseload, the cost profile gets even worse. It's possible we can turn that around with further developments, but we'll see.
Cities have already embraced uber/lyft; it won't be hard to expand that when the cars drive themselves and the cost goes down even further.
Ahh that makes more sense. Thought you meant bullet trains and hyper loops. Individual cars electric and driverless is definitely something to work towards. I lived in the city for school and only used public busing for drinking purposes. Other than that it was a whole lot of hassle to get from a to b.
Our city just spent countless dollars on an elevated bus lane to take people by bus to a place in town where people don’t ever take the bus.
I'm hoping for a combination of things. Expanded light rail to form the backbone and move a lot of people at once, and then a self driving car network to handle last mile type trips and free up space currently used for parking. That freed up space (and the nature of self driving cars) will alleviate traffic and we can convert some existing space to pedestrian parks and plazas where people can just be dropped off at the edge of by a self driving car instead of trawling for parking.
So... this is happening... "The White House is blocking US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield and other officials from the agency from testifying before a House Education and Labor Committee hearing on reopening schools next week, just as the debate over sending children back to classrooms has flared up across the US." https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/17/politics/white-house-cdc-house-testimony-schools/index.html Their rationale is pretty special... ""Dr. Redfield has testified on the Hill at least four times over the last three months. We need our doctors focused on the pandemic response," a White House official said, confirming the decision to block the CDC's participation in the hearing."
So...I tested positive. I had a feeling like the most God awful hangover I had back when I was young and drinking whiskey. One of those "I want to die" hangovers. It lasted 3 days. It didn't quite knock me off my feet, but dear God I just wanted to lay down in a grave and be left alone. I had no fever or cough, but I had the sore throat, headache (I've never had a headache in my life before this), chest pain and muscle pain. And I was confused...like WTF? about everything confused. The next 10 days or so the symptoms slowly dissipated. I haven't had any symptoms in over a week now. I guess I'm one of the ones that had "Mild" symptoms. "Mild" being a comparative term apparently. For three days I just wanted to die. It was not a pleasant experience.
That sucks, man. I'd like to know what advice and guidelines you are getting from medical professionals, post-covid. Did they tell you to continue wearing a mask or, since you should have some antibodies, say you can relax your precautions? I had the same symptoms for three days at the same time my wife had a fever for six days. But that was when testing was non-existent in our area, so we couldn't get tested. Enjoy your antibodies, and hopefully you never have to worry about it again.
So... you want to go back to school? Turns out that kids 10-19 spread COVID at the highest rate of all age groups. Even better than adults. Yay. https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/10/20-1315_article