Quote:
Originally Posted by 240glt
The debate surrounding the retirement of Edmontons' trolley bus system has been going on for some time, & I'm interested to hear what people here think.
There are pros and cons to keeping the system in place. The pros are that the busses keep pollution out of the city (As a cyclist I certainly appreciate this) and that they are still relatively inexpensive to operate. They also have a certain nostalgic value as well. On the few occasions I have ridden on a trolley bus, I've always enjoyed how they just seem to glide along, without making any noise.
The cons are more numerous, in my opinion. While the trolley busses keep diesel exhaust out of the city, the power to run them is generated by burning coal & natural gas outside of the city, so the environmental benefits really are negligible. Trolley busses operate in primarily older neighborhoods, many of which are trying to gentrify, and the mess of overhead cabling is pretty ugly, and poses problems in creating attractive streetscapes in neighborhoods like Alberta Avenue. Also, while the system is relatively reliable, it is getting old. If there is a power loss to the system, the busses stop in their tracks. The busses are also notorious for jumping off the cables. How many times have you seen a trolley bus, stopped in the midle of an intersection, with the driver around back trying to fish the arms back onto the cables ?
So what do you think ? Trolley busses: stay or go ?
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Your opinions don't really seem to justify. The buses you've mentioned are the ones we have right now. New trolleybuses can avoid stopping in the middle of the intersection even after dewiring. Drivers can also take advantage of the power steering and on-dashboard rewiring. There should be an option of having the entire fleet renewed. Of course, pretty much everyone wants to have these old beaters retired and out of sight, just like the GM diesels. Even though I am a trolley supporter, the ones we have now are inefficient, unreliable and potentially dangerous. Inefficient, because there's no regenerative braking. Unreliable because they are aging, no on-board battery backup and it breaks down too much. Dangerous, because drivers got honked at by blocked traffic. What citizens need is patience. In just more than a year, the entire system can be refreshed and have all the aforementioned problems solved.
From my experience of riding current trolleybuses, most riders complained because of delays from various problems that made commute times longer than they were expecting. On-board batteries makes all the difference. No more delays, no more backup diesels, able to maneuver around any detours and potentially less EPCOR standby crew. If power is lost, chances are only a section of the network is lost. New trolleys can keep moving like normal until a section breaker is reached, where it can be rewired with very little delay. All of these problems are plaguing our current trolley system, discouraging some riders from even riding them again, which means less ridership along these routes. If one thinks that battery costs too much, think again, because hybrid buses will be using on-board batteries too.
Everyone should take a chance and ride the leased New Flyer trolleybus that is supposed to be in Edmonton later this year. I am very confident that this will be light years better than what we have now. I can guarantee that once it's being tested in Edmonton, many will learn how to hate the old trolleybuses more.
I do have a question to make. From the fractional distillation process that are commonly found in petroleum refineries, how much energy is needed to separate crude oil into various parts such as diesel? For sure, it must take more energy than a generating power plant. Even more than the transmission losses from the trolley overhead. Is that right?
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