7 ms·

It's very difficult to make thousands of up-front planning decisions perfectly. It'd be even more costly to try to perfect every aspect upfront within the plann

by lhnz 3y ago

It's very difficult to make thousands of up-front planning decisions perfectly. It'd be even more costly to try to perfect every aspect upfront within the planning stage and it'd be more reasonable to make best attempts but to provide for the ability (and budget) to retrofit bespoke alterations to fix problems that arise at a later date.

AlecSchueler 3y ago
But surely it should be simple enough to look at what alterations have been made on other lines already and start off from a basis that is at least as good.
- vidarh 3y ago
  Or they decided it was an opportunity to test potential improvements. Testing them on a new line where fixing any "improvements" that don't pan out will be perceived as an improvement might well be better than testing them on an old line where any regressions will be immediately perceived as such...
- martyvis 3y ago
  With a constant rotation of contractors and the government staff overseeing them, offering innovative solutions at a better price than the next bidder, opportunities to learn from experience are difficult to achieve with large multi year projects
- lhnz 3y ago
  The design and planning process for UK infrastructure is already notoriously expensive and we already do significantly more "planning" than we used to do 100 years ago (when we were actually capable of rapidly building high quality infrastructure). I would expect there to already be consultants doing similar to what you've suggested however the work is complex and many will be quite cut-off from the build process or only around in the short-term.
  - bluGill 3y ago
    while 100 years ago we built rapidly, there was a large cost in human lives. Planning is part of how we solved that - only part of it, but it is a factor.
  - AlecSchueler 3y ago
    Sounds like many of these issues could be described with better knowledge sharing and more tightly coupled processes between planning/building/maintenence. It sounds quite fatalistic what you've said, that we've basically reached maximum planning saturation so we can only pay the costs afterwards when things go wrong. But surely questioning these assumptions is good for our civic involvement and for the lines.
    - lhnz 3y ago
      I agree that it would be fatalistic to not try to improve the situation using technology, I'm just trying to explain what happens as you try to do so with more planning.
Wytwwww 3y ago
> difficult to make thousands of up-front planning decisions perfectly. So don't. Just use something well tried and tested and don't try to be innovative (in areas we you can't dedicated significant amounts of resources for up-front planning)
- concordDance 3y ago
  This seems a bit defeatist. Some hope for and striving for improvement is good for a society.
  - captaincrisp 3y ago
    I feel the point is a bit subtler. We should strive for improvement. We should also understand that that takes more than the normal amount of resources to do something different and better & either commit to spending what's required or, if we can't afford to, use something already proven instead. The half-done or broken improvements still get called "innovations" and give innovation overall a worse reputation.
    - kergonath 3y ago
      > I feel the point is a bit subtler. We should strive for improvement. We should also understand that that takes more than the normal amount of resources to do something different and better & either commit to spending what's required or, if we can't afford to, use something already proven instead. Indeed. I wish this point were articulated that way more often. > The half-done or broken improvements still get called "innovations" and give innovation overall a worse reputation. We fetishise innovation as an abstract concept, for good reasons because you cannot have progress without innovation. What we tend to miss is that while innovation is good, some specific innovations are terrible. This is particularly infuriating when they are re-surfacing old, solved problems. Looking at wall tiling for example (or the cladding that can be found in much of the Underground): this was a good solution to a common problem. Bare concrete walls have obvious downsides, which is why we don’t tend to use them in building anymore. Doing away with tiling or cladding sounds like an architect being innovative, but if the replacement does not solve the problem, it’s a regression. It will look modern and clean as long as it will be properly maintained, which is to say for about a year, and then it will decay the way concrete does. It will eventually be clad, or reviled as a post-modern monstrosity the way some bad brutalist buildings are today. Innovation for innovation’s sake is cargo culting progress. This is giving innovation a bad name.

by lhnz 3y ago

AlecSchueler 3y ago

But surely it should be simple enough to look at what alterations have been made on other lines already and start off from a basis that is at least as good.

vidarh 3y ago
Or they decided it was an opportunity to test potential improvements. Testing them on a new line where fixing any "improvements" that don't pan out will be perceived as an improvement might well be better than testing them on an old line where any regressions will be immediately perceived as such...
martyvis 3y ago
With a constant rotation of contractors and the government staff overseeing them, offering innovative solutions at a better price than the next bidder, opportunities to learn from experience are difficult to achieve with large multi year projects
lhnz 3y ago
The design and planning process for UK infrastructure is already notoriously expensive and we already do significantly more "planning" than we used to do 100 years ago (when we were actually capable of rapidly building high quality infrastructure). I would expect there to already be consultants doing similar to what you've suggested however the work is complex and many will be quite cut-off from the build process or only around in the short-term.
- bluGill 3y ago
  while 100 years ago we built rapidly, there was a large cost in human lives. Planning is part of how we solved that - only part of it, but it is a factor.
- AlecSchueler 3y ago
  Sounds like many of these issues could be described with better knowledge sharing and more tightly coupled processes between planning/building/maintenence. It sounds quite fatalistic what you've said, that we've basically reached maximum planning saturation so we can only pay the costs afterwards when things go wrong. But surely questioning these assumptions is good for our civic involvement and for the lines.
  - lhnz 3y ago
    I agree that it would be fatalistic to not try to improve the situation using technology, I'm just trying to explain what happens as you try to do so with more planning.

Wytwwww 3y ago

> difficult to make thousands of up-front planning decisions perfectly. So don't. Just use something well tried and tested and don't try to be innovative (in areas we you can't dedicated significant amounts of resources for up-front planning)

concordDance 3y ago
This seems a bit defeatist. Some hope for and striving for improvement is good for a society.
- captaincrisp 3y ago
  I feel the point is a bit subtler. We should strive for improvement. We should also understand that that takes more than the normal amount of resources to do something different and better & either commit to spending what's required or, if we can't afford to, use something already proven instead. The half-done or broken improvements still get called "innovations" and give innovation overall a worse reputation.
  - kergonath 3y ago
    > I feel the point is a bit subtler. We should strive for improvement. We should also understand that that takes more than the normal amount of resources to do something different and better & either commit to spending what's required or, if we can't afford to, use something already proven instead. Indeed. I wish this point were articulated that way more often. > The half-done or broken improvements still get called "innovations" and give innovation overall a worse reputation. We fetishise innovation as an abstract concept, for good reasons because you cannot have progress without innovation. What we tend to miss is that while innovation is good, some specific innovations are terrible. This is particularly infuriating when they are re-surfacing old, solved problems. Looking at wall tiling for example (or the cladding that can be found in much of the Underground): this was a good solution to a common problem. Bare concrete walls have obvious downsides, which is why we don’t tend to use them in building anymore. Doing away with tiling or cladding sounds like an architect being innovative, but if the replacement does not solve the problem, it’s a regression. It will look modern and clean as long as it will be properly maintained, which is to say for about a year, and then it will decay the way concrete does. It will eventually be clad, or reviled as a post-modern monstrosity the way some bad brutalist buildings are today. Innovation for innovation’s sake is cargo culting progress. This is giving innovation a bad name.