Re: Comet impact in the Eastern United States - Feasibility of Evacuation

On Wed, 12 Mar 2008 02:45:43 -0400, dbd@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 (David
DeLaney) wrote:

>David V. Loewe, Jr <daveloewe@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>Matthias Warkus <Warkus@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>>David V. Loewe, Jr schrieb:

>>>> Why not?
>>>> 
>>>> Are cars breaking down on the roads at the rate you describe
anywhere?
>>>
>>>You bet enough will be breaking down to make it an issue. Nobody was 
>>>predicting any actual rate.
>>
>>It doesn't happen now.  Why should it then?
>
>... You don't really mean to say "No car ever breaks down on a highway or
>road anywhere in the USA", now do you? I invite you to actually -watch-
the
>sides of the interstate as you drive down it.

Which part of "at the rate you describe" (and he is describing a rate,
just not trying to quantify it) is not registering with you?

>Of course, maybe you DO mean that, in which case you're decoupled from
the
>facts, I fear.

I smell burning straw.

>>Most US expressways have inner shoulders and, to a lesser degree,
>>inner grass medians.  Therefore, most Lane One disabled vehicles have
>>a place to be moved to without crossing a traffic lane.
>
>Um. Again, you're extrapolating from 'some' to 'most'. 

No.  YOU are making the leap from most have SHOULDERS [1] to most have
grassy MEDIANS.

>Outside of the cities
>and suburbs, _some_ have grass medians. Others have empty space where a
car
>would fall down, because the highway is elevated; still others have a
hill
>in between them. 

What?  You aren't going to drag out the ones that have wooded copses?
Or the ones with swamps?

>And in suburbs/cities, most of them don't have much available
>space in the middle as such, because they needed to carve the right of
way out
>of existing property and didn't add 15 extra feet of width to put an
extra
>lane, unused, going each way in the middle.

Rural highways make up the bulk of the system mileage.  They have
inner shoulders for the most part.  They have grass medians to a
lesser degree than they have shoulders.  One wonders if you actually
read the qualifying words I rather deliberately stuck in my verbiage.

One of us used to be a truck driver.  One of us drove the highways and
byways of the US for a living.  That was ME.  I know I have a better
handle on the layout of most highways (aka most miles of the system)
than you do.  Most of the ones with hills or cuts or woods or swamps
*still* have enough clear space (grassy or not) to stash a vehicle in
so as to get it completely out of the traffic lanes.

>>>> Even if a car becomes disabled and can't be moved out of the fast
>>>> lane, why is the road now completely blocked?
>>>
>>>It isn't, and nobody ever claimed that. It just blocks the lane it
can't 
>>>be moved out of.
>>
>>For ONE car length.
>
>Drive the interstates, David. One stopped car affects traffic for quite a
way
>behind it. Up to several miles in crowded or slow conditions. Which these
would
>be guaranteed to be.

Matthias seems to be talking gridlock.  Backed up for several miles
for the short period of time it takes to move the vehicle and for some
amount of time afterwards does not meet what he is describing.

Moreover, despite the repeated assertions by some posters, there is an
inner shoulder minimum, even in the city, of 4' and an outer shoulder
minimum of 10' (and don't talk to me of construction, as the OP
scenario postulated an approximate year's notice).  Even if a car gets
stuck in the inner shoulder, there is more than enough room between
the widths of both shoulders for traffic to be maintained.

[1] And I've shown that the *standard* for rural areas is 10' wide
inner shoulders - more than enough space to get any non-permitted
vehicle completely out of the traffic lanes.
-- 
"Always remember that it is impossible to speak in such a way that 
 you cannot be misunderstood: there will always be some who 
 misunderstand you."
   Sir Karl Popper