15 Comments
User's avatar
Jennifer Depew, R.D.'s avatar

Next time I design a cloned dinosaur park I will definitely avoid the tram design flaw.

Expand full comment
Yassine Meskhout's avatar

Thank you, that's all I ask for.

Expand full comment
Greg Stark's avatar

I remember riding in a trolley bus in the 1960s with my mom to go visit my grandmother. At intersections of big streets with their own trolley lines the sky looked like a giant spider web of criss-crossing wires.

Expand full comment
Eric F. ONeill's avatar

Cities in the western US are completely different from the denser cities of Europe and the eastern US. Trams are completely wasted here, buses only marginally less. The only public transportation that makes sense is some kind of variant of Uber/Lyft.

Expand full comment
Noah Pardo-Friedman's avatar

I’m no expert, but it seems to me that could change. We could choose to build cities in such a way that transit makes more sense, and I think that’s a good idea.

Expand full comment
Eric F. ONeill's avatar

Do you live in the Western US? Short of complete compulsion, that is NEVER going to happen.

Expand full comment
Noah Pardo-Friedman's avatar

What makes you say that? Minds can change. Or are you making more of a logistical argument?

Expand full comment
J'myle Koretz's avatar

Jurassic Park was an insurance scam?

Does that mean Michael Lewis is going to turn it into a book called "The Big-Toothed Short"?

Expand full comment
Joe Bloggs's avatar

I find trams a lot more comfortable than buses, because you’re not bouncing around as much and they’re quieter ( than diesel buses). Also, they make for much nicer streets because they’re quieter and cars are deprioritised.

Expand full comment
J'myle Koretz's avatar

For one of it's five trolley lines, Salt Lake City looked at a five-lane street that's the biggest east-west corridor in town—and found a right-of-way a block and a half south that just barely fits one track and a sidewalk!

The trains only pass each other at stations, and the route is the best urban jogging and dog walking east of the Mississippi!

Try it if you ever pass through SLC. Salt Lake: now with twice as many interesting things to do—four!

Expand full comment
spinagon's avatar

Jeeps only being able to drive on pre-approved routes is a feature, not a bug. You don't want tourists getting lost in the jungle and being eaten by a T. rex

Expand full comment
Eric F. ONeill's avatar

Both. The cost would be prohibitive. But even more, the west has a libertarian streak which would be impossible to break without gross compulsion. And since the western US is heavily armed, that’s not going to happen. The second amendment is not going away anytime soon.

Expand full comment
Dirk's avatar

Tourists getting their rental bikes stuck in tram rails is one of the traditional sights kf Amsterdam, I wouldn’t have it any other way

Expand full comment
St Paul Dad Guy's avatar

The only benefit I can think of for that weird electric jeep transportation system is no one has to drive, and everyone can spend the whole time looking at dinosaurs

Expand full comment
J'myle Koretz's avatar

A ski-lift at a height one foot higher than the park's tallest dinosaur would probably have been cheaper.

And the movie would still have been suspenseful—and with the length of time a person can stand being trapped on a ski lift with Jeff Goldblum without jumping to certain death being roughly equal to the running time of a summer blockbuster, Spielberg could have made the whole thing one take!

Expand full comment