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Watertown to Belmont: Suck it and leave our trackless trolleys alone
By adamg on Wed, 05/18/2011 - 12:42pm
The poles holding up the overhead wires for the 71 and 73 electric buses may be too declassé for leafy Belmont, but gritty Watertown wants nothing to do with diesel buses, Wicked Local Watertown reports:
Town Councilor Vincent Piccirilli read several letters from Watertown and Belmont residents requesting that they vote to maintain trolley service to save on noise and air pollution. Residents attending the meeting agreed and many said that the trolley system adds character to the town.
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Comments
I Was Amazed...
... that there was even a question concerning the trackless trolleys in H2OTown. In this day and age, to consider replacing an excellent electric vehicle with one that runs on gas or diesel? And to also add more noise pollution? Just nuts.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Especially when the argument to remove
the trolleys is based on such a totally subjective and baseless premise. That the poles and wires - which have been there for decades - are suddenly asthetically unpleasing and will cause residents to move out enmasse.
Pause in your amazement and
Pause in your amazement and tell us exactly ho you think that nice electricity is generated.
By Fairies And Moonbeams?
That's what you expect me to answer, right?
Look, I know that electricity, in this case, is ultimately generated by another source of pollution. If you can prove to me, however, that the generation of said electricity is more harmful to the environment than the diesel and/or gas buses that would replace the TTs, go for it. I'm listening.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Location, Type of Impacts Differ
It depends on whether you are concerned about point/line source (traffic) pollution in local populations or generalized large-airmass airshed issues.
In urban areas, the former are more of a concern than the latter for health effects ranging from cardiovascular disease (linked to particulates) and various criteria pollutant gases (most notably NOx) linked to respiratory outcomes, particularly in children and the elderly. In fact, the EPA has designated a bunch of new monitoring stations to be installed in so-called "hot spots" to monitor for violations of the new NAAQS.
Benefits of capacity?
According to Department of Energy, the majority of the electricity in MA is generated using natural gas;
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/st_profil...
Still I imagine that a gas-fired generation plan is more efficent that a gas-powered bus. Thin that out with by splitting some atoms, and yes, I think it probably in our interest to keep the disel and even gas busses off the street where possible.
About a third of the energy
About a third of the energy produced at the plant is lost in transmission. That is, one third of the coal or gas burned is pure waste.
Either natural gas burning or hybrid electric buses would be superior to transmitted electric vehicles. In any case, pollutants from vehicles has been cut down tremendously in the last few decades. So we're much healthier now, right? Errr... no. There's always some professional hypochondriac to complain about our good fortune.
Well, See, Now You're Talking About Different Options
The debate was over TT vs. Diesel and/or Gas vehicles. When you introduce natural gas burning or hybrid electrics into the debate, that changes the question.
So, are we still debating diesel and/or gas vs. TT, or have we put that to rest?
(By the way, NotWhitey, I should hope you've read enough of my stuff here to know I'm no enviro-freak nor a hypochondriac. It just seemed to me, as a Watertown resident, that this was an obvious choice.)
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Prove it
Prove that statement. I just spent a while trying to determine just how much energy one of those trackless trollies even uses. Without that, you can't tell me how much of the power plant's emissions is due to that one bus to compare it to a bus powered by some other kind of fuel. So, prove it.
Second law of Thermodynamics
Think about how much energy is wasted in order to produce and transport diesel (or any) fuel, compared to transmission of electric power.
Which one is better? Well think about this for a moment: do we have many Edison-style generators located nearby to users of electricity, or do we have relatively fewer Westinghouse-style generators that transmit over long distances instead?
Regardless of whether your energy supply comes via wires, or via fuel trucks, you are going to lose energy. No matter how well you optimize, it will happen. I hope you understand that. It is a fundamental law of thermodynamics.
at a power plant where the
at a power plant where the noise pollution isn't on our streets and the air pollution can easily disperse instead of being blown straight into the faces of pedestrians?
Diesel Engine vs Power Plant
I would certainly hope the power plant is more efficient, at the very least. Plus there are clean ways of generating electricity, granted they are only representing a small percentage right now.
You hope, so it must be true?
You hope, so it must be true?
Well, yes, I am making a bit
Well, yes, I am making a bit of an assumption since I haven't done the research on this matter. However, I would be shocked if I discovered that internal combustion engines are in fact more efficient.
You hope not...
So it musn't?
I don't think there ever was a question in Watertown
It was Belmont - which then asked Watertown to support its attempt to beautify the streets. They got their answer, I guess.
Correct, Belmont asked
Correct, Belmont asked Watertown, and they said no.
According to the article, Cambridge also has to agree since the lines run thru parts of Cambridge. And considering that these trolleys north of Harvard Square are supplemental service on Mass Ave (as the 77 "North Cambridge"), it'll be hard pressed for Cambridge to say yes.
They should remove all traces
They should remove all traces of electrification from Belmont, especially those unsightly wires going to houses. What's good enough for the early part of the 19th century is good enough for Belmont.
Give them some horse-drawn
Give them some horse-drawn omnibuses if they really want to take a step backwards!
Trolleybuses
I don't know if people are aware, but these "trackless trolleys" are trolleybuses that only exist in a handful of places in the US - Boston region, San Francisco, Seattle, Philadelphia, Dayton. They are in some ways a vestige of earlier days but they are quite prevalent in Europe (especially Russia) as well as parts of China. The main problem is when the poles falls down and the driver has to leave the bus and string them back to the wires. I think this is done manually on the Silver Line on the way to Logan.
The Silver Line to Logan
The Silver Line to Logan changes power source at Silver Line Way. Seattle is very intensively wired, I remember noticing. I think they simply ripped up the tracks of their streetcar network but continued to use the wires to run trolleybuses (though this entails running a 2nd wire for every route -- for current return, instead of using the steel rails -- so I don't know how "original" the present wire system is).
And
Sometimes when the equipment fails, you get to sit on the bus while the driver calls in and says "I can't get my pole to stay up."
They can give us the trackless trolleys
If they'd like to get rid of them in Belmont, I'd love to see them on the 34 and the 36 routes in Roslindale and West Roxbury. We even have an old substation in Rozzie Square that could be put back into service.
I hope they'd fix the 39
I hope they'd fix the 39 first, but I suppose my bias is showing.
Well, as long as we're dreaming ...
I'd rather see the Orange Line continue up Washington.
In any case, the T deeded the substation over to the city and the transformers are long gone.
34/36 trackless trolleys
They did run trackless trolleys on routes 34 and 36 until 1958!
Don't the trackless trolleys cost much more to operate?
I know this isn't the focus of the article, but I think that I remembered reading somewhere (UH?) that there was talk of getting rid of the trackless trolleys because they cost much more to operate than the rest of the T buses (does anyone seriously dispute that these are, for all practical purposes, buses?).
I thought that the the greater expense was tied to how old these particular vehicles are (spare parts hard to come by) and that there were just so few left in the country that there were no economies of scale to take advantage of. Am I imagining all of this?
That's A Good Question
I do know that the T receives federal funds for running these vehicles, so whatever costs there are are offset to (?) degree.
It seems logical to assume that the funds offset enough of the cost to make them worthwhile, otherwise the T would have discontinued use of the vehicles. But, we are talking about the T, so who knows?
Anyone have solid figures on this?
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
According to 2009 Federal
According to 2009 Federal Transit Administration data for the MBTA
http://www.ntdprogram.gov/ntdprogram/pubs/profiles...
It costs the MBTA $142.00 per hour to operate diesel and CNG buses and $216 per hour for the trackless trolleys. Maintaing those overhead wires adds up.
Turn 'em back into real trolleys.
The rails are still underneath Belmont St. and Trapelo Rd. I know this because they've worked themselves out of the asphalt over the years. Does wonders for my suspension, and the bicyclists appreciate the obstacle course to break up the monotony of the daily ride into work.
My dad tells me of the days where he could take the trolley into town from Cushing Square. It would be cool to be able to that again.
Not necessarily
Trackless trolleys cost about 3 times as much as buses to buy, but they last much longer. The new Cambridge vehicles replaced trolley buses from the mid-70's, so those lasted 2 to 3 times as long as buses. Of course you have to figure the infrastructure of the wire network, but compare that to the cost of the CNG terminal they built at Arborway.
Personally, I like the speed and the quiet operation of trackless trolleys. And for those who think the wires are hideous, somehow visitors to Vancouver are always raving about it being the most beautiful city in North America and they have a huge network of trackless trolleys all over the city.