Bump-Canceling Bunk Beds Promise Smooth Bus Rides | Hacker News Reader

Bump-Canceling Bunk Beds Promise Smooth Bus Rides

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99 pointsOsiris3086 comments

I took a sleeper bus on a 24-hour journey in China years ago, slept very comfortably, and wondered why this had not caught on in other parts of the world. Someone suggested that it was a regulatory thing: in road transportation, passengers are obliged to keep their seat belts on (or at least passengers must be in conventional seats with seat belts there for the use). I am surprised to hear that a company in the USA thinks this is a good business direction.

> in road transportation, passengers are obliged to keep their seat belts on (or at least passengers must be in conventional seats with seat belts there for the use)

I don't think this is universally true: most city busses I've taken don't have city belts. Additionally, many of the seats are perpendicular to the direction of travel.

Yeah, many like taxis, emergency vehicles, buses and trucks weighing 18,000 pounds or more are exempt from seat belt and child restraint laws in the USA

Can you clarify? I believe taxis must have seatbelts just not car seats.

Edit:

But yes, tour buses with sleeps are used all the time in the US.

Lying down in buses is illegal in Germany.

I went coast to coast on a lie down bus in the US about 30 years ago, similar to the first one pictured here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Tortoise

Not over comfortable but was quite a fun way to travel.

Bizarre reactions here. Cabin has $3m of funding. People are suggesting trains and fixing the entire road system across the entire trip? Not even meaningful alternatives. Here's mine, in the same vein: Just make personal helicopter transport that's quiet and safe and fully automatic.

Seriously comical. I really like Cabin's approach to the problem.

I think you will find that those absurd people live outside of the United States, generally in a country where road conditions are far better — but still without quiet helicopters.

I have experienced Cabin's bump cancelling technology on a prototype on 101. We drove ~4 miles without it turned on, and then the same 4 mile stretch with it activated. Even having seen the data beforehand, I was impressed.

I had a very comfortable bus ride from Krakow to Warsaw for 7 euros a few years back. Each seat was able to lean back really far and still you weren't bother your rear neighbor. Each seat also had their own iPad-like-device with games, movies, music and internet.

Now Poland does not have many highways that are of good quality. But the ones we drove were good enough to sleep on. Also the toll for cars is really low (I believe 3 euros).

I'm willing to pay an extra to be able to lay down flat down but I really do wonder what surplus is added due to the stabilizing tech. I believe it's only applicable in a country such as the USA, where the roads are poor and the wages are relatively high. Still a large enough market to make it work though.

> only applicable in a country such as the USA, where the roads are poor

Not sure about this. I've traveled all over the USA, and the highways are uniformly excellent.

Local city streets however are a mixed bag, especially in the north, where harsh winters create conditions for potholes to form.

We did a journey in Mexico where the first class buses go on the good highway and have extreme air conditioning and lie back seats. The second class buses go on the bad roads and use schoolbuses with no AC. But the second class buses made the trip in half the time of the first class, because they could go over the mountain instead of around it. Fascinating choices.

I really want sleeper buses in Europe like there are sleeper trains.

Overnight busses are great for traveling if you're in another country. You can pay for the transportation to get to your new destination, and save a night on lodging cost at the same time by getting to sleep. I took an overnight bus from Venice to Paris and it was a great way to travel: no transfers, didn't need to pay for a hotel that night, and got to see some parts of the countryside I otherwise wouldn't have.

There are also overnight trains from venice to paris operated by Thello.com. For other destinations check out Nightjet and Euronight.

> If riders can't get a good snooze in, they're way less willing to pay $178 to $228 per round-trip. (A savvy flier who buys their ticket at the right time can usually snag a trip between SFO and LAX for about $115).

Can someone explain why you'd pay more for an 8h bus ride than a 1h flight?

It's in the article > "Cabin’s idea is that people would rather spend eight hours asleep while traveling than four hours getting to and from an airport and in a cramped seat in the air."

Most people do not have upgrades or priority access and have to spend a lot of time dealing with checkin, security, luggage and general uncomfort which makes small trips much longer than just flight time.

Also many travelers arrive the day before an event to get a hotel and sleep, so perhaps this extra time and cost can be avoided with the bus.

A 1h flight takes a lot longer than 1h. To do some math:

8am flight:

  4a: Wake up, complete packing.
  5a: Travel to airport
  6a: Check-in
  7a: Security (take off shoes)
  8a: Takeoff, if not delayed
  9a: Landing
  10a: Checkout complete?

10pm bus:

  9p: Travel to bus
  10p: Bus departs
  2a: Bus layover for driver lunch (assuming 1 driver)
  3a: Bus departs layover
  7a: Bus arrives
  7:15a: Checkout complete.

This assumes 1 hour to travel to either bus depot or airport, and that the bus is traveling overnight on empty highways for almost all of the trip. I've never flown so please update any inaccuracies with that time table.

> Also many travelers arrive the day before an event to get a hotel and sleep, so perhaps this time and cost can be avoided with the bus.

There's a large value in starting your day in the same city where you're working or otherwise spending a lot of time. From not having to spend the time and effort on traveling, to the relaxation of not having to "scene-change" and adjust to the behaviors of people in two different cities. And this package lets the right traveler have both for cheaper.

>>> If riders can't get a good snooze in, they're way less willing to pay $178 to $228 per round-trip. (A savvy flier who buys their ticket at the right time can usually snag a trip between SFO and LAX for about $115).

This basically combines the bus into both transportation and lodging. For an example, let's use a $250 hotel room. This assumes you'll fly in the day before a 2-day event and fly out the day after, or bus in on the first day and bus out the following night:

1h flight & 3 nights:

  Flight: $115
  Room: $250 x 3 = $750
  Total: $865

8h bus & 1 night:

  Bus: $230
  Room: $250
  Total: $480

Even if the bus costs twice the plane, it could still save money over the hotel.

These are some suspect numbers. An hour to "finish packing in the morning", why not do that before you wake up? An hour to check in? I've flown hundreds of times and think this has taken 30 minutes once or twice. An hour for security? Last few times I went, it was less than 15, even without TSA Pre.

I mean, sure, if we inflate the numbers badly on one side, that side starts looking worse, but what is the point?

Agreed but part of the problem with flying is the expected vs actual. Airlines suggest you arrive 2 hours before your flight because if everything goes badly it can take that long to get to your gate, but when it all works well you end up sitting for an hour and a half at that gate.

That said, this is a bay area service and SFO security lines are much worse than say San Jose (SJC) security lines simply because there are more flights out of SFO. If you're regular airport is SJC you might regularly only get to the airport an hour before your flight leaves.

I think if you ignore the specifics, and just change it to “6am - arrive at airport 2 hrs before flight”, it’s pretty normal. They recommend you arrive at least an hour ahead for domestic flights, and if you’re factoring time for things like parking or the risk of traffic delays, arriving 90 - 120 minutes early is reasonable. (It’s what I do an any rate, reasonable or not).

I would basically never take a 1 hour flight (unless it’s a connection). It’s just not worth it. A train or bus is more comfortable and less of a hassle.

(It’s suspect to include packing for the flight but not the bus, though. Whether you have to do that has nothing to do with your mode of transportation.)

Have you flown from the Bay area to LA area. It's so much easier than driving. There's numerous airports on each end. Flights on Southwest are cheap or you can fly semi private on boutique air for about double but still not very expensive compared to these buses.

Finally traffic can be terrible even in the middle of nowhere on i5. The train is too slow or doesn't go where you need to be so isn't useful.

"PreCheck". Stylized as "Pre√".

Want it discussed as clearly as possible so we can abolish that particular form of authoritarianism ASAP.

Indeed. This is also one of the selling points of the Shinkansen in Japan. Flights are often cheaper, but getting to (cheaper flights) from Narita/Kansai is a total pain in the backside. With the Shinkansen, the seats offer a lot more room, and you get to move from city center to city center, without the absurd security measures involved in modern day air travel. With the Chuo Shinkansen, Japan will have upped the game to the next level.

So you can sleep.

Yeah, seriously, I don’t get this. I understand the argument that commuting to the airport, security theater etc is a huge pain. And maybe sleeping on the bus would be nice. But I would only take the bus as an alternative if it’s also cheaper than the flight. Otherwise, it seems like the tradeoffs cancel each other out.

The key word in your message is "I". Some people are willing to bet that there are enough people with different priorities/preferences

To skip security and rides to airports!

I have friends who are deathly afraid of flying that would make this choice in a heartbeat.

It can be good if it saves you a hotel room night. Sometimes I schedule travel like this but not very often.

Plane: 2h commute + check in, 1h flight, 1h commute back. Most of the time you can only read your phone or a book, or snooze during the flight. Not a lot of productive time, and no night sleep to speak of.

Bus: 30m commute (I suppose it's not outside the city) + 8h undisturbed ride + 30m commute. You can sleep a normal night while traveling.

The concept of the 8h undisturbed ride is a bit generous. Studies have shown that the 1st night away from home is not an undisturbed night of sleep. From my travels, I can say I fall into this category. Maybe it'll work for some people, good for them. I consider them lucky.

This feels like that apocryphal NASA story except it ends "and the Russians fitted hammocks".

(Two attachment points you could probably protect with something structurally like bike shocks, self stabilizing laterally, costs tuppence ha'penny.)

I just took an 8 hour overnight Megabus last week and had a horrible time sleeping, ruined my entire next day. I was really struck by the thought that it's so strange we haven't found a solution to this yet - how hard can it be to just put beds on buses? It's such a simple step towards more sustainable long-distance travel. What a pleasure to see that this is possibly a near-future reality :)

Right now, the system can only move the bed up and down, so passengers will still feel hard braking and tight turns.

On the other hand, I suspect this will make motion sickness even worse --- feeling sensations of movement (or more precisely, changes in acceleration), especially if it's not in all directions, but without seeing it is what causes people to get disoriented.

At sea, I have ridden through some storms that made it a little hard to walk around, but sleep was not a problem. Ship motion at sea is a bit different from bus motion on a road, but not as far as whether it is predictable. Sometimes we're rolling along and then there is a sharp jolt, as if an odd wave came by.

* From Emerald Princess at sea

Pretty bold bet that with this upgrade in comfort they will be able to create a market for sleeper busses in the US.
Would be a much less risky endeavour if the market already existed and they just had to gain technology leadership.
Still, it's a cool idea, I wish them luck!

Or just use a train.
Like if you want to travel from Moscow to Vladivostok (6 days) you'd better use this: http://thegoodlife.ru/image/962-mv.html + separate dining car.
Traveled on these, quite interesting experience. Definitely it is a good time to think where you are going.

Unfortunately, trains are difficult to build in the US, which is a car-focussed culture.

Not really that difficult, you got a ton of empty space between cities where you can put rails. Then do the stations outside of the crowded city centers, just like airports.
For "short" routes, I'd prefer trains. E.g. I prefer Cologne/Berlin by train in Germany, would even if the station was - just like an airport - outside of the city. The train ride is a lot more relaxed, not really longer if you calculate the total travel time, more space, no security theater (and related queuing), luggage check, etc.

Arbitraging a fickle TSA policy (less intense enforcement on rail vs. air travel) is not a good reason to build permanent infrastructure.
Rail and air operators will be similarly incentivized to carry as many passengers per trip as they can, so I would expect seat sizing/comfort to converge.

The cost to provide a large amount of space is much cheaper for rail.

A train takes three days to do what an airliner can in six hours. So a marginal sqft of train car needs to cost something like 1/12th a marginal sqft of airliner just to break even on a per-ticket basis.

That's only true for Amtrak in the US, where trains are pitifully slow, and on top of that you picked one of the least favorable relations in terms of distance and speed.
High speed rail achieves up to 200km/h (avg) as the bird flies, commercial aviation in the medium range may do about 400km/h on average (e.g. the 960km of New York - Chicago in about 2:30). Consider that the turn-around of an airplane is about an hour, and for a train it's likely less than that, and the 1/12 factor you bring up may end up being much less in practice.
Or put another way, there are plenty of medium/high speed rail operations that are profitable while giving a large amount of space to passengers.

There is an absolutely gigantic rail network in the United States. It's almost entirely privately owned by freight rail companies and they're not interested in passenger traffic. Amtrak is the basically only long haul passenger traffic carrier and for almost all of their routes they do not get priority above freight traffic. This makes it very difficult to stay on schedule, which leads to a bad reputation, which leads to decreases in passenger traffic.
The only real exception to this rule is the Acela express train on the eastern seaboard. There, Amtrak owns most of the rail and thus can run their passenger trains at a faster speed with priority. Acela gets good reviews and has tons of traffic.

I've always wanted to take the trans-siberian (except I'd take the route that ends in Mongolia, from which you can take a train to Beijing), but I wouldn't say that it's something you "better" use if you value your time at all and aren't traveling for pleasure.
There are one-way nonstop flights from Moscow to Vladivostok for $200, which takes only 8-9 hr and is half the price of the train.

I did the trans-Mongolian train (Beijing to Moscow through Mongolia). The first bit is well worth it. The back half (Irkutsk to Moscow) is days and days of unrelieved boredom, with no stops longer than 10 minutes and no scenery.

Long distance passenger train travel in the US is unreliable and relatively expensive. I've had trains that are 9 hours late to arrive, effectively cancelling the entire trip.

I’m a little puzzled by the over-engineering. Wouldn’t fixing the road be much cheaper and benefit more people?
Don’t get me wrong: lowering the cost of active suspension is a wonderful idea, and will have a ton of benefit, but…

Roads are huge and are deteriorating all the time. Keeping the road in a state suitable for people to sleep in a normal bus would not be cheap, and maybe even impossible.

I grew up in Europe where highways are perfectly smooth overall. There are bumps in the city, but you are not really meant to drive fast on those. This is to a point that I have met some native French speakers who wouldn’t know the word for “potholes” in French.

Ha, that’s a good point! I drove from Paris to Bordeaux a few months ago and was blown away by the quality of the French interstate—it was perfectly smooth, zero potholes, impeccable lines and signage. Of course it had the most expensive tolls I’ve ever heard of, but as an American, it made me think about whether higher tolls would be worth it, if we could be sure the money would actually go into better infrastructure.
Anyway, I bet a similar bed-in-bus system on that French highway wouldn’t require this bump-cancellation tech, so you make a good point, at least from a technical standpoint. Politically, now that’s a different story ...

I checked: Paris-Bordeaux toll is 55€ (US$63 with tax) for 563km (350 miles) of highway, 583km total. Add 34L (9 US gal., 39MPG!) of fuel @1.5€/L (US$6.6 per gallon) that is 51€ of fuel. So toll+fuel total, that's at least 106€ ($122) one way. Now you have to take into account the car rent/lease/depreciation+maintenance. You're likely better off with the train (2 hours and 8 minutes) unless you carpool.

In the USA, highway building and maintenance is paid out of the highway trust fund, which is filled from the federal fuel tax. That fund doesn’t receive enough money to maintain highway quality.
This being the USA, the average citizen doesn’t accept the fact that “we would like to have better roads” may mean “we need to raise the fuel tax”, so, instead, they pay, on average, $515 per year in extra car repairs, so that they can keep their payments on fuel taxes at a low $97 (according to https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/06/25/why-d...)

There's also many roads (that are reasonably considered highways) that are maintained using state and local funds.
(for example, in Michigan, counties, townships and incorporated municipalities all fund work on roads)
I don't mean that as an argument against your point about spending money in the wrong spot, just pointing out that the trust fund isn't the only spending.

Pennsylvania is the same - there is a $0.58 tax on a gallon of gas ($0.75 on diesel) that is used to fund the majority of the costs related to road maintenance. Wikipedia tells me that is the highest fuel tax rate in the country - the roads must be incredibly expensive to maintain in this state because they are generally in significantly worse shape than the roads in neighboring states.

In Germany, total taxation on gasoline is around 0.85 € per liter (3.2 € per "gallon"); less for diesel.

Yeah, every state is spending on roads. I was talking about the additional ~1500 entities in Michigan that also have road budgets. It's only really the 83 counties that are building larger roads though.

Pennsylvania does have a large number of miles of road.
However Pennsylvania has a large amount of corruption in the state government also...

Alternatively, take a tiny fraction of what we spend on 'defense' and send it to the highway trust fund. The federal government has a problem with prioritization, not with lack of funds.

The federal gas tax was and still is 18.4 cents/gallon. It would need to be raised to 77.7 cents/gallon. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2014/7/24/some-perspecti... Worse, that was in 2014.

I believe, at least in California, raising gas tax is frowned upon by voters because the so called highway fund (filled with gas tax money) has been raided to pay for non-road related projects.
No one likes bait and switch.

I’m a little puzzled by the over-engineering. Wouldn’t fixing the road be much cheaper and benefit more people?
My information might be over a decade out of date, but the last time I read about it, the US and Italy did not require warranties on roads, but Germany did. As a result, companies are constantly charging money from the government in the US and Italy to repair mediocre roads, while German roads are overall excellent and do not require frequent repair.
Funny how that works.

> while German roads are overall excellent and do not require frequent repair.
Well certainly better on average than some other countries, but certainly not what I'd call excellent by any stretch of the imagination.

I only know what it was like around Stuttgart in the early 2000's. Compared to Pennsylvania in the 80's, it looked like utopia!

Stuttgart suffered a "traffic stroke" since then, so to speak. The roads may be fine, but the traffic isn't. Interestingly things have taken a noticeable turn to the worse since the Greens were elected to state government... some say they invented "red wave" traffic lights. I'm not sure if that's true, but if you're driving to Stuttgart, pack an extra pack of brake light bulbs -- they might burn out on you.

The bus company isn't in charge of the roads. They have little ability to change the quality of the road, all they can do is improve their buses.

Domino’s Pizza seemed to have taken upon themselves to act on that. I suspect that this is because it was the cheaper option for them.

Er, wouldn’t fixing the road be the overengineering? One solution requires a single company to build a single bus to solve a specific problem. The other requires every municipality in the country to “fix the road” (unclear what that even means?) to solve for a specific problem affecting one specific use case.

I was anticipating that fixing potholes would benefit all the vehicles on that road and that you would save a lot on vehicle’s suspension.

Yeah, but they're not the government's vehicles, so what do they care?

I’m not generally very comfortable with cynicism when it comes to road safety.

Would be nice with these type of bunks beds in airline economy class for long distance flights. You would be able to sleep and get good rest compared to reclining seats.

Combine this with self-driving tech and you could have a roving network of traveling cabins across the country. Neat!

This is how I want to fly! Take off and landing safety would be hard, though.

Greyhound buses are nasty enough, and they expect someone to sleep in a Greyhound bus bed? Think of the lice and bedbugs.
Let me go ask my wife if she would take a Greyhound sleeper bus. See if I get smacked.

> Greyhound buses are nasty enough, and they expect someone to sleep in a Greyhound bus bed?
This isn’t Greyhound.
> Think of the lice and bedbugs.
Bedbugs tend to spread through people using their own bedding (which is why hostels often forbid people from putting their own sleeping bags on the bed). Presumably on such transportation as this bus you would be issued sheets and blankets, people wouldn’t use their own. Train companies with sleeping carriages have decades of experience in this and it turns out that bedbugs are not that big a problem.

I have a bad back, the last thing I want to do is lay down while traveling for hours at a time.

Let me guess:
1. It’s still a loud, shaky and smelly diesel bus.
2. Cabin length only fits people under 6 feet and average shoulder width.
3. Even with curtains on, you can still hear and smell your neighbours snore, vidya, movie, etc.

That's not so bad. Lack of cushion destroys my rear after 8hours on a bus,no leg space destroys my knees,no armrest means I have to rub against a stranger for many hours.
#2 I agree with but #3 and #1 are a given. For example, With air travel,even 1st class won't isolate you from shaky flights or noisy neighbors(btw,noise canceling headphones are magical!)

> It’s still a loud, shaky and smelly diesel bus.
Modern diesel engines are not smelly or sooty. Most coach buses are quiet and reasonably smooth.
> Even with curtains on, you can still hear and smell your neighbours snore, vidya, movie, etc.
This is a $200 bus ride. Your neighbors aren't going to smell.

I've had people smell next to me in business class.
Money can't buy class.

Anecdata
I used Cabin late last year, and am 6ft 2. It was compact but I had enough space (would have liked more ceiling height but length was ok)
Didn't have any problems with the bus noise, or other people, and the bus was about 3/4 full.
Biggest issue for me was the bumps in the road, so the latest ideas sound like a good step forward.
Being able to go from Santa Monica in the late evening to San Francisco first thing the next morning worked out really well for me, I'd use them again.

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