$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('shortonoil', '[')
Over the next 5 years the US GDP will fall by 28% (Available Energy) and we are headed into the worse depression in probably the last 1000 years. It will take us at least 40 years to get out of it. You are still thinking like a 2005 Oil Age man; but in reality, the Age of Oil is rapidly coming to an end!
PeakOil is You
Streetcars - the true end of suburbia begins
Re: Streetcars - the true end of suburbia begins
by vtsnowedin » Sun 31 Aug 2008, 18:20:23
Before the age of oils start in1859 there were houses and there was GDP. GDP and the the oil supply are not welded together though they have danced promiscuously for a century. When oil leaves the stage we will go on to another partner but with a lot of tears of regret.
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Re: The true end of suburbia begins
by ReverseEngineer » Sun 31 Aug 2008, 18:21:54
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', '
')Every debate about the future seems to always devolve into zombie hordes.
')Every debate about the future seems to always devolve into zombie hordes.
Don't you drop this Tag Line on the end of all your posts:
"Peak oil is sort of like a mental Everlasting Gobstopper, except it tastes like ass and you can't get it out of your mouth."
The Zombies ARE the Gobstopper! That's where every analysis ends up. Discussing whether people will own homes or rent when the fundamental underpinning of the economic system is coming apart is an exercise in futility.
At one time not so long ago, Real Estate was seen as the "safe" investment, shunned by cowboys playing the market for bigger returns in equities. For the typical American Joe, his house was his repository of wealth, if something really bad came up you could always take out a mortgage, or even outright sell the house. Not anymore.
As we now have found out, the assumptions on how we built our houses and where we bult them were fundamentally wrong, based on cheap transportation. All those houses are close to worthless now, even the ones that still have folks living in them because they got nowhere else to go.
Are the city properties worth something? Well, I personally would neither want to own a city condo or rent one as we spin our way down the toilet here. I have a real tough time getting out of my head the images of Buenos Aires that FerFal paints in his Blog. New York, Chicago, Los Angeles will be Buenos Aires on Steroids.
Out here in the boonies of Alaska, there are just a ton of houses up for sale and on the auction block, and nobody is buying. Why? Because the prices they are asking are based on old values that don't hold up anymore, and why would you buy a house for $200K today when chances are better than even its not going to be worth $100K next year? I didn't buy any property up here, I rent. Long as the economic system stands up, I can pay it. When the system goes toast, there just is no way owners of the properties are going to be able to collect rents on them or pay takes on them either. So like everyone else around here, I can just pick a property to squat on. Or more likely several friends and I all take up residence in one of the houses they currently own, to better protect it and more efficiently heat it with our own warm bodies filling up the space better.
Eventually some type of economic system will be reborn, but the intervening period is the Zero Point, its chaos. It will last a good while. I would not be investing in real estate right now. Invest in Food, invest in Guns, you will get a better return there.
Reverse Engineer
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Re: The true end of suburbia begins
by mos6507 » Sun 31 Aug 2008, 20:46:50
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('cube', '
')Excuse me if I do not also share your optimism.
')Excuse me if I do not also share your optimism.
I'm not really that optimistic. But I need something to hope for. I'm setting the bar a little higher than capsule hotels.
- mos6507
Re: The true end of suburbia begins
by cube » Mon 01 Sep 2008, 05:54:35
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('cube', 'E')xcuse me if I do not also share your optimism.
I'm not really that optimistic. But I need something to hope for. I'm setting the bar a little higher than capsule hotels.
I once said it requires a population density of 25,000 / sq mi to justify a light rail line.
I think 20,000 / sq mi will suffice.
Imagine a square that is (1 mile by 1 mile) with a train station in the middle.
The average person will take 10min to walk half a mile so that means there's 20,000 people within walking distance to this train station.
Of course not everybody within walking distance will take the train but once bus feeder routes are added in, I think it's a safe bet this train station will service 20,000 passengers.
A 10 mile system with 10 stations would carry
10 X 20,000 == 200,000 passengers / day
or 20,000 passengers / route mile
//
passengers / route mile gives a good indication of how "busy" a system is.
The metro in Mexico city = 40,000
New York City subway (infamous for being crowded by American standards) = 10,000
why such a disparity?
I think it's a matter of simple economics.
Mexicans are much poorer that's why it takes 40,000 paying passengers to justify laying down a single mile of railroad track where as in America 10,000 will suffice.
//
The idiots over at www.lightrailnow.org
will throw their support for just about any LRV project.
Even for numbers below 2,000
I'm not saying we're going to end up like Mexico City post peak but in an economically contracting world you can bet half the transportation projects that were given the green light today NEVER would of seen the light of day in an economically diminished world.
Not to get off topic but I'm certain we'll never see a project like "The big dig" in Boston ever again.
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