The "Elektromote", the world's first trolleybus,[6] in Berlin, Germany, 1882. Maybe New York is lacking the infrastructure, but the technology has existed for a long time. A trolleybus may be expensive to implement in rural areas but in the biggest city in the USA it should be quite cost effective.
I don’t think a street plowing operation would work best on overhead. When you’re plowing the trolley pole would likely dewire.
The answer to me is just living without being able to plow for 12 hours straight charge up in between, and buy some more trucks or battery packs to run shifts. Just ask if diesel plow trucks didn’t exist - what would you do?
That's a nice point for some aspects: we have (had) all over the world trolleybus of various kinds, those on rails have some co-existence with cars and asphalts issues (like slippery passages for bikes, complex ops when the asphalt need to be re-do etc) but beside that have worked HYPER well for decades. Those on tires have proven to be full of issues to a point most who have had them have given up.
I see so far no feasibility study about:
- converting highways to rails with dual-usage vehicles (all vehicles, cars and trucks banning bikes) so vehicles can run normally on road but for just the long range usage they run full electric form grid, converting them to wheels only for going out or maneuvering on a faulty vehicles;
- crafting a urban rail network again at least for some "important traversing roads".
Perhaps the result would be negative anyway, but at least a broad simulation with public discussion, some eventual experiment etc...
Trolley rails seem carefully designed to be deathtraps for bicycles, as if someone looked up bicycle wheel widths and depths, grip on varius surfaces, etc., then tested iteration to come up with the rails. Still, if it reduces carbon output, I'm all for it.
There is usually separation between tram tracks and cycling lanes. It really isn’t a problem unless you mix them -- the only place I’ve had a wheel caught is Amsterdam, where pedestrians/bike/trams share the space.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromote
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolleybus