zxcvzcxv wrote:
There are a lot of innovations in trains that could make them an even better solution economically and environmentally after COVID, because you don't just want to replace gas cars with electric cars but also have mass commuter options that are green. If you have trains that don't have to stop to pick up and drop off passengers, they would be enormously more efficient. So, you get individual train cars that either accelerate on their own (much, much less mass, and hence, much, much less energy required) or are brought gradually up to speed and connected to the trains, sort of like the lift chairs on ski lifts now have a line that goes swiftly up and down the mountain and a separate line that moves slowly for people to get on the chairs and then be shifted safely onto the fast moving chain. As the whole train moves at a constant speed, you use very little energy (you turn the train around seamlessly by having it go around in a loop), and you just have to accelerate one small car at a time, which joins onto the main train and doors open to let you in or out. When you want to get off the train, you go to join the sidecar and it releases to the station, using no energy but regenerative braking or even going up a small incline to store energy for it to accelerate to join a train the next time passengers are at the station. With frequent or much longer trains, you also radically reduce time waiting.
Imagine a future with fast charging electric cars with extremely advanced and capable autonomous driving systems.
You charge your car at home in minutes, or at the 'gas' stations which have been updated to support the infrastructure.
You drive to a motorway (highway) junction and the car tells you you must engage autonomous driving mode. The car rapidly accelerates up to speed.
From there you join nose to bumper traffic, effectively a train, which is moving efficiently at 120mph. All the cars know where all the other cars are for miles around due to how they communicate with eachother.
You then leave at your junction and can retake control should you want.