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News Wire: Why did it take so long to roll out PTC? Because 'it had never been done before'

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Posted by charlie hebdo on Friday, May 3, 2019 9:02 AM

BaltACD

 

 
Ulrich
I don't think the moon landing and PTC can really be fairly compared. The moon landing was a massive effort involving the entire country and its resources. PTC is not a national effort.. it is a significant undertaking nonetheless but without comparable public resources available to make it happen. And PTC is a system that has to work well  indefinitely once implemented.. the moonshot, on the other hand  was initially a one time endeavor where everything had to work just exactly right for that one very finite mission. 

 

It may not be the proper comparison, however, that is the one the gets thrown in the face of those explaining why it has taken 'so long' to bring PTC to reality.

 

 

Try that line of 'reasoning' with the folks at NASA.

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Posted by rdamon on Friday, May 3, 2019 7:29 AM

Let's not forget the other costs

https://www.space.com/17338-apollo-1.html

 

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Posted by BaltACD on Tuesday, April 30, 2019 4:43 PM

Ulrich
I don't think the moon landing and PTC can really be fairly compared. The moon landing was a massive effort involving the entire country and its resources. PTC is not a national effort.. it is a significant undertaking nonetheless but without comparable public resources available to make it happen. And PTC is a system that has to work well  indefinitely once implemented.. the moonshot, on the other hand  was initially a one time endeavor where everything had to work just exactly right for that one very finite mission. 

It may not be the proper comparison, however, that is the one the gets thrown in the face of those explaining why it has taken 'so long' to bring PTC to reality.

 

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by Electroliner 1935 on Tuesday, April 30, 2019 2:43 PM

BaltACD
The come back for some, is that Man got to the Moon less than 10 years after Kennedy laid down the challenge.  

Dispatcher, "We have a Problem"

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Posted by Ulrich on Tuesday, April 30, 2019 2:41 PM

I don't think the moon landing and PTC can really be fairly compared. The moon landing was a massive effort involving the entire country and its resources. PTC is not a national effort.. it is a significant undertaking nonetheless but without comparable public resources available to make it happen. And PTC is a system that has to work well  indefinitely once implemented.. the moonshot, on the other hand  was initially a one time endeavor where everything had to work just exactly right for that one very finite mission. 

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Posted by BaltACD on Tuesday, April 30, 2019 11:35 AM

For PTC to be implemented it had to be invented and developed to a production level product for use by multiple carriers under a myriad of differing conditions.

The come back for some, is that Man got to the Moon less than 10 years after Kennedy laid down the challenge.  

Were 'Man to the Moon' to have been a PTC type mandate, there should be routine 'passenger trips' available to the public to the Moon and return, in perfect safety.

Space travel, even today, is nowhere near 'perfectly safe'; 40 years after the first trip to the Moon.

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by Brian Schmidt on Monday, April 29, 2019 2:02 PM

When Congress decided in 2008 to mandate the nation’s railroads install positive train control, railroads initially had less than a decade to bring the technology to fruition. But, first, they had to develop it since there was no off-the-shelf...

http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2019/04/29-why-did-it-take-so-long-to-roll-out-ptc-because-it-had-never-been-done-before

Brian Schmidt, Editor, Classic Trains magazine

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