Good day my good friend.

I just wanted to say to you all: thank you. At the start of autumn, I set you a challenge. Help to raise £400 for the Trussell Trust through sponsorship and paid subscriptions by the end of March. You smashed it!! The amount from paid subscriptions and from sponsors committed so far is £420.

That will make a real difference to hungry families across the UK who are really being squeezed hard by the cost of living. I honestly cannot ever thank you enough.

But, a met target means a stretched target, and we still have 2 and half months to raise more. That is why I need your help in achieving £500 being donated. So, offer to sponsor (email me about that), become a paid subscriber (click the button at the end of this newsletter), or if you want, just donate directly. Whatever you do, thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. You’re brilliant!

If you have any suggestions for interesting news items or bits of research to include in this newsletter, you can email me.

James

Integrating parcels and passengers – Its not an issue of being a bad idea

Every so often, I hear of someone coming up with the great idea of combining deliveries and passengers into vehicles. And there is a study on it, like this one published yesterday (and here’s another one from just over a year ago – search Google Scholar, there are loads), saying its a great idea. As if its never been tried before. In fact, you can experience it for yourself, if you fancy forgoing the flight and spending the better part of a week crossing the Atlantic on a container ship.

What is needed is work to overcome the actual barriers to delivering this in practice, more extensively. Liability, comfort, trying to match up the dynamics of demand on both sides (which are increasingly on demand) – business barriers, not the technical ones. As far as I can see, no work is being done on tackling this. Not even any research on understanding this issue. So, please, no more simulations showing potential. Work on the problems.

Breaking the flying law, but not to impress your mates

Drones and the use of remote operated aerial vehicles and the rules governing them can be a sore topic. Just ask Gatwick Airport. But, many places across the world, including here in the UK, are advancing the deployment of such vehicles as an economic opportunity. As well as doing something slightly more worthwhile, like dropping essential supplies into rural areas. So, how do we get people to keep to the rules?

This study from New Zealand provides a partial answer, and some interesting initial insight. Most of the findings are not a shock – a handful of idiots ruin it for most people. But what I found interesting was the role of flying clubs. Who, having established rules and social norms, saw higher compliance with the rules. Maybe this is a way of ensuring compliance? All drones need to be a member of a club. I like that idea of social pressure, though I’m unsure how workable it is!

Random things

These links are meant to make you think about the things that affect our world in transport, and not just think about transport itself. I hope that you enjoy them.

• How flood forecasts in real time with block-by-block data could save lives (Ars Technica)

• England and Wales’ most overcrowded cities (City Monitor)

• Rainforest Carbon Offsets Used by Major Corporations ‘Largely Worthless’: Analysis (Common Dreams)

• What a Long, Strange Trip to Kill Four Dams (Daily Yonder)

• Doing surveys ethically: Practical tips (World Bank)

Something interesting

I won’t comment on most of these technologies, many of which seem to be a solution looking for a problem. But the road rollers do actually look useful. I find it insane that we still do roadworks where often all that protects workers is traffic cones. Maybe an example of car brain?

If you do nothing else today, then do this

Jonn Elledge’s Newsletter of (Not Quite) Everything is always worth a read. But yesterday’s was particularly entertaining, especially the links on the New York Subway being colourful. Plus some wibblings about the Tube Map.