Hacker News Reader

I’m not sure I follow. Americans tend to have high emissions regardless of location. This makes sense if you consider that society almost everywhere except ultra dense cities is built around personal automobiles; and dense cities obviously have lots of other needs for energy as you’ve noted

I also wouldn’t say cities are particularly less capable of electrification than anywhere else. Bus systems can be electric. Subway systems are already electric. There are some diesel train systems that would be expensive to electrify (eg Boston regional commuter rail), but even this isn’t impossible (frankly it should have been done years ago, and a study in the 2010s had recommended it because it gives other benefits like improving reliability and reducing maintenance)

As you’ve noted, there’s a big question mark on how cities will adapt central business districts around a non-office world. It’s also worth noting cities have handled such a transition before: during the industrial revolution, cities were full of factories, and over time these shuttered and were replaced or turned into housing.

Not everyone wants 10 acres or cares about the threat of nuclear war. Cities will be for those people.

> What is the tenability of cities without fossil fuels? I think we do know, it's really the cities that collapse.

I walk everywhere. It's suburbs that collapse without fossil fuels.

> How does public transit work? Generally speaking they are all diesel. Do we have a plan to spend a trillion $ converting this all to electric?

Our subways have always been electric. Our street cars are electric, and have been for a century, before that they were horse driven. All new buses are electric.

> What's even the point of giant office buildings anymore? Downtown cores are dying if not dead as it is.

This is probably true.

> I really dont think we have quite thought out the consequences of our actions.

The consequences of NOT following these actions will horrific.

>I walk everywhere. It's suburbs that collapse without fossil fuels.

I think shooting from the hip the suburbs hurt without fossil fuels for a short time. However, who are the people buying teslas it's rich folks in the suburbs. Who in 10 years will be driving the gasoline toyota econobox. It's the poor in the cities.

>Our subways have always been electric.

That doesnt cover everything. Not all cities have a subway. Not all subways are electric, the danger of frying people made a number of subways diesel. My understanding is that much of NYC subway is still diesel for various reasons.

> Our street cars are electric, and have been for a century, before that they were horse driven. All new buses are electric.

I'm not sure I follow. This is certainly not true in the general sense. Perhaps true where you are? Where are you?

>The consequences of NOT following these actions will horrific.

That's the big debate there. Climate change isn't even important to the discussion.

If we fast forward ~75 years. We know without question that we are going to run out of fossil fuels. If we do nothing to switch now, it's a certain collapse of society.

Clearly we must do something. The sooner we begin, the less painful it is in the long run.

However, we cannot ignore the consequences. We must address these issues.

> That doesnt cover everything. Not all cities have a subway. Not all subways are electric, the danger of frying people made a number of subways diesel. My understanding is that much of NYC subway is still diesel for various reasons.

I'm disputing YOUR generalization, that [all] cities are doomed, not creating a new generalization that they are all fine.

> much of NYC subway is still diesel for various reasons

NYC subway still uses cloth bathed in oil to insulate some electrical circuits.

Cities existed before oil. A city without cars can actually be a massive improvement

>Cities existed before oil. A city without cars can actually be a massive improvement

True but cities required domestication of the horse. There were literally horse shit all over the roads and the occasional dead horse that was abandoned.

The answer isn't subways or monorails neither.

The answer may be robotaxis. I am very optimistic that this could solve a large degree of the issues.

If you were to replace all inbound/outbound subway connection of Manhattan with bridges and car traffic you would need 49 bridges the size of Manhattan bridge as a replacement.

Cars are very useful to go wherever you want, but are literally the worst for volume.

Similarly to how trucks are necessary to move stuff around but they cannot replace train freight/air planes/container ships.

>If you were to replace all inbound/outbound subway connection of Manhattan with bridges and car traffic you would need 49 bridges the size of Manhattan bridge as a replacement.

dont take me as attacking nyc and/or their subway. I'm certain at some grand time in the future all cities have a subway with rapid transport.

I was replying to

> The answer may be robotaxis. I am very optimistic that this could solve a large degree of the issues.

What I was trying to say is that cars (autonomous or not) are to mass transportation what copper wire is to the internet: better to keep the bulk of it out of it.

Also car infrastructure is extremely expensive, both in and of itself and as a collateral, parking lot requirements have a huge maintenance and spatial cost.

Unfortunately most missle silos in the US are located in the rural midwest.