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Re: Newton commuter rail Where does having usable Newton platforms on both sides fit in the priority list relative to the Worcester Union Station second platform?

Apparently the Neoplan Jumbocruiser was an articulated double decker bus.

CATL is not going to be able to produce enough batteries to reduce the demand for Panasonic's batteries; there's plenty of unmet demand for all the batteries both can manufacture. And you don't need ``base load generation''. Wind + solar + natural gas peaking turbines work just fine, though of...

The Model 3 is currently the highest production quantity EV of any manufacturer at this point according to the link I posted above. And they're in the middle of ramping up production and working through the bugs, which was expected. It's pretty unlikely that Tesla will go out of business at...

If you were actually focused on reducing costs you'd be looking a lot more carefully at whether batteries would be cheaper than overhead wires. Clearly we should electrify both buses and commuter rail, but I think the VW money should be allocated to whichever mode will provide more cost...

Do you have data on how effectively an investment in electric buses vs electric commuter rail will reduce cases of asthma? I've seen comments expressing concern about freeway pollution in Somerville near I-93, and I'm wondering how effectively asthma can be reduced by assigning electric buses...

https://pedestrianobservations.com/2018/02/27/boston-regional-rail/ says the electricity cost for Boston to Providence for a 320 ton train is expected to be $180 at $.15/kWh, or about 1.2 MWh per one way trip. Tesla batteries seem to be about 1000 pounds per 100 kWh, or roughly 200 kWh per ton...

You're right that batteries that require two hours of charging for every hour of running aren't worth using. But the 1966 Electrovair II wasn't exactly a success either; is the Electrovair proof that the Tesla Model S can't go 200 miles on a charge? The Tesla Supercharger technology that's...

And again, if the argument you're making had any validity, the T wouldn't be actually getting Type 9 Green Line cars with completely custom trucks.

I'm curious what promises you think Tesla doesn't deliver on. The big stationary battery in Australia? automobile deliveries? I've also been suggesting that the MBTA should work with an existing railroad truck manufacturer to place an order, not build these things in house. First of all...

What exact number of kW or kWh are you claiming that trains need that you believe batteries cannot supply?

We could probably have 10 times the wind and solar generation we do now in New England without any significant battery deployment, and it's likely that a year from now Tesla will be producing battery packs a lot faster than they have been in the last several months (apparently there was a new...

I think I've been reading that LIDAR has traditionally been around $50,000 per vehicle. That's approximately free for a Green Line train car that costs millions of dollars, and probably less than the cost of a full time employee for one or a few years, but not affordable for a typical Nissan...

I think the Type 10 cars should be designed with the assumption that they might have a human operator in the beginning who might become unnecessary at some point during their life. The partition between the operator cab and the rest of the car should probably be installed with something like a...

I think investing in overhead power for commuter rail is a wasteful dead end which will probably turn out to be 5x to 10x more expensive than adapting Tesla Semi batteries to commuter rail. If we can spend $75 million on electrifying transit, battery powered buses from Proterra or BYD or New...

MBTA 73 / 71 bus improvement bike lanes Page 5 of http://www.cambridgema.gov/CDD/Projects/Transportation/~/media/5FFF6527D5AB4DF8A95C7CA7D7074EFF.ashx seems to be proposing that just west of Norumbega St, they seem to think that Belmont St should end up with 9.5' west facing parking lane 6'...

Extra tall double decker 60' articulated buses for route 28 extended to Malden Seattle has some double decker buses. Unfortunately, those buses apparently have somewhat limited interior headroom. That's presumably a result of trying to keep the height within the typical 13.5' to 14' limit of...

Re: Green Line proposed platform length I think the MBTA's proposed design actually requires a 209.8' platform if the operator can consistently line up the front of the front door with the front of the platform and the ends of the train that don't have doors are allowed to go beyond the end of...

Re: Green Line Type 10 door width Page 35 of the capacity PDF has detailed dimensions of the proposed cars. The second and sixth segment are each 4326 mm long, which is a bit more than 14'; I don't see any clear obvious reason why they couldn't have 64" doorways if that would match what the...

Re: Heath St / Hyde Sq Now that you've pointed that out, I can see that the Google Maps satellite view with the Transit option turned on shows pretty much that line, which would explain where that line comes from and why it wouldn't make much sense for them to be talking about 225' platforms...