Yes! I want a pilot program of building a 100ft tall mast for each block in a school district, with a zipline leading down to the school. Imagine the saved time for everyone who no longer has to wait for school busses on their morning commute!
I investigated a similar idea for a conworld once and ended up rejecting it.
AFAICT ziplines with modern technology really aren’t good at covering long distances. I didn’t study the math, but just eyeballing existing long-distance ziplines it seems you need approximately 1 meter height for 10-20 meters traveled. The average distance to school in the US seems to be between 1 mile and 5 miles depending on who you ask. Let’s take the lower option. To go 1 mile you’d need a 250-500 foot mast. But that’s just on average; some people will live two miles away and need 500-1000 foot masts—up to as high as the Stratosphere Tower in Vegas.
Not only do you have to pay for a Stratosphere Tower on every block (there are 72000 blocks in Manhattan!), not only do you have to tolerate a forest of huge towers that will probably lower land value, but you’ve also got to get kids up a 500 foot tower every morning, which means realistically that you’re paying for some really good elevators.
And we’re still only saving kids a two mile bike ride or five minutes waiting for a bus!
You could limit it to the blocks closest to the school to decrease max tower height, but that would also limit the benefit.
Yes! I want a pilot program of building a 100ft tall mast for each block in a school district, with a zipline leading down to the school. Imagine the saved time for everyone who no longer has to wait for school busses on their morning commute!
I investigated a similar idea for a conworld once and ended up rejecting it.
AFAICT ziplines with modern technology really aren’t good at covering long distances. I didn’t study the math, but just eyeballing existing long-distance ziplines it seems you need approximately 1 meter height for 10-20 meters traveled. The average distance to school in the US seems to be between 1 mile and 5 miles depending on who you ask. Let’s take the lower option. To go 1 mile you’d need a 250-500 foot mast. But that’s just on average; some people will live two miles away and need 500-1000 foot masts—up to as high as the Stratosphere Tower in Vegas.
Not only do you have to pay for a Stratosphere Tower on every block (there are 72000 blocks in Manhattan!), not only do you have to tolerate a forest of huge towers that will probably lower land value, but you’ve also got to get kids up a 500 foot tower every morning, which means realistically that you’re paying for some really good elevators. And we’re still only saving kids a two mile bike ride or five minutes waiting for a bus!
You could limit it to the blocks closest to the school to decrease max tower height, but that would also limit the benefit.
Who says the whole distance ought to be covered by a single line?