How to Fix the Future

How about a thread for dedicated to creative ways to fix some of the problems we have?

Let's be positive and brainstorm and not post negative comments about other ideas that turn threads into debates instead of creative discussion, unless something is factually impossible.

I have a few...Here's one:

I caught a few minutes of a show on one of the education type channels about building a transportation system of pods for Wash DC. I didn't catch the whole thing, but here's some things I did see:

It's basically a monorail system made of individual "pods" that travel on a raised platform.

They are computer operated. You push a button and a pod appear and takes you any where you want to go. The pods are all electric and can tell when they need to be charged and then automatically return to a charging station.


The system would be really energy efficient while getting people around a lot faster than we do now. Since they are individual (hold up to 4-6 people), and faster than cars, I think people would like them a lot more than the public transportation we have now that you have to share with some real "characters".

There's no doubt it would be really cool, but it would also be really expensive to build. But once it's built, it would save a lot of money.

Then I started thinking about this...One another show an expert said that 60% of our developed real estate is dedicated to the car in the way of roads, alleys, highways, parking spaces and parking lots, garages, gas stations, etc.

A lot of that is very valuable public land. And because the pod system uses elevated monorails with very small footprints, it would free up a lot of very valuable property in places like DC, NY, and all major cities.

This land could be sold to pay for the construction of a pod system. Some of it could also be developed as green space, like parks and dog parks, bike paths, urban gardens, sports fields and rec areas, etc.

But that's not all...Think of the money saved on medical bills from zero car accidents, let alone all the deaths that will be prevented.

Something like 32,000 people a year die from car crashes. If you live to be 75, that's about 2 1/2 MILLION people will die from car crashes during your life time.

How much are 2.5 million lives worth? And this doesn't even count all the disabilities and injuries, with real monetary costs as well as intangible costs such as pain and quality of life...Or money spent on car insurance.

I know, we'll still need some cars and trucks and we won't be able to recover all of the 60% of land devoted to cars or end all car crashes, but there is a lot of potential when we consider all the numbers.

And a concept that could not only pay for itself, but really stimulate the economy by giving cities land they can sell and/or be developed.