[Denny]

I am surprised that my compnay, currently suffering financially, like many others, still has so many head office folks flying around the country. These are mostly internal, not customer visits.

So much that oculd be done with a conference call or a net meeting. They do not create an aura of austerity, the actions do not match the words.

I think the worst thing that has hit coporate expense budgets has been air travel points. Its created an incentive for all kinds of people to manufacture rationale for business fights.

[cube]

I've never ridden on a regional jet (50 seat) before. Maybe I should put that on my list of things to do sometime within a few years or I'll NEVER get a chance to do it...........if you know what I mean.

Does anyone have the breakdown of air travel types?
For example what percentage of air travel is:
1) regional
2) domestic
3) international
4) "trunk line"
My gut tells me regional probably makes up a small fraction. I assume in this case "regional" does not necessarily mean short distance, but instead small jet + short distance.

This is an important distinction. Some of the most profitable routes are the short distance but heavily traveled routes using large planes. These are called "trunk lines" and it's basically the cash cow of the airline business. It's the profitability of these trunk lines that subsidizes the losses of the other routes.

world's busiest air travel routes
Tokyo <---> Sapporo.....500 miles (measured by passengers)
Madrid <---> Barcelona.....300 miles (measure by number of flights)
Not surprisingly there are plans to build high speed rail links at these routes.

[Barbara]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('alokin', 'I')n Europe we have trains, but don't expect them to be comfy. They're expensive (at least in Germany) late and you may stand for two hours. But this is not because trains are bad it's because of the privatisation.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Barbara', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('alokin', 'I')n Europe we have trains, but don't expect them to be comfy. They're expensive (at least in Germany) late and you may stand for two hours. But this is not because trains are bad it's because of the privatisation.

[TheDude]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', 'W')here are you people getting your information from? Deutche Bahn is not privatized. Any lateness this year has been due 90% to public sector union strikes. The other 10% has been due to weather.

[TheDude]

DP - quoted myself in toto for some reason...

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', 'I') cannot think of a better railway in the world than Germany?

[MrBill]

TheDude wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')iki says they're a public limited company; that page is actually for "Aktiengesellschaft."

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '[')img]http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/ee2/4s4ufun/cartoon.jpg[/img]

[MrBill]

cube wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')s for railroads it will definitely play a larger role in the future:
I think the coming economical difficulties will do more to take cars off the road and promote public transit then all the campaigning that environmentalists have ever done.

[dorlomin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '
')I am not convinced this is the best solution? It has not worked well in the UK so far. But like many privatizations they are half-hearted affairs, so the commercial logic usually gets buried under political interference. Then when it does not work optimally the privatization process is blamed. Of course, the reason governments privatize in the first place is usually that they do not have the ability to raise taxes to cover the necessary capital spending and upgrades and/or cannot afford to continue to subsidize ongoing operating losses.

[MrBill]

Nothing discredits the privatization process more than privatization done poorly! I was in London last week. The congestion just keeps getting worse. Terminal 5 is a joke in many ways. Every other BAA employee is telling you where to queue with too few actually helping you check-in and get through security. But nice shopping malls. I know that is why I fly? I feel for you! ; - ))

[bodigami]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '(')...)
The environmentalists arrested off the coast of Canada this spring during the harp and hooded seal hunt used photos of hunters clubbing seal pups. Something that has been outlawed since 1987. Old footage because it is more graphic and commands more public sympathy, but nothing to do with reality.

[yeahbut]

Frustrated by the lack of trains in your area? Just get yourself an old sailboat and slap some wheels on her...

"It was a belligerent April Sabbath above the 47th parallel, and we were braced against the gunwales of the sloop Molly B., scanning the livid western sky, waiting for all hell to break loose. Finally, of course, it did. It always does in this part of the world. When the squall hit us upside the starboard bow the boat heaved, the jib snapped, the mainsail swelled, the mast shuddered, and off we went on the ride of our lives.

By the time I could grab a pair of goggles to keep the rain out of my eyes we were pushing five knots. At ten knots Kitty, my wife, tied herself to a cleat. At 15 knots the jib wrenched from its stay and flapped around like abandoned laundry. At 20 knots the wind suddenly pulsed and the boom lashed about, knocking my prized Tokyo Fighter baseball cap off my head and over the stern. I started to lunge for it, but pulled back. There was a more pressing matter 300 yards aft. Bearing down hard on us, retching diesel smoke like some Third World iron works, loaded to the tippy top with pine chips and logs, was a 15-car freight train.
Bummer.

This is clearly the chief danger of sailing on railroad tracks. And for some veteran rail dogs like my co-captain, an attorney we called Loophole, it was also the chief thrill. I yanked on his slicker for attention and shook my arm at the problem. To my profound alarm, he laughed. “I can beat this sucker!’ he screeched like a park bench lunatic. I wrestled him for the mainsheet, but insanity made him stronger. “Think about it!” he shouted. “In two miles we’ll be at the spur and home free. We stop now, we’re cream cheese.” "

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('zensui', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '(')...)
The environmentalists arrested off the coast of Canada this spring during the harp and hooded seal hunt used photos of hunters clubbing seal pups. Something that has been outlawed since 1987. Old footage because it is more graphic and commands more public sympathy, but nothing to do with reality.

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('yeahbut', 'F')rustrated by the lack of trains in your area? Just get yourself an old sailboat and slap some wheels on her...

[Gerben]

We still have a good network of canals in place in the Netherlands. Most of the cargo boats use diesel atm though. It would be cheaper than road transport but takes a while longer.

[nemo]

Canal boats are crazy efficient. I'd think that solar powered canal boats are well within the realm of what's possible. Historically, huge loads were moved on canals with just a horsepower or two. A couple of kilowatts of power is all you'd need really, even if it won't be fast.

As for turboprops and efficient aircraft, I suspect that some significant gains could be made for a slight trade-off in safety. Inflatable escape slides and oxygen masks that drop from the ceilings make us feel safer, but in reality I suspect their usefulness is rather limited - how many lives have those oxygen masks saved in total,in all airplanes, throughout the history of aviation? How much do these systems weigh, and how much extra fuel is burned to carry them around at 850kmh? There are other weight cuts to be made too in heavy multi-redundant systems and so forth. Who knows, people may just be willing to risk a 30% higher lethality rate (still really really safe after all) for a significantly cheaper ticket?

[MrBill]

I would put my money on railways, ports, canals, riverways and other 19th century means of bulk transport making a significant comeback. We can start by dredging canals and ports plus rebuilding our railbeds. As you say maybe some solar, some back-up coal to liquids, some wind power enhancements may be possible? Perhaps in some limited applications. It is a trade-off in terms of just in time versus bulk hub and spoke transport and distribution, but it is more energy efficient at the expense of larger inventories and more storage. That plus a migration of labor to sources of renewable power where manufacturing can be located versus shipping power to where it is needed and where people live now. That means a lot of stranded infrastructure. Wasting assets. Some winners and a lot of losers.

Physical Reality > Economic Consequences > Social Reaction > Political Response > Feedback Loop > New Reality > Etc.