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180 Comments
- Chewie67, on 10/12/2007, -3/+107I like it.
Yeah, they may not be the prettiest things in the world, but rather than taking up new green space for a windmill, why not just build over what's already been developed? - crazyman, on 10/12/2007, -3/+86Personally I they actually are quite attractive. What compared with the rest of the high-way. When you are on the high-way I don't think you worry about aesthetics.
- gharding, on 10/12/2007, -1/+66Darwin will be teaching the birds how to not fly into turbines.
- kr8tr, on 10/12/2007, -5/+46I live right next to a major freeway (Loop 410, in San Antonio). I ALWAYS have a breeze in my yard - the open space of the freeway allows wind to just funnel down the lanes.
This is a brilliant idea! - violentvinyl, on 10/12/2007, -6/+43"I got charged $2000 to my insurance for a run of gaurd rail after i pushed into it by another car."
You need a better lawyer/insurance company. - razrielle, on 10/12/2007, -8/+41@cerialthriller
I dugg you down for poor grammar, spelling, and etiquette - thcobbs, on 10/12/2007, -3/+32Well, since you'd been thinking about it.... Why didnt' you propose it?
- mtvkilledusall, on 10/12/2007, -5/+33More energy innovation like this is what we need. I've been wondering how long it would take for someone to propose something like this.
- m0laria, on 10/12/2007, -0/+26Dude, they go OVER the road, not IN the road...
- ngonzales80, on 10/12/2007, -15/+41@cerialthriller
I logged in just to digg you down. - ericdano, on 10/12/2007, -0/+26Wind, but what about solar? The freeways and roads in California are regular ovens most of the year.......
- atbnet, on 10/12/2007, -0/+25How often do you see the overhead signs that have up now just randomly fall down and smash cars?
- Twango, on 10/12/2007, -1/+21Good use for wasted space. Again, not *the* solution, but yet another of dozens of ways to harvest energy that'll be part of the mix. Energy is all over the place. Like the main walkways in shopping malls, and in the millions of gyms where people sweat to heat the air.
I'd put the same money into tidal collectors instead. Water is 1000 times as dense as air. - dementia, on 10/12/2007, -5/+23That would just cause you to burn more gasoline when driving
- LDawg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+17Dude, did you even look at the story??
- strictnein, on 10/12/2007, -2/+19@cerialthriller:
I also live in a "no-fault" state and here's how it works. Someone hits you. If you don't hear from their insurance company by the next morning, you call _their_ insurance company to arrange repairs to your car.
Someone hit my car in the morning. That morning I went to get an estimate for the repairs from a quality repair shop. Later that day _their_ insurance company called me and I faxed them the $1900 estimate. That evening I got an approval from _their_ insurance company for the repairs. My insurance company didn't hear a thing about it until I called them a week later, and they said "We don't care about what happens, unless it was your fault and we have to pay for it". - hijinks, on 10/12/2007, -0/+15all modern wind turbines rotate very slowly but produce a lot of energy. The days of new turbines killing birds are over.. I doubt these would move fast either
- nonymous666, on 10/12/2007, -1/+16They do something similar in Germany... the median and shoulder strips of the Autobahn and other highways have major portions of them lined with huge solar panels that feed the electricity they produce into the public power grid.
- m0laria, on 10/12/2007, -1/+13@scagnetti
No, I've never heard of sarcasm because I was raised in the wild by a species of wolf incapable of understanding it. - NickDaddyKing, on 10/12/2007, -2/+14i know im gonna sound like an idiot when i say this but.... solar paneled sides would also be nice
- strictnein, on 10/12/2007, -3/+15@cerialthriller: the fact that your insurance company took a hit because another car ran into you is the issue here. Unless you somehow didn't get a license plate from the car that hit you, I don't see how that would ever be the case.
- JCSaint, on 10/12/2007, -2/+13I wonder if the center dividers would be as structurally sound as before with these little wind catcher in them. The whole point of those things is to make sure accidents don't spill across both sides of a highway. It's a great idea I just hope it's practical.
- feralwombat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11@cerialthriller
Until recently, I held an insurance license and issued/handled auto policies for the State of NJ. What you are describing is completely inaccurate. If that is how your insurance company chose to handle it, they are screwing you over. What your insurance company decided to do is just pay off the claim as it is cheaper than going to court. In your policy it states they must go to court for you unless it is clear that you are at fault. In the case you describe it does not sound like that at all, though I cannot see your claim so it would make it hard to see the facts.
No-fault insurance is not at all what you describe, and in no state--absolutely including NJ--does no-fault insurance apply to physical damage of property, only bodily injury. I'm not sure where you get this 50/50 claim from, but your insurance company should subrogate against the insurance of the vehicle owner that hit you. The only way it would be a 50/50 is if you were determined to be 50 percent at fault for the accident and the two insurance companies decide to split the costs and move on. Also, points would be added to your insurance. These are completely different than driver's license points. Check your policy and talk with your agent about how many points you have. If you have any points (since you claimed a previous clear record) than you were determined to be partially at-fault for the accident. This has nothing to do with NJ's no-fault insurance.
The NJ no-fault insurance is chosen at the time you sign up for the policy. You have the option to waive your right to sue another driver if they cause you bodily injury, except for in cases of extreme trauma, disability, death, dismemberment, etc. If you do not waive this option, your premium is quite a bit higher.
In your policy you have something called Property Damage Liability Coverage. This--as found on the NJ Dept of Banking and Insurance Web site--states, "Pays for claims and lawsuits by people whose property is damaged as a result of an accident you cause."
There may be Uninsured/Underinsured Motorists Coverage on your policy, depending on what you selected. If the person that hit you did not have enough insurance to cover the damage to your vehicle, your policy would pay out up to the limits you purchased. This type of coverage does NOT add any cost to your policy if your insurance company has to use it as you were not determined to be at fault for the accident.
You really should click this link and download the pdf from the NJ DOBI Web site:
http://www.nj.gov/dobi/acrobat/everythingauto2006.pdf
Back on topic... wind turbines would be fantastic if they could make them safe and efficient. Anyway to capture wasted energy on a reasonable scale is worth the effort. - don_corpus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10I wouldn't have thought it would be necessary. Wind turbines hardly spin very quickly.
- strictnein, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10"soft car metal"???
Do you own a Kia? - underthelinux, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10Wait, why not expand that idea?
Why just on freeways - if the wind is the idea, why not in between buildings... where there is a natural wind tunnel? Smaller versions, of course. I can think of a few places where there's always breeze, just because the buildings/hills/structures create a "tunnel." - jynxedu, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9Why not just equip prisons with GIANT hamster wheels and let them earn their keep?
- digguserer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8@omegapoint
I was going to digg you down.. Until I googled a bit.
http://www.tfhrc.gov/pubrds/mayjun00/onemileinfive.htm
Just one more thing to blame the horrible US education system for misinforming me of. A side corrallary to this is that because Germany's roads have far fewer straight sections, driver fatigue is much less of an issue and there are fewer fatigue related accidents (like falling asleep at the wheel), so straight roads being safer is debatable if not totally false. - razrielle, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9How would the electricity get to the power grid, metal wheels?
/sarcasm - Gene04, on 10/12/2007, -4/+11Its an excellent idea, there is no need to clear space for wind turbines. The only question is, how would they implement safety mechanisms for birds and other flying species?
- noisician, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9yep, that's why so many insurance companies have stopped covering auto insurance in NJ
- Mojave, on 10/12/2007, -7/+14You're right, it's not a closed system, but in order to determine its effectiveness, you have to think of it in those terms.
A car moving through a calm area will create a small wind, which uses energy. If you now introduce a windmill, that wind will power the windmill, but will create more drag on the car, requiring more energy.
Another way to think about it. A moving car will create turbulence behind it which can be used to pull another vehicle along. If another car or motorcycle gets behind your car, there will be more drag on your car, which will require more energy, even though the turbulence that is sucking the other car along is past you. That's not the best explanation in the world, but hope it makes some sense. - jspegele, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8@m0laria
You expect us to believe that you were raised by wolves, and on top of that, you expect us to believe that those wolves didn't teach you how to understand sarcasm?? How much of a moron can you be? - JCSaint, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8They look like they have a grate but they'd be less effective if junk and ice clog them. Which leads me to wonder what maintenance for these things might be like. "Lane closed for wind turbine repair." ugh
- DreKor, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7That's why you need to make them cheap, and easy to replace. Engineers can do all kinds of cool stuff.
- omegapoint, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Certain strips of road are straight simply for reasons of civil engineering necessities, safety, and for driver comfort. The thing about roads needing to be straight for airplanes to land is an urban myth.
- jimsf, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7This is a great idea and I also like ericdano's idea about using soloar on our highways too. All of this makes perfect sense.
- edm1950, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9probably about a hundred times a year. Personally I've seen signs fall 5 times so far.
- rnwen2750, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6irvman21 - What? Some "environmentalists" may be against them, but all the ones I know think that any step in the right direction is a good one.
- deanshultz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5to PurpleDrink: "the point of digging isn't to be a grammar teacher. Why people do this, I don't know..."
Sorry, cannot let this one pass...
To participate in these forums, others must understand the point(s) made. It is, at a minimum, rude to expect that others mentally correct another's grammar, in effect doing the other's work.
The purpose of grammar and spelling is to facilitate clear communication. Otherwise, the recipient has to figure out what the speaker meant. That leads to misunderstandings. Further, I don't want to know what someone 'kinda' meant. You want to persuade me? Communicate with me. Don’t ask me to do your job.
We expect people who live in the good ol' U.S. of A. to speak 'merican and get indignantly-righteously-damn-pissed when they don't. Yet we let slide all sorts of grammatical, spelling, and logic errors from those who should know better. There are people born outside of but who work in the U.S. and speak English as their second language, yet write better posts than the one we are discussing. That's just lazy, imho.
No one is asking for perfect prose here. What I expect and so should you is clarity - good grammar and correct spelling make that happen. However, if a post is littered with typos, run-ons, and half-truths that would grow an oak from Pinocchio, I automatically dismiss the person as uneducated and their opinion without merit.
If people want to participate in these forums, know the language.
Grammar and spelling do count. - DeadlyBrad42, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I know money is the most important thing ever, but it wouldn't kill you to try to spread an idea that could just help out everyone for no personal gain.
- elf25, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8yea, and chunks of ice flying off the spinning blades of death into my car windshield....
- Mojave, on 10/12/2007, -11/+16While this sounds like a brilliant idea, there is an energy conservation issue. The extra gasoline required to counteract the increased drag on the car created by the turbines, while very very small, would probably cancel out the very very small amount of electricity created by each car.
On the other hand, if these were installed on downgrades, where cars are coasting or braking, then there would be a gain. - zoom1928, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6atbnet, that's not really a valid point considering how light most signs are. They also don't have the extra weight of the blades and generators along with the vibration from the blades. One local company found-out that the hard way when trying to build windmills from the same monolithic poles they had used for cellphone towers. Even when overspecing a great deal, the windmills require much stronger foundations and posts than you would first think.
- benitojuarez, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5what about the damn mini ramp things that go on on/offramps and generate electricity when you drive over em?
- omegapoint, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8You are absolutely correct, the windmills would not in any way create more resistance. I think the folks who are saying it would are misapplying some basic physics about energy in a closed system.
- willcode4beer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4The relative straightness probably has more to do with being cheaper to build, (considering a straight road is shorter), since it is inversely proportional to safety.
- VeganG, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5They could color them and make some crazy trippy effects!
- Elliuotatar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Sticking thousands of turbines along highways seems like an awfully complicated and inefficient way to gather energy. You've got all those moving parts to deal with.
It seems to me that putting pipes under the roadway to collect all the thermal energy from the sun and vehicles heating the roadway would be a much simpler and more efficient solution. Also, one could use the pipes to melt ice on the roadway in the winter.
Downside is to do that you have to tear up the roadway, or install them when the road is being constructed. - getliquified, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4great idea
this would be a step in the right direction to rid ourselves of fossil fuel use -
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