On the Nature of Things | Forum

Colonel Sun wrote: ↑Fri Feb 14, 2020 4:15 am

noddy wrote: ↑Thu Feb 13, 2020 3:36 am that would be the first monorail Ive heard of which is more than just a white elephant.

in nearly all cases they are just a very expensive and clumsy way of doing a bus route.

Well, it's in active use.

The Osaka Monorail connects with most of the major train lines and one of the subway lines.
There is a proposal to add four more stations.
My only complaint is that the train connections are at minor stations, only serviced by the local milk-run trains, not the express trains.

In Tokyo, there is the Tokyo Monorail, built for the Tokyo 1964 Olympics, which runs from Haneda International Airport to downtown connecting with the Yamanote [Green] line which does a loop around Tokyo. Apparently, there is a proposal to extend the monorail to central Tokyo Station, the original plan.

As you may recall, monorails were a huge fad solution to public transport during part of the 20th century. However, they never, er, took off.

noddy wrote: ↑Mon Feb 17, 2020 2:38 am

Colonel Sun wrote: ↑Fri Feb 14, 2020 4:15 am

noddy wrote: ↑Thu Feb 13, 2020 3:36 am that would be the first monorail Ive heard of which is more than just a white elephant.

in nearly all cases they are just a very expensive and clumsy way of doing a bus route.

Well, it's in active use.

The Osaka Monorail connects with most of the major train lines and one of the subway lines.
There is a proposal to add four more stations.
My only complaint is that the train connections are at minor stations, only serviced by the local milk-run trains, not the express trains.

In Tokyo, there is the Tokyo Monorail, built for the Tokyo 1964 Olympics, which runs from Haneda International Airport to downtown connecting with the Yamanote [Green] line which does a loop around Tokyo. Apparently, there is a proposal to extend the monorail to central Tokyo Station, the original plan.

As you may recall, monorails were a huge fad solution to public transport during part of the 20th century. However, they never, er, took off.

It would take Japanese or Chinese levels of density to justify all that effort to put them up in the air and it seems that is the current status quo for them.

Project Gutenberg's

Innocent At Large, by Poul Anderson and Karen Anderson

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license

Title: Innocent At Large

Author: Poul Anderson and Karen Anderson

Release Date: April 3, 2016 [EBook #51650]

The book's description of the technology of 1960 was in some ways remarkably close to actual 1960s technology. The book described in detail advances such as cars powered by internal combustion engines ("gas-cabs") together with the necessary supporting infrastructure such as gas stations and paved asphalt roads, elevated and underground passenger train systems and high-speed trains powered by magnetism and compressed air, skyscrapers, electric lights that illuminate entire cities at night, fax machines ("picture-telegraphs"), elevators, primitive computers which can send messages to each other as part of a network somewhat resembling the Internet (described as sophisticated electrically powered mechanical calculators which can send information to each other across vast distances), the utilization of wind power, automated security systems, the electric chair, and remotely-controlled weapons systems, as well as weapons destructive enough to make war unthinkable.

The book also predicts the growth of suburbs and mass-produced higher education (the opening scene has Dufrénoy attending a mass graduation of 250,000 students), department stores, and massive hotels. A version of feminism has also arisen in society, with women moving into the workplace and a rise in illegitimate births. It also makes accurate predictions of 20th-century music, predicting the rise of electronic music, and describes a musical instrument similar to a synthesizer, and the replacement of classical music performances with a recorded music industry. It predicts that the entertainment industry would be dominated by lewd stage plays, often involving nudity and sexually explicit scenes.

Nonc Hilaire wrote: ↑Sun Aug 30, 2020 11:27 pm 4gzBhTL4oAs

noddy wrote: ↑Sat Oct 10, 2020 1:01 am JtBwk0Z9oLM

Nonc Hilaire wrote: ↑Sat Oct 10, 2020 7:58 pm

noddy wrote: ↑Sat Oct 10, 2020 1:01 am JtBwk0Z9oLM

I suspect editing. Incomplete with none of the lame jokes these newsreels usually had.

Some of the products featured in the book have since become iconic, such as the Nevalyaskha roly-poly dolls that righted themselves to an upright position. Others remained as prototypes, such as the Belka A50 compact car, which had a stub-nosed front and a bubble-shaped roof. And some have enjoyed a second life in post-USSR Russia: cosplayers have been known to use the top half of a Saturnas vacuum cleaner as medieval helmets. Atlas Obscura has a selection of images from the book.