I honestly don't know what to make of this.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/1 ... 77129.html

About the only comment I can make is that the auto accident rate and death toll must be much higher, but we don't hear much on that in a national publication unless the carnage is unusually large, like an incident where a motorist ran off a bridge at a speed well over the posted limit and crashed her vehicle in a zoo in New York City with seven fatalities.

Floor open. . .

This isn't really news. A transit vehicle operating in a very dense urban area, using a 19th century propulsion system, with people riding on the outside of the vehicle can be expected to have accidents. It is perhaps surprising that there aren't more accidents. But I think that people who choose to ride the cable cars (count me among them) realize the potential dangers and the need to be alert and prepared for the unexpected. I also think that we all beneift from the skill and focus on safety of the conductors and gripmen.

The article is accurate. The cable cars are dangerous, but loved. So, we have to budget for the expected accident claims. Changing them to make them safer would ruin their character.

The only alternative I can think of is making all the cable routes pedestrian only streets.

The cars are safer now than 30 years ago. Standee limits are enforced, and the curves have been softened and super elevated to reduce passenger throw-offs.

If you have access to a copy, I suggest reading George Hilton's "The Cable Car in America". You will find that the problem of cable car accidents has been around over 120 years.

What you saw was a reporter on a light news day looking for something to fill space. This sort of stuff happens all the time.

In my opinion cable cars probably are less dangerous today than they were when they were a more active part of the San Francisco transit system. There is much less overcrowding and tourists probably hold on tighter. You don't see people reading a newspaper while riding on a step.

One unfortunate side effect of the invention of the internet, is that a huge amount of new "journalists" have been created, for a billion internet news outlets..There isnt enough real news to sustain them all, so they have to go out and invent news just to keep their jobs..

Scot

Even back about 1930, a national magazine (Collier's) wrote about the New Haven, Conn. open trolleys in football game service. The author claimed that the local police banned automobiles from the trolley streets to reduce injuries to the crowds of standees on the cars.

And don't test San Francisco on that one either. They've come "this close" to making Market Street pedestrian/transit/delivery only and sluffing off all the highway traffic onto parallel Howard/Folsom, which are each 4 lane 1-way streets with no transit. They ought to do it with Mission as well.


Fkrock is a media professional, by the way.


You have no idea. Content farms, articles for money, Churnalism, "blogs" on real newspaper sites written by people of dubious credential... there's a wide gamut. And really it's all about getting your eyeball in front of an ad. Time was, it was to get you to pick Newspaper X instead of Newspaper Y at the news rack. They wanted long term customers. Nowadays it's hit and run: get sensational, get you to click, hope you click an ad.

Consider that the source of this story is routinely derided by its critics as "The Puffington Host" for both its exaggerated sensationalism and its left-leaning views.

...and that its founder, Ariana Huffington, used to be a "conservative" mouthpiece who could be seen often on Fau... er, Fox News blabbing about everything imaginable but is now a "liberal" who badmouths anything "conservative".

Sensationalism? Ohhh, yes indeedy (its what the "Puffington Post" specializes in, after all), but there is a grain of truth as well (there usually is with stories involving something that's as well known as SF's cable cars, since an outright lie would be far too obvious).

The cable cars are nowhere near as dangerous as the automobiles that swarm around them. Where's the outrage about eliminating private cars driven by distracted lowest commmon denominator qualified idiots?

dave