SInce we’re talking climate change I think we should bring back airships for short-haul flights. The fact it floats with little effort means less fuel is needed.
I figured in continents like Europe, for example, building an extensive high speed railroad would be far more effective.
Last summer I did a trip through Western Europe by train and I went from Basque country to Copenhagen without any major problems. I did 3800 km in total by train. If Europe takes trains serious, they could have a high speed connection to everywhere.
The longest train travel you can do in the world (as of 2021) is from Lagos in Portugal to Singapore. It take something like 21 days and multiple train changes though but still.
yeah, this is like Musk trying to solve traffic with underground tunnels. The solution has been in front of our eyes this whole time; trains. Cheap, easy to build and maintain, efficient, easy to electrify… and in europe we also proved just how far you can go with railways. There’s one under the channel, and 60 odd kms of underground railway tunnel under the Gotthard pass.
On a continental level, there really isn’t anything stopping us
what’s the point when trucks already exist, and water-based fuel & electrification are just over the horizon?
Not to mention for safety reasons these ships would need to use helium and we kind of need to preserve as much of that as we can. It’s a non-renewable resource and we need it for lots of science and tech purposes. The fact we still use it for balloons and shit it’s mind boggling.
Most rational capitalist economy:
Using 8.5 million cubic meters of an extremely rare, nonrenewable, resource a year, that is otherwise needed for scientific development, semiconductor manufacturing, welding, and medicine for Lifting Fucking Balloons!
It’s fucking depressing.
I keep forgetting they actually existed already
fun fact: there are only 25 of them in the whole planet, most of them used for advertising
there are like dozens of reasons why we got rid of them in the first place.
They are expensive, dangerous, not particularly efficient or fast, and tbh i’ll be fine without a 100 meters long amazon Ad in the sky.
