Transportation Technology "Bombs".

[Rothman]

Is it more accepted and universal than fuel injection in gasoline engines or the steering wheel?

Mike

I seem to remember some hype back in the 1990s of switching out steering wheels for joysticks (a/k/a driver impalers).

[triplemultiplex]

Is it more accepted and universal than fuel injection in gasoline engines or the steering wheel?

"This Century"

GPS navigation

But neither GPS navigation nor paper maps "bombed".

I seem to have flipped the intent of this thread. 

[1995hoo]

....

GPS nav has also made route designations sort of moot, if I'm being honest.  The average motorist doesn't care or notice what shields are on the signs, they just know "turn here" "exit there" "go three more miles..."  That does hurt a little, as a roadgeek.  In a pre-GPS world, there was so much more value in route continuity.  "Just stay on highway xx."  For example, they came up with I-69 as this idea of having one route to follow from Mexico to Canada, but since then, GPS has made it irrelevant that such a corridor carry the same route shields.

That comment makes me think of the well-known sign on westbound I-70 in Maryland, which I've always figured reflects the way many people don't distinguish between types of routes when giving directions—"Take 70 west to 68 and follow that to 219." Someone using navigation software would presumably not need this sign. (Picture from AARoads.)

Is it more accepted and universal than fuel injection in gasoline engines or the steering wheel?

Mike

I seem to remember some hype back in the 1990s of switching out steering wheels for joysticks (a/k/a driver impalers).

More recently, Tesla tried replacing the steering wheel with a steering "yoke." It was unpopular and they wound up giving people the option of a regular wheel or the new yoke. (Surprises me a bit, given that Elon Musk's companies aren't generally known for respecting customer opinions—there's definitely a "we know better than you do what you need" attitude.)

[Dirt Roads]

Self-driving and straight battery-electric vehicles.

WAAAYYY too early to make that pronouncement.

I agree on the electric cars being way too early on that pronouncement. I also disagree with the carrot-and-stick approach certain states are making to force the usage of electric cars by a certain year. The extreme cold and the inability for Tesla's to charge in extreme cold certainly didn't help paint a positive picture of electric cars.

At least with my two examples (Personal Rapid Transit and Mobile Lounges), these were transport technologies that are almost 50 years old, but failed to get widespread adoption, thus they are what I considered to be transportation "bombs".

Was it 'too early' when the same technology bombed in the market at the turn of the 19th to the 20th centuries?

Kinda like when Maglev technology bombed in the 1880s?  Oh yeah, that's because a more-efficient rotary electric motor was developed in 1886.

[SEWIGuy]

Self-driving and straight battery-electric vehicles.

WAAAYYY too early to make that pronouncement.

I agree on the electric cars being way too early on that pronouncement. I also disagree with the carrot-and-stick approach certain states are making to force the usage of electric cars by a certain year. The extreme cold and the inability for Tesla's to charge in extreme cold certainly didn't help paint a positive picture of electric cars.

At least with my two examples (Personal Rapid Transit and Mobile Lounges), these were transport technologies that are almost 50 years old, but failed to get widespread adoption, thus they are what I considered to be transportation "bombs".

Was it 'too early' when the same technology bombed in the market at the turn of the 19th to the 20th centuries?

Mike

You seriously comparing electric car technology from back then to now?

[elsmere241]

That comment makes me think of the well-known sign on westbound I-70 in Maryland, which I've always figured reflects the way many people don't distinguish between types of routes when giving directions—"Take 70 west to 68 and follow that to 219." Someone using navigation software would presumably not need this sign. (Picture from AARoads.)

That sign reminds me of the time GPS told us to get off at MD 68 in the middle of the night to get to the Hagerstown KOA, and we took narrow roads to the back entrance while pulling a trailer (and almost went up someone's driveway).  The next morning we came out the front entrance and everything was well-signed, including how to get to I-70 and I-81.  Of course, the KOA catalog had said not to use GPS.

[SectorZ]

GPS navigation

But neither GPS navigation nor paper maps "bombed".

GPS was invented for more precise placement of bombs.

[ZLoth]

GPS navigation is probably the single most important transportation technology that's been nearly universally adopted this century so far.  For mostly good, but some bad.  Way fewer people getting lost, but plenty of hiccups along the way.  Took them a while to shake out all the inaccuracies that guided people down non-existent or unsafe roads.   GPS nav is only as good as the data it's working off of and that's gotten good enough for probably 99 percent of use cases.

It's been huge because it's mostly killed paper maps and it's changed the way people drive.  Instead of learning their city's road systems and remembering landmarks for their turns, they mostly use GPS nav.  Obviously folks like us can still get around without nav, but for the general population, they're used to having the car's GPS nav on or having an app on their phone.  They'll go wherever it tells them, even if the difference in travel time is negligible.

I disagree with that. When I first moved to Texas five years ago, I was 100% unfamiliar with the area, so I was highly dependent on the GPS on even going to the nearby stores. As I learned the lay of the land, I no longer depended on the GPS and knew the landmarks.

[1995hoo]

That sign reminds me of the time GPS told us to get off at MD 68 in the middle of the night to get to the Hagerstown KOA, and we took narrow roads to the back entrance while pulling a trailer (and almost went up someone's driveway).  The next morning we came out the front entrance and everything was well-signed, including how to get to I-70 and I-81.  Of course, the KOA catalog had said not to use GPS.

Heh. There's a winery near Linden, Virginia—the aptly named Linden Vineyards—whose website used to recommend that you not follow GPS or mapping website directions because most of them would send you up a gravel road with switchbacks (Fiery Run Road south of VA-55) in order to save 1.3 miles compared to using a route consisting entirely of paved roads with no switchbacks. The road conditions result in the latter route taking more time notwithstanding the shorter distance. Google Maps, at least, no longer recommends the gravel road.

I'm sure that sort of thing is very common in rural areas, though maybe gravel switchbacks might be an extreme example.

[kphoger]

GPS navigation

But neither GPS navigation nor paper maps "bombed".

GPS was invented for more precise placement of bombs.

[vdeane]

GPS navigation is probably the single most important transportation technology that's been nearly universally adopted this century so far.  For mostly good, but some bad.  Way fewer people getting lost, but plenty of hiccups along the way.  Took them a while to shake out all the inaccuracies that guided people down non-existent or unsafe roads.   GPS nav is only as good as the data it's working off of and that's gotten good enough for probably 99 percent of use cases.

It's been huge because it's mostly killed paper maps and it's changed the way people drive.  Instead of learning their city's road systems and remembering landmarks for their turns, they mostly use GPS nav.  Obviously folks like us can still get around without nav, but for the general population, they're used to having the car's GPS nav on or having an app on their phone.  They'll go wherever it tells them, even if the difference in travel time is negligible.

I think about any trips from my location in southern Wisconsin to any place southeast beyond Chicago.  GPS nav almost always routes you through Chicago, but going via Bloomington adds just token minutes to the overall trip and is a much, much less aggravating drive.

The technology has been amazing for knowing about and getting around traffic jams.  Particularly the irregular ones that spring up due to crashes or temporary road work.  Lets the driver bail on their planned route well in advance of the slow down and get around it.  Nothing worse than having just passed an exit and around the next turn, everything comes to a screeching halt.  Now an occasional glance at Google Maps or whatever will give you fair warning.

GPS nav has also made route designations sort of moot, if I'm being honest.  The average motorist doesn't care or notice what shields are on the signs, they just know "turn here" "exit there" "go three more miles..."  That does hurt a little, as a roadgeek.  In a pre-GPS world, there was so much more value in route continuity.  "Just stay on highway xx."  For example, they came up with I-69 as this idea of having one route to follow from Mexico to Canada, but since then, GPS has made it irrelevant that such a corridor carry the same route shields.

I would call it a minus.  And people do still get lost.  Pretty much anywhere the road network doesn't neatly fit into what the GPS can say and people need to actually look for and read signage, in fact (especially in places where people would have been better served by checking out Google Street View before they left!).  I believe I've told the Kingston roundabout story on the forum before.  Short version, the person driving to a DOT meeting missed the turn because they had no clue where they were going and not looking at signage, just relying on GPS.  Rest of the day she would do little else other than complain about how horrible the roundabout was and how she would never drive through it again, even if it meant going over an hour out of our way to get back.  Not to mention people driving slower than they need to because they have no clue where they're going.

As for people avoiding congestion, another minus.  Not the part of Google Maps being able to show it... I check that before I leave work every day.  The part where people are automatically routed.  There are only two alternate routes to the Northway for my drive home, and the one that should be shorter/faster clogs up to stop and go levels every single time the Northway backs up, thanks go GPS.  Even the other one has a couple lights that back up and operate at LOS F if enough people divert.

And call it the Aspergers/OCD roadgeek in me, but diverting routes is not something I like doing.  I still drive by the "take highway X to Y" method.  Not doing that makes me feel out of sync with the world, in fact.  And you can take route numbering and route numbering logic from my cold, dead, hands.

Is it more accepted and universal than fuel injection in gasoline engines or the steering wheel?

Mike

Depending on how self driving cars and electric cars advance?  Possibly one day!  Electric cars that have preconditioning don't even include a button to turn it on.  Instead, you have to program in a charger on the cars on-board navigation, follow the route it gives, and it will automatically turn on the preconditioning at the correct time.  EV enthusiasts seem to think it's awesome.  I just see a future when roadgeeks will have to choose between navigating themselves and seeing what they want to see and getting the best charging speeds.  And fully self-driving cars won't even have steering wheels at all, if we ever develop them.  They likely won't even position the seats for optimum roadgeeking.

In short, if the futurists are right, our hobby as we know it will die within the next few decades.

[SEWIGuy]

Calling GPS a minus because of a couple personal anecdotes is ... something.

As someone who does a lot of driving to appointments for work, it has made it so much easier for everyone. I just verify the address. I don't have to ask for directions at all. GPS gets me where I need to go with very little problem.

And also as someone who has relocated a couple of times with my directionally-challenged wife, GPS has been incredibly valuable just to run simple errands.  Like ZLoth, she eventually figures it out, but on our recent move, she had to use GPS to do simple Target runs even though she had been there prior.

I wouldn't call it the greatest technology ever, but it has been incredibly valuable.

[J N Winkler]

For all its many shortcomings, I don't think I would describe turn-by-turn GPS navigation as a transportation-related technology that has "bombed," simply because it has proven to have enough staying power to remain an ongoing nuisance.  (GPS by itself most definitely has not bombed, aside from the close-to-literal sense associated with military use.  In the civilian world, it is extremely useful for mapping and journey logging, to name just a couple of benign applications.)

I personally don't use turn-by-turn largely because it is delivered by voice and I can't hear.  However, if it were made visually accessible in a way that allowed me to keep my eyes on the road--e.g., through a heads-up display--secondary reasons would come into play, such as lack of the ability to configure the routing algorithm to match my personal preferences, which encompass a willingness to go out of my way (sometimes considerably so) to avoid aggravation in terms of loose surfacing, difficult geometry, poor LOS, lack of spare capacity to accommodate diversion due to congestion elsewhere, etc.  At least in theory, this is achievable through continuing refinement of routing algorithms and improvements in the quality, accuracy, and detail of the underlying GIS data.

[MikieTimT]

3M High Visibility Signal

[SEWIGuy]

Couple of additional thoughts. Not sure they are "bombs" or just went out of style.

**Pop up headlights
**Headlight wipers
**Touchpad entry? This seems to have gone away with the advent of proximity key fobs

[kphoger]

Calling GPS a minus because of a couple personal anecdotes is ... something.

Agreed.  I work in an industry where multiple people are driving to customers' houses all day, every day.

Occasionally, I see instances of boneheaded guys blindly trusting their sat-nav device.  For example, the one who came from out of state to work in Wichita for a few days and couldn't navigate addresses well enough to know he was several miles down S Topeka Ave instead of several miles up N Topeka Ave;  this was the same guy who, when he called to ask for directions to the correct part of town, insisted we tell him to turn right or left, despite us having no clue which direction he was currently facing.  Or the guy who "couldn't locate" an apartment complex because Google Maps placed it in the middle of the road, even though the complex was immediately on the other side of the tree line and the very next driveway was the access road to it.

But I also remember the days before widespread smartphone and sat-nav use.  Back when the guys carried paper maps of the city.  Back when, if you said a Wichita address to one particular guy, he could tell you what the nearest cross-streets were, approximately what decade the house was built in, whether it was siding or brick or whatever, and if he had done work there in the last few years or not—all by the address.  Sure, the guys were arguably more able to navigate with their brains back then.  But.  New neighborhood still under construction, not on your paper map?  Good luck with that!  Working in an unfamiliar town for which you have no paper map?  Good luck with that!  Called the customer for directions, but you're unfamiliar with the town's road network?  Et cetera.

A few incidents of people's lessened ability to navigate by brain power do not negate the much larger number of times GPS has enabled them to navigate better than they could have before.

[wanderer2575]

Calling GPS a minus because of a couple personal anecdotes is ... something.

^  This

A few incidents of people's lessened ability to navigate by brain power do not negate the much larger number of times GPS has enabled them to navigate better than they could have before.

^  and this.

I can't get into calling something a fail in general when there are isolated incidents, especially when those incidents occur because people shut off their brains and common sense.  (Is a calculator a "bomb" because nobody knows anymore how to use a slide rule or work arithmetic problems by hand?)  Yeah, GPS on rare occasions routes a driver into a river or onto a goat path, but the GPS doesn't control the steering wheel -- the driver does.  vdeane has the Kingston story; I have the Port Huron story:  At the end of I-94/I-69 it used to be that you forked to the left to M-25 and Port Huron, and forked to the right for the Blue Water Bridge.  When the freeway was rebuilt, those movements were switched -- left to the bridge, right to M-25.  Despite three sets of overhead signs plus additional signs stating "Your GPS Is Wrong / Follow Posted Signs," every day for awhile at least a couple dozen stubborn motorists who hadn't updated their system's map base found themselves unwittingly going into Canada.  (Anything to declare, Sir?)

[thenetwork]

Not necessarily a "technological" bomb, but a transportation bomb:

The days when local jurisdictions or DOTs placed oodles of signs encouraging people to enroll in Carpool and/or Share-A-Ride programs.

I know it was a thing to do back in the days of the energy crises and high gas prices (from the 80's perspective).   But with people not all commuting from the same home-to-work routes, riding with a group of 'strangers", and more recently, Covid, hybrid work environments and the advent of Uber/Lyft rides which are more-or-less safer than old-school carpooling (since most people have cell phones at hand) have pretty much sealed put the last few nails in the coffin.

Nevertheless, in most of the country nowadays, you are hard-pressed to find those same carpool/Rideshare signs still posted in the wild.

[jeffandnicole]

Digital speedometer displays...originally.

Back in the 1990's I think it was, some cars were equipped with a digital speedometer rather than a dial.  What car dealers found out - motorists at the time didn't care for them. They actually liked the dials.  So they faded away.

Over the past several years, automakers have started installing them again.  This time around, they are often optional as the display is more like an iPad screen, where the dial could even just be a computer image, with the ability to display a dial, a digital number, or both.

As for people avoiding congestion, another minus.  Not the part of Google Maps being able to show it... I check that before I leave work every day.  The part where people are automatically routed.  There are only two alternate routes to the Northway for my drive home, and the one that should be shorter/faster clogs up to stop and go levels every single time the Northway backs up, thanks go GPS.  Even the other one has a couple lights that back up and operate at LOS F if enough people divert.

And call it the Aspergers/OCD roadgeek in me, but diverting routes is not something I like doing.  I still drive by the "take highway X to Y" method.  Not doing that makes me feel out of sync with the world, in fact.  And you can take route numbering and route numbering logic from my cold, dead, hands.

Regarding this:

If it's my normal commuting route (NJ's I-295), I rarely detour as well.  There's a few options depending where I'm at, with the easiest being the parallel NJ Turnpike.  But if I'm getting to the Turnpike to avoid the backup, many others are as well (and that's in addition to the regular traffic that's going that way). When exiting the Turnpike, there's often a jam thru the plaza onto the local road (NJ 168).  I wind up losing so much time that I've basically avoided a 10 mile backup just to sit in another backup that me nearly all the time I saved on the Turnpike.  And I had the privilege of paying to do so. Unless a crash has closed 2 of the 3 lanes of 295, or all lanes, I just stay on it and deal with the slowdown. 

That said, I've been doing this commute for 25 years 4 months.  Within the first few weeks, there was a full highway closure.  In the other 25 years and 3 months, maybe one or two others.  NJSP do a good job keeping at least 1 lane open.  That includes one fatal during a cold winter week, where they detoured us into the grassy median.  Due to the coldness the median didn't rut with the highway traffic going over it.

In short, if the futurists are right, our hobby as we know it will die within the next few decades.

This I don't necessarily agree with.  There's probably always going to be an option to take control of your vehicle.  Even planes, which are much more automated now than people realize, always allow the pilot to override the system.  For your commute, you may actually like the automation, especially when incidents do arise, because the car will communicate with other vehicles and find the best way real-time, rather than depending on today's version of GPS which doesn't do a good job of predicting the jams it's creating by detouring traffic.

[vdeane]

Occasionally, I see instances of boneheaded guys blindly trusting their sat-nav device.

That is pretty much the only way I see people using it.  I even have the experience of working with someone doing grade crossing inventory work and he liked to put every crossing into GPS.  Works great for public crossings, but for private crossings, some of them aren't anywhere near a public road that's in the GPS.  Often simes we'd have to hunt around for the crossing.  A few times we never found them at all.  The most memorable time was when the closest road was a Thruway entrance ramp, so we were blindly following the GPS when it randomly said "you have reached your destination", by which point we were stuck getting on the Thruway and then driving 10 miles to the next exit just to turn around.

It doesn't help that, aside from a couple coworkers, literally nobody listens to me when I try to help navigate, even though I'm better than the GPS.

New neighborhood still under construction, not on your paper map?  Good luck with that!

It's the same with GPS.  Arguably worse, since people no longer look at signs.  It can take a few days if not weeks for changes to show up in Google Maps.

I also don't think that it's a binary between paper maps and GPS.  I use Google Maps.  I'll even shove things into the directions, usually just to get drive times, but sometimes to see what Google comes up with.  I just don't navigate by it.  In fact, the one time I tried, because I-287 was closed, US 202 was marked closed, and trying to navigate the local roads looked complicated (I didn't want to backtrack to I-80), it was completely useless because Google didn't know I-287 was closed, so it was just sending me back there.  In the end, I just went up US 202, figuring that I'd try to find some way around its closure.  Fortunately, Google was wrong about that too.

Calling GPS a minus because of a couple personal anecdotes is ... something.

^  This

A few incidents of people's lessened ability to navigate by brain power do not negate the much larger number of times GPS has enabled them to navigate better than they could have before.

^  and this.

I can't get into calling something a fail in general when there are isolated incidents, especially when those incidents occur because people shut off their brains and common sense.  (Is a calculator a "bomb" because nobody knows anymore how to use a slide rule or work arithmetic problems by hand?)  Yeah, GPS on rare occasions routes a driver into a river or onto a goat path, but the GPS doesn't control the steering wheel -- the driver does.  vdeane has the Kingston story; I have the Port Huron story:  At the end of I-94/I-69 it used to be that you forked to the left to M-25 and Port Huron, and forked to the right for the Blue Water Bridge.  When the freeway was rebuilt, those movements were switched -- left to the bridge, right to M-25.  Despite three sets of overhead signs plus additional signs stating "Your GPS Is Wrong / Follow Posted Signs," every day for awhile at least a couple dozen stubborn motorists who hadn't updated their system's map base found themselves unwittingly going into Canada.  (Anything to declare, Sir?)

I didn't call GPS a fail (as much as I may wish it was!).  I was, however, responding to a post earlier in this thread claiming it was some wonderful thing benefiting society.  I don't see this as like the calculator situation.  Being able to use a slide rule or solve arithmetic problems on paper doesn't really help in life if you have a calculator.  Being able to read signs, navigate, and actually bothering to familiarize yourself with where you're going does.  Sure, you could do both.  But I don't know anyone who does.  People are lazy.

Digital speedometer displays...originally.

Back in the 1990's I think it was, some cars were equipped with a digital speedometer rather than a dial.  What car dealers found out - motorists at the time didn't care for them. They actually liked the dials.  So they faded away.

Over the past several years, automakers have started installing them again.  This time around, they are often optional as the display is more like an iPad screen, where the dial could even just be a computer image, with the ability to display a dial, a digital number, or both.

That's interesting.  Why wouldn't someone want a digital speedometer?  You can get your speed down to a single mph (rather than nearest 5) and you can switch to metric with a push of a button.  No small numbers for me when I go to Canada!  I love my digital speedometer and I would consider going back to a dial to be a major regression.

This I don't necessarily agree with.  There's probably always going to be an option to take control of your vehicle.  Even planes, which are much more automated now than people realize, always allow the pilot to override the system.  For your commute, you may actually like the automation, especially when incidents do arise, because the car will communicate with other vehicles and find the best way real-time, rather than depending on today's version of GPS which doesn't do a good job of predicting the jams it's creating by detouring traffic.

The images I often see involve four seats facing each other (so the front ones are facing backwards) with a table in the middle, like you're in a living room rather than a car.

[Rothman]

Not necessarily a "technological" bomb, but a transportation bomb:

The days when local jurisdictions or DOTs placed oodles of signs encouraging people to enroll in Carpool and/or Share-A-Ride programs.

I know it was a thing to do back in the days of the energy crises and high gas prices (from the 80's perspective).   But with people not all commuting from the same home-to-work routes, riding with a group of 'strangers", and more recently, Covid, hybrid work environments and the advent of Uber/Lyft rides which are more-or-less safer than old-school carpooling (since most people have cell phones at hand) have pretty much sealed put the last few nails in the coffin.

Nevertheless, in most of the country nowadays, you are hard-pressed to find those same carpool/Rideshare signs still posted in the wild.

Carpooling is definitely not a bomb.  My brother carpools to work in the Seattle area and then you have the successful slug riders in the DC area.  In urban areas, you still have carpools.

That said, has carpooling ever reached the ridiculous forecasts of New Urbanists and the like?  Heck no.  But "last nails in the coffin"?  Hardly.

[J N Winkler]

That's interesting.  Why wouldn't someone want a digital speedometer?  You can get your speed down to a single mph (rather than nearest 5) and you can switch to metric with a push of a button.  No small numbers for me when I go to Canada!  I love my digital speedometer and I would consider going back to a dial to be a major regression.

I wouldn't want to rely on a seven-segment display alone, which is essentially what the early digital speedometers were.  They were hard to read under sustained acceleration since the number shown would change frequently, often before it could be read.  A dial makes it easier to see approximate speed at a glance and to visualize rate of change in speed.

[Bruce]

Not necessarily a "technological" bomb, but a transportation bomb:

The days when local jurisdictions or DOTs placed oodles of signs encouraging people to enroll in Carpool and/or Share-A-Ride programs.

I know it was a thing to do back in the days of the energy crises and high gas prices (from the 80's perspective).   But with people not all commuting from the same home-to-work routes, riding with a group of 'strangers", and more recently, Covid, hybrid work environments and the advent of Uber/Lyft rides which are more-or-less safer than old-school carpooling (since most people have cell phones at hand) have pretty much sealed put the last few nails in the coffin.

Nevertheless, in most of the country nowadays, you are hard-pressed to find those same carpool/Rideshare signs still posted in the wild.

The signs are gone because the Internet has better resources for arranging carpools. There's also vanpools, which are still very popular out in the West Coast metro regions because they're between coworkers and on a somewhat fixed route.

A 2019 survey of Downtown Seattle commuters showed a slight decline in carpool/vanpool from 2010 despite the presence of new rideshare options (which are counted as Other here).

[pderocco]

Dare I say it, the monorail?

Cal Expo has a monorail that was intended to help with getting around, and was put into operation in 1969. Due to accessability and safety issues with the other stations along the route, this monorail effectively is a amusement ride whose sole station is above the main game. Japan seemed to have a more developed monorail system.

That's a great video. That's what it takes to do branching on a monorail. The mechanism probably costs a thousand times as much as a switch that flexes a couple of rails on the ground a couple inches one way or another, something that was originally done by moving a manual lever next to the switch. And there's no way to overcome that cost difference.

[pderocco]

Dare I say it, the monorail?

I was about to suggest that myself, but then I realized how many monorail systems are actually in use around the world, so I determined that it wasn't actually a technology bomb.

It depends upon what it's used for. If it's used for pleasure, the standards are different than if it's used for practical transportation. A rollercoaster is good at giving people a fun time, but lousy for getting to work. The monorail is a less dramatic example of that distinction. "We visited Seattle, and we took the monorail from the shopping district to the Space Needle!"