Where's my damn rocketpack?
Years ago there used to be this thing called the "World's Fair" which I guess is still sort of going on, but their real heyday used to be back in the 1900s.
Basically huge expos that would take over a city, showing the new scientific achievements and gadgets that were worming their way into the world. IIRC, "moving sidewalks", or travelators, were first introduced during one, with the expectation that they would soon take over the world and revolutionize urban transportation... they were their generations' Segway.
They didn't really take over the world, just airports, which to me is just a bit of a shame as I just love the things. I kinda dig escalators too, but there's just something about the moving sidewalk that captures my imagination when I'm standing on them, and usually if my mind isn't filled with other things I start wondering what the engineering challenges would be to update them with modern technology (like maglev) or to route an entire city with them, or even if it would be possible to actually combine different speeds of covered travelators to connect big parts of the city and do away with schedules altogether.
I.E., the outside strip would be going at airport speeds, which you'd step onto until you've gotten your speed matched with it, and then you'd walk a bit and step onto a strip going double the speed, until you had your speed matched with it, etc. I'm such a dork, really.
Anyways, its hard not to encounter these things when you're in the Cleveland airport, just because of how oddly its laid out and through some mad chance of luck I never, ever end up anywhere near where I need to go, whether its to catch a connection or to even just get the hell outside. I could go on about the Cleveland airport, but its mostly just this odd hybrid between a small-town airport and a larger hub like O'hare or Midway and hence everyone seems to fly through them, but the damn thing completely shuts down after a certain point and there is absolutely nothing around it.
I found this out the hard way when Continental screwed me once (well, weather was involved, but they still weren't too cool)and I ended up in my own little hybrid version of The Terminal and Castaway after an entire flight not only hit Cleveland at around 11pm, but found out the hard way all of our luggage hadn't made it.
Anyways the talk in Cleveland went fine, although sometime I really need to write up a "things I've learned about public speaking" type of post, and I made it back just fine with time to spare to throw on a suit and go to a viewing, which was kind of a downer but really not as bad as you'd think, everyone for the most part seemed OK.
If you have to go from cancer, I guess there are worse ways than finding out about it 4 weeks earlier and having the end come quickly. Relatively little pain, as compared to say my grandmother who was on morphine for months once it was in her bones, and you have enough time to handle what is important to you but not enough to really dwell on what is coming up. Then again some would say there's never enough time, but in this case it could have been worse.
Unfortunately since I completely eschewed all work or even touching anything but my main inboxes over the last few days, my to-do list is a bit overwhelming and my life for the next several days will be nothing but checking them off one by one with pots of coffee handy and fondly remember what a pillow on my cheek feels like.
Posted by drunkenbatmanJuly 21, 2004, at 06:25 PM
Comments (9)
Posted by: ssp at July 21, 2004 08:13 PM
Hey, we had Expo 2000 in Hannover. A lot of cultural things there (though most a bit bland and tourism focused), a bit like a theme park for grown ups.
They even had a Kraftwerk song for it.
As far as 'travelators' go, I'm all for it. They're particularly good when going up and down as well. Paris Charles de Gaulle aiport is travelator heaven in that respect.
Posted by: Klenke at July 21, 2004 11:02 PM
Asimov described your "Slidewalks" or strips in "The Caves of Steel" (1954)
"As is normal with Asimov, the tale is heavy on dialogue and light on action. There is one stand-out chase scene, though, which proves that the author was quite capable of writing action sequences when inclined to do so. In it, Baley and Olivaw are being followed and seek to escape along the Strips. These are moving sidewalks, each one faster than the next, so as you step across them your speed increases until you're flying along at near 90mph. By cunning manoeuvring, the two investigators elude their pursuers; hopping from fast strips to slow ones so that the followers zoom past, then jumping across to a fast strip at an intersection and so forth. It's a great sequence just screaming to be given the Hollywood treatment." - http://homepage.ntlworld.com/m.hodder/cavessteel.html
Posted by: porter_chick at July 22, 2004 12:32 AM
Sorry to hear about your aunt Michael. Hang in there, it was nice to see you this weekend.
Posted by: Chris Hanson at July 22, 2004 03:23 AM
You'd probably enjoy Heinlein's short story "The Roads Must Roll" then. Travelators exactly as you describe...
Posted by: ledge at July 22, 2004 10:51 AM
Glad to see someone got to the Asimov and Heinlein references before I did. Good taste in literature out there then.
Heinlein even invented the Segway in the series of short stories that include "The Roads Must Roll"! No seriously! Ok, so it only had one wheel and people sat on it rather than standing, but still it was a self-balancing device that maintenance workers rode on inside the underground tunnels that serviced the rolling roads to get from place to place that would be too inconvenient to walk but not roomy enough for a normal vehicle.
Posted by: drunkenbatman at July 24, 2004 01:27 AM
Hey, cool, thanks for the reading references, I've jotted them down for the next time I'm at the used bookstore. I love reading those older books, even things like "have space suit, will travel"... they can be a little corny, but they just have this... spirit about them.
That period is kind of considered to be one of conformity... track housing, suits and ties... but it was "hey, cool, I'll be able to have a jet pack" and not "holy shit, my neighbor might be able to have a jet pack and kill us all. think of the children and pass a law". Both ideas have merit, but there's something to be said for that... spirit.
Posted by: d.w. at July 29, 2004 03:10 PM
I wrote a post about World’s Fairs after reading a book called ‘Devil In The White City’ (about the 1893 Chicago fair) last year.
Posted by: Glen at August 5, 2004 01:41 AM
Yes, I've always called them "slidewalks" since I read about them in science fiction stories back in the '60s. I think it's a perfect name, and I wish it were more widely adopted instead of silly terms like "people mover" that I see used in the airports.
I once convinced the wife that one could buy an anti-gravity belt. :)