New super highways and C**ts

cookeeemonster

So...Boris has basically give the go ahead for the 2 new major super highways - east - west and north - south and who is threatening to take tfl to court to stop it? The black cabs union of course.

F**K THEM.

Plenty of good cabbies on the road (no, really) but enough is enough, this is too far.

Not happy about this. Will any of the good ones talk to their union about this? I'd hope so but they seem like a dinosaur organisation who can't accept change, ever.

And the ironic thing???!?!?

THEY HAVE THE MOST TO BENEFIT FROM A REDUCTION OF PRIVATE CARS ON THE ROADS THAT THIS WILL BRING.

Wood, trees, etc.

EDITED to take angry, ranty stuff out

stu-bim

CookeeeMonster wrote:

The black cabs union of course.

Any self employed group of people that use the term 'union' to describe themselves says as must as you need to kow about the attitude to earning a living from working for themselves

The Rookie

CookeeeMonster wrote:

via their outdated diesel engines.

Not sure what that means? That all Diesels are outdated or that the modern (same as Ford Transit) Puma Diesel engine is outdated?

veronese68

I think tfl should say they are going to review black cabs using bus lanes. A black cab doesn't carry any more people than a private car so isn't easing congestion in the way a bus is. Way too expensive to be truly public transport, only a few can afford them.

tgotb

Veronese68 wrote:

I think tfl should say they are going to review black cabs using bus lanes. A black cab doesn't carry any more people than a private car so isn't easing congestion in the way a bus is. Way too expensive to be truly public transport, only a few can afford them.

If you take the driver out of the equation, many black cabs carry *less* people than private cars. In the worst case, a car stuck in traffic is at least taking its driver somewhere, whereas many black cabs you see driving around don't actually have any passengers at all.

At the very least, TFL should stipulate that black cabs are only allowed to use bus lanes if they're actually carrying a passenger...

The other thing TFL should do is review the operating hours of the cycle superhighways; opening them up to cars from 7pm, when the evening rush hour is still in full flow, makes no sense at all.

tangled_metal

Switching quickly between several (would use the word "Flic*ing" but it got edited) channels recently before going off to do something I saw a documentary about the big push to diesel. Back in the Blair days when there was a big drive to lower Carbon emissions to meet Kyoto and other climate agreements/targets they encourages motorised road transport users to switch to diesel from petrol engines. The argument being they had higher mpg and released less carbon than petrol as a result. They changed VED to base it not on engine size but carbon emissions and other actions. The trouble is that diesel releases a lot higher particulate matter (which is a cause of cancer - with other factors I reckon) and higher levels of other gases especially NOx gases. The documentary was making the point that despite the claims (such as that Honda diesel engine add with a nice, quiet, winged diesel engine flying around a cartoon, pastoral scene among butterflies and interacting animal/plant/bird life) diesel is not cleaner than petrol. The argument was that petrol and diesel are not really safer or cleaner than the other.

Having said the above I drive a diesel when not cycling to and from work of course. I got it for reasons other than pollution or carbon emissions. It suited me for it's performance on hills, none of that losing of power going up steep hills in the Lakes and other reasons. Indeed with my mileage petrol makes more sense fuelwise.

Levi_501

Lets just hope they do not paint these ones with slippery when wet blue paint.

veronese68

Tangled Metal wrote:

higher levels of other gases especially NOx gases.

Well, at least we should be happier.

tgotb

Levi_501 wrote:

Lets just hope they do not paint these ones with slippery when wet blue paint.

The blue paint wasn't slippery, even when new. It looked terrifying, but was actually very grippy...

itboffin

Veronese68 wrote:

I think tfl should say they are going to review black cabs using bus lanes. A black cab doesn't carry any more people than a private car so isn't easing congestion in the way a bus is. Way too expensive to be truly public transport, only a few can afford them.

Introduce flat fares that'll shut them up

menthel

TGOTB wrote:

Levi_501 wrote:

Lets just hope they do not paint these ones with slippery when wet blue paint.

The blue paint wasn't slippery, even when new. It looked terrifying, but was actually very grippy...

Not the stuff at the end of CS7 in Colliers Wood, bloody treacherous when wet.

cookeeemonster

Wrote this thread in angry rant mode, not all cabbies are bad the same way as not all cyclists/white van men
/etc are.

But their union is spreading lies and misinformation to their members and the general public and it's wrong.

Or...the union that represents a minority of black cabbies is anyway.

More info here: http://cyclelondoncity.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/boris-finally-nails-it-bicycle-to.html

The Rookie

Tangled Metal wrote:

. The trouble is that diesel releases a lot higher particulate matter (which is a cause of cancer - with other factors I reckon) and higher levels of other gases especially NOx gases. .

Not sure why that always comes up, Petrols and Diesels have the same regulated limits and both will be at about the same level, this is not true of heavy commercials, but as the argument was over cars being petrol or Diesel then this part of the argument is a nullity. (P.S. Engine emissions is my day job).

surrey_commuter

TGOTB wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

The other thing TFL should do is review the operating hours of the cycle superhighways; opening them up to cars from 7pm, when the evening rush hour is still in full flow, makes no sense at all.

I thought they were going to be physically separated?

rick_chasey

TGOTB wrote:

Levi_501 wrote:

Lets just hope they do not paint these ones with slippery when wet blue paint.

The blue paint wasn't slippery, even when new. It looked terrifying, but was actually very grippy...

Does take twice as long to dry out though.

tgotb

Surrey Commuter wrote:

TGOTB wrote:

Veronese68 wrote:

The other thing TFL should do is review the operating hours of the cycle superhighways; opening them up to cars from 7pm, when the evening rush hour is still in full flow, makes no sense at all.

I thought they were going to be physically separated?

I was talking about the existing ones. CS8 is not segregated, and from 7pm most cab drivers see it as fair game (both for driving and parking).

Big_Paul

The Rookie wrote:

CookeeeMonster wrote:

via their outdated diesel engines.

Not sure what that means? That all Diesels are outdated or that the modern (same as Ford Transit) Puma Diesel engine is outdated?

The Puma is a late 90's engine, sure you can add a DPF and tweak the ECU to make it run a bit cleaner, but when they go off par they chuck out a load of crap, watch a Transit or Mondeo TDCi accelerating hard, they spew black smoke like a 1970's truck.

FWIW, my own Terrano uses the same 2664cc engine as the older Fairway cabs, doesn't smoke anywhere near as much as a Puma, even under full power pulling a 2ton trailer up a hill.

essex-commuter

Replacement Puma goes into production this year, EU6.

leeefm

The Rookie wrote:

...Petrols and Diesels have the same regulated limits and both will be at about the same level, this is not true of heavy commercials, but as the argument was over cars being petrol or Diesel then this part of the argument is a nullity. (P.S. Engine emissions is my day job).

I thought (taking the common perceived wisdom) that diesels emit much smaller particulate matter than petrols; and it was this that is more damaging to lungs. Please enlighten....

neal1984

Big_Paul wrote:

The Rookie wrote:

CookeeeMonster wrote:

via their outdated diesel engines.

Not sure what that means? That all Diesels are outdated or that the modern (same as Ford Transit) Puma Diesel engine is outdated?

The Puma is a late 90's engine,

There have been many versions of the Puma engine. I was involved in the launch of the Euro 5 engine a couple of years ago. Puma engines have not been used in taxi's for some years now. My dad has one in his taxi and it has done 250k with no trouble. The only parts that have failed are auxiliary parts fitted by LTI

rower63

My understanding of the current official disfavour of diesel is that recent studies have pronounced that in major cities virtually all particulate pollution and more than half of all Nitrogen Dioxide pollution is from diesel engines.

Underscore

leeefm wrote:

The Rookie wrote:

...Petrols and Diesels have the same regulated limits and both will be at about the same level, this is not true of heavy commercials, but as the argument was over cars being petrol or Diesel then this part of the argument is a nullity. (P.S. Engine emissions is my day job).

I thought (taking the common perceived wisdom) that diesels emit much smaller particulate matter than petrols; and it was this that is more damaging to lungs. Please enlighten....

I suspect that you may be thinking of DPFs. These are used to capture the soot that older diesels produce under load, and then burn them off later - by dumping loads of unburnt fuel in to the DPF every so often, which is one reason why you'll struggle to get anywhere near the quoted fuel efficiency on a modern diesel. There was a report a short while ago that said that the invisible (smaller) particulates produced when the soot in the DPF is burnt off are a lot more hazardous to health than the visible soot that it captured.

_

leeefm

It could be that. I don't know enough about diesels.

It's the PM-10 and smaller particles that are floating around that cause the problem. It seems that most places blame increased diesel use for the rise in these particles, but from what the Rookie said, I'm no longer sure.

The Rookie

leeefm wrote:

The Rookie wrote:

...Petrols and Diesels have the same regulated limits and both will be at about the same level, this is not true of heavy commercials, but as the argument was over cars being petrol or Diesel then this part of the argument is a nullity. (P.S. Engine emissions is my day job).

I thought (taking the common perceived wisdom) that diesels emit much smaller particulate matter than petrols; and it was this that is more damaging to lungs. Please enlighten....

Direct injection gasoline is just as bad as Diesels......

As for black smoke, that's usually due to a clogged EGR valve sticking open, any engine can suffer that regardless of design age!

My BMW M47N engine is of a similar design age and BMW are still using that in millions of cars a year!