The History of Transportation

Then, you may find this interesting...

Most of the vehicles and modes of transportation we use today use petroleum or fossil fuels for power (in some form).

But believe it or not, throughout most of the history of transportation, horses were man's primary way of getting from one place to another. It wasn't really until the 1800's that powered vehicles, especially those using gasoline engines, were discovered and used.

Here is the timeline of the most significant moments in the history of transportation on the earth:

Transportation Time-line

Pre-Industrial

Industrial

Why are fossil fuels still used?

Presently, we use gasoline engines to power most vehicles and machinery.

We tend to use technologies that are more readily available to us, simply because they are easier to use on a daily basis and it's more costly and difficult to switch to other methods in "mid-stream".

Let's face fact, petroleum (currently) is cheaper to deliver and use.

Fossil fuels have been the "norm" for quite some period of time. For anyone born after 1930, gasoline-driven automobiles and machinery have been a part of our everyday lives in the civilized world since we were born.

It would seem (or has seemed until recently) almost impossible to try to live without them or to suddenly stop using oil and gas.

Producing and distributing fossil fuels has become commonplace and relatively easy, as the infrastructure is already in place. This is the primary reason for us still using gasoline in our cars.

Practically everything we use or own that has any type of engine in or on it uses petroleum. Setting up the infrastructure for a new technology (both for distributing and refueling) is extremely difficult and costly.

But, why haven't other technologies worked over gasoline?

Let's take a look...

Methods Already Tried

When looking back through the history of transportation, you can see that alternative methods of moving about are not a "new" idea by any means. Just looking at our simple time-line above, you see a few attempts at using other things (other than fossil fuels) were already made by others at different times.

1.) Steam Power

It's well-known that steam-powered boats were used for years on rivers and lakes. But, these were shortly replaced by bigger, more powerful diesel-engine propelled ships (Petroleum "triumphs" again).

Nicolas Joseph Cugnot's 1769 road vehicle only traveled at a maximum speed of 2 1/2 mph. Nicolas was, however, ahead of his time in that the vehicle was powered by steam and not by men or horses. It was also used to carry heavy loads - it performed work.

Other inventor's actually built and used smaller steam-driven cars in the years after Nicolas' apparatus came on the scene.

The Stanley Family sold the Stanley Steamer between 1896 and 1924. It worked rather well. The Stanley Steamer's only real problem was longevity - as it had to be frequently refilled with water and could not hold enough, or carry enough, for long trips.

Abner Doble created the Doble Steam Car and the Paxton Phoenix Steam Car. These were also rather innovative ideas for their time.

So, what prevented these ideas from being used or accepted?

These steam-driven cars were initially too expensive to make and sell - and not many people could readily afford them at the time.

(Again, cost was a significant factor).

Not having enough people to buy them caused demand for them to plummet - and eventually, they were unable to make them and stay in business.

Three other things "killed" the steam-driven cars -

• Invention of the electric starter - This eliminated the manual engine crank for internal-combustion engines - which was extremely dangerous and known for being able to break a man's arms if the engine ever back-fired.


• Henry Ford's successful use of the assembly line - This allowed the Model-T to become cheaper and easier to manufacture and, therefore, more affordable and available for the masses to buy and use.


• Startup times - Steam-powered cars were known to take as long as 45 minutes to start on a cold morning. People thought this was really inconvenient. Gasoline cars with electric start were, therefore, more in demand and people thought they were the better (more convenient) of the 2 choices.

2.) Electric Power

Electric cars were first created in 1832 by a man from Scotland named Robert Anderson. And, American Thomas Davenport and Scotsman Robert Davidson improved upon those original ideas in 1842.

A man from France by the name of Gaston Plante invented a better storage battery shortly thereafter.

The electric car was also improved upon by Thomas Edison and others who followed in their footsteps over a half century later.

Again, what happened? Why didn't we continue using electric power?

Throughout the history of transportation, we see that these original carriages were VERY small in size.

"How small?" you ask? Well, very small.

They were called "carriages" because of their size, which was not large enough for anything serious. Two to four persons and very little luggage could actually be transported with them.

And they faced the same obstacles that steam-driven cars did at about the same time -

• Distance - Electric cars at the time could only go about 18 miles before the batteries needed to be replaced. There were no "rechargeable" batteries at the time.


• Roads - During and after the 1920s, highways were built that allowed people to travel longer distances with greater ease. Gasoline cars could handle those distances much better.


• Cost - After Henry Ford invented the assembly line, gasoline cars were mass-produced and were available at half the price of the electric cars of the time.


• Oil Prices - Texas crude oil was discovered. Oil and gasoline prices were cheaper and cheaper. Having a gasoline car (at the time) was economical compared to the electric car.

Hopefully this understanding can help us clearly and optimistically look to the future for what it holds for all of us on Planet Earth as we begin using these newer technologies more and more.

Return from History of Transportation to
Alternative Energy Transportation

Return from History of Transportation to
Home Page