just extraordinary. we are the specialists of the lifestyle europe your romance. in 30 minutes on d. w. sometimes books are more exciting than real life. raring to read. oh. what if there's no escape? w literature list, laundry, german ma, street. london's iconic black cabs get an electric transformation, buses and kronos evolved to go driver free and trans racing driver. charlie martin on how embracing her authentic self helped her excel right now. on red

with the black cat, london's unofficial mascot now drives through the city electrically with how bad the old tabs were. the noise, you know, that they usually did come foot, you cramped up, that they, she so she moved, obviously utilizing poking it got there are missions i still managed to which finally the icon, it look about it. this is probably one of the most recognized vehicles in the world exactly like the black runabouts that dotted the london cityscape for over a century. ah, the best of the old traditions,

but merit with new technology holds a special place in that in the hearts of many people. peter powell has driven a cab in london for 27 years and he loves his job. is quite unique clearly because you're in charge of yourself auditorium. you you got a freedom to go out to work to shoot your life. stop driving through london and one of those iconic black tabs is special. even today we retain the tradition of the about the black cap. we've always been voted the the best taxi service in the world. the traditions with i'm only took the. busy out the taxes are like, as in all i come, but the already found boxes in the boxes. despite his love of

tradition, peter is happy that he's swapped his diesel cat for an electric one smooth is and that comfortable is a. it takes a lot of stress out of your day that this is so smooth, you got to read. jim bright, came to makes it loveliest, mover everything. the whole world experience. you fantastic. only the see the company that now builds the electric cans in a new factory near coventry has shaped the london taxi trade since 19 o 8. using the technical underpinnings of an austin. they developed the boxy body variance of the theme, to london cats. the f. explore, introduced in 1958 was the company's most popular model and one, all its successors had been based on but the 2080 mission regulations for central

london sounded the death knell for the cult diesel powered taxi. but eli b. c reacted fast with a completely new edi production line, supported by chinese car maker dealing project manager lloyd bonds and, and his team developed an electric london taxi bringing the venerable british icon into the future. we've continued to invest in the taxi product to make it the best taxi in the world and the world's only purposely design taxi. it's not a vehicle that is converted from a van or from a cow from a minibus. it's the only vehicle in the world that is designed with a clean sheet of paper to meets the requirements of being a taxi, the london conditions of fitness, ah, some of the most stringent taxi regulations in the world. and the new electric

model, the t x traces, it's dna back to the fx from 1958. we've kept the look the same, so things like the proportions around the headlights, the grill. keeping that very, that very traditional look. and we've kept that on the new t x, the round, circular, headlights, that quite a up front stately grill, the proportions along the side of the vehicle. the the long bonnets. we have plants swooping roofline at the back of the vehicle. and then inside. we've kept the concept of the interior much the same in london, keeping the well being of passengers in mind is mandatory to london's requirements are very strict in terms of the v equal length,

the vehicle whits. but there's also requirements for it to be wheelchair accessible . london was one of the 1st cities in the world to make will chair accessibility mandatory on taxes in, in 1989. so we have to be able to fit a wheel chair. there has to be a ramp for the wheel chair. there's a step. these regulations are very, very restrictive. great importance is also attached to comfort there's a requirement for the minimum distance between the seats. so that this space for people to sit facing each other. and there has to be a sufficient head room, the folk glories that that was put in place because of people with, with top hat, some bowler hats to be able to get in. and a car that transports passenger is in the british capital also has to be right up there in terms of technology lessons. requirements are very strict at the turning

circle. so how far we can, we can turn around in the road, how quickly we can do that. the turning circle is 8.8 meters turning circle. and that's because of the turning points at the savoy hotel. the savoy hotel has a very, very tight entry on into savoy co. we come in on the right hand side as opposed to the left is neo neve . drove in k, where you're supposed to draw. one won't shorter the road. this is the. yeah, this is i deal with the taxi is ideal for this because you got 24 foot, turn the circle and a concierge here. we'll probably wanna let you out. the latest regulation that affects the taxi trade in london. only cars with emission free power trains can now be registered for passenger transport, which has had

a huge influence on the black caps. the way we see the biggest changes are underneath the bonnet and if we look on the old vehicle, we see there a 4 cylinder diesel engine. very much a very much of its time in the, in the late eighty's. ah, but quite noisy, quite rapidly. i'm not a very good customer experience compared to what we have now in the new t x. where under the bonnet is everything to generate electricity. a small fuel based range extender can charge the battery if necessary. the 110 kilowatt electric motor is built directly into the rear axle in order to keep the tall vehicle center of gravity as low as possible. the batteries are tucked away in the floor panels, and the entire body is made of aluminum. the individual components are not riveted

or welded, but rather glued together in a complex process. it's a bonded alum indian chassis, which originally comes from the aircraft industry. so plains like the airbus a 320 a built this way. on top of that, we put composite panels, i'm and to get the, the, the expertise in that type of a body design. and we ended up with the engineers who, with experience in formula one, another motor sports to come in and help design an engineer the product. and the engineers also managed to build a huge glass roof into the aluminum body. this allows passengers to get to know the city even better. a london cappy often doubles as a tour guide and the the amory arch value. where the admiral, which a huge debate i felt the building, my left her

a huge hotel. i love the golf. absolutely love it. you go to what play see. so the chocolate i can pitches all the time. subs on deer, so i can i am an am a little oak until they're fed up. i'll guy randall dye. ah, there are currently 6500 t x models from l e v c on the road in london. and almost half of all london cats are now electric. the battery capacity is enough for a 130 kilometers or the equivalent of 8 hours of stop and go traffic loading the battery to 80 percent at a fast charger takes half an hour. but being forced to take those breaks doesn't bother peter powell at all. when cleaning the cab. yeah i so i deal with, given what though, i'm read very, very highly from the die. i 1st shot in driving say of one of the,

the very 1st i honor i was gonna bar one of i quite a few checks. he's all 27 years in his job. even don't is she her very up to die? hey, coach. h iconic, retire. neil iconic looked like we need to keep that y cronic. nope. the electric london cab. a great example of how british tradition lives, owen and motors emission free and innovatively into the future. with blue, it's 9 am and krona. oh, and christina anderson is ready to get her unusual bus on the road.

rhythm organs. i'm abilene warning, we have to do one really without any passengers to see if the technology works. and if, if there is a construction site somewhere or something unusual on the route where we have to say ok today, we can't do this event or you have to be careful here. love with our dog broke off this autonomy bus does a lot on its own driving breaking, accelerating it precisely follows a virtual blue line. each round trip is 3 kilometers through kona locals, tourists. everyone's getting on board in a city. bus service is also available, but it only stops at the main tourist location, a rosen back fortress 4 times a day. the steep climb can be tough for some people. enter the autonomous shuttle

which runs all day and is a welcome compliment to public transport. just like in the town of pope, were a shuttle runs from the train station to the city center, straight through the pedestrian zone and rail, a tiny bus shuttles back and forth between a production sites factory and offices on a freeway feeder road with heavy traffic operators are still on board for now, but that's supposed to change some day. it can only happen if the buses are absolutely safe. a 3 d lazer 1st scanned the entire route, roads, walls and buildings were recorded as a cloud of points. a digital image of the vehicles environment down to the centimeter. the best route was then calculated. this is the blue line stored in the buses, memory lasers on the roof scan the surroundings for up to 100

meters. as it moves. the laser beams are reflected, allowing the boss to calculate its current position. software checks the position against the stored route. any deviation is immediately correct. hm. mm hm. the bus remains precisely on the blue line. something in the way the bus comes to a halt. yes, the leon. yeah. oh they oh, here's the line where it would automatically pull into the stop on. it's only this out, this is where the car is. so it would collide on dia, it stops and wait for the obstacle to move within the next 15 that i can use the controller to steer the shuttle around and then into the bus. stop on the down,

low handy harvest in the fossil us. but how safe is the bus if an obstacle suddenly gets in its way to laser beams, scan the surroundings 50 times a 2nd. they recognize things that are too close. the bus reacts immediately no moment of shot, thanks to the sensors. m. you have slept fur is responsible for the development of the safety equipment. he thinks autonomy shuttles will become a reality within the next 5 years. he has high hopes align indulged. we have around $3000.00 traffic deaths in germany every year. in 90 percent of the result of human error technology has the potential to eliminate. most of that 90 percent pilot is anointed, pretend to read with the sensors are being constantly improved. the goal is that

some day an operator can monitor and guide the shuttles remotely. if this plan gets approved, the buses will then be entirely autonomous. oh boy, i figured out how it's gonna take my life. i'd say myself in the mirror and i just realized i don't even have any connection with preston. stand back anymore or support a living. she's not living here. growing up. there were 3 things that charlie martin was convinced of the 1st that she was trans and didn't identify as meal the gender she'd been assigned in both. the 2nd, the place she felt most at home was the race track. the time that she'd never be able to reconcile these 2 world. i am charlie martin, i'm a professional racing driver. i'm in l g b t,

t plus activist. i'm hope to be the 1st trans driver at the 24 hours of lamar. i growing up feeling very limited because knowing that i was transgender from a young age, i never had any role models growing up. i'd never seen anyone like me doing anything the i spy today. and that had the effect of making me feel very limited in terms of my life options. carolyn, cause he was the 1st person that i discovered he was transgender. and i up until that point, i didn't realize people could be born. sworn gender, feel that they all i identifies as different gender and then they can actually physically transition and and so and so on. so when i saw her it was like some one telling me the world isn't flat. you know, i can have really

a real eureka moment in my life. when i was about 89 years old, i had a friend called hamish and his dad used to race, not professionally, but um, you know, very competitively at club level. and he said, yeah, you know, we're going racing if you'd come, i'd never actually been to race track and especially being in the paddock with all the cause being surrounded by, by of these calls. it's very, yeah. it's a very kind of intoxicating smell. being in that environment, you know the caster lauren and just the noise and do something about it. they just yeah, just let a real spark of enthusiasm in me. i said year le seat of a c. i made up my mind. this is it. i'm going to join d some,

some racing myself, but as opposed to 5, was like a half finished project at a row cage had a 16 valve and jane, but that was, it was light at 4 wheels at night. doors on a, it was a like with everything was stripped out of it, but it was something i could afford. a 1st thing i did out, she was a sprint, a cobra. but nonetheless, i was there. i was can p saying does doing my to sport on my own stay. and that was a great feeling ah, coming in stop period does when i started to struggle. very struggle with my my gender identity and i wake up in the morning and see myself in the mirror and i israel, i see, i don't, i don't even have any connection with the person staring back at me any more at nothing in my life really matter. to me any more because it's a slight will was the point living. you're not living with you. i

figured out how's gonna take my life and i couldn't, i, you know, i was at a point where i just couldn't even function. you know, i could barely get through the day of that slip break down. um and i thought myself, this is this wrong, i can't do this. and that was january 2012 that i, i decided okay, the so i'm going to transition a se, transit shed was the thing that i wanted most in my life. and yet at the same time, it was the scariest thing could imagine. it was this, you know, it was like this huge mountain. the i was terrified of confronting, and i looked at might sport and i just thought no one's gonna accept me in that space. charlie's family and friends convinced her not to give up and racing 9

months into her medical transition, which involved coin, laundry placement, had to be in surgery she had done to arrest track for the 1st time. wilson's class was like scary thing and could imagine i had sat in my car, amanda sat, my car in the car park to thinking will i'd have to do that. you like to go home known f nice. fortunately. 7 or 8 of my clase fans i raced with came either so mean a can he pick hog, you know, there were like, equally about racing next year where you could see the love. i felt my gesture was a really profound thing. it made a massive impact. in fact, they hadn't done that. i would have gone back the next year. 2 years into the transition, charlie began attacking her motorsport goals with jean, you would figure in a new found confidence. things began looking up in her area. i pans for probably

the hardest part of that experience, and i starting to find confidence and self belief that i'd never 9 and my whole life. and i think that had a huge impact. no, just on racing, but on so many levels on just how you think of function. it's like having compute said it's freely old and slow and you install in your crating system when you boot up and it's like from let's go good. you wanted a, what does what it felt like to me. i went to france, i did it around the french heal claim championship. and i one by 3 seconds and i break the close recorded by tea seconds. which in her climb turns is it's like a lot. i mean, i just whether or when it's,

it's going to have experience. and i have you, wilma surprise, me included like, where did that come from? say 2017 was my last year hill climbing and at the end of that year there was a within the, within the team structure, there was the opportunity to do an endurance race. in that car. i looked the calendar. i could if i had the budget, the one race and i looked i know one word that popped out on me. the mon, november 2017 thought. wow. 3 or endurance race in a prototype at the mom. of course, not the 24 hour cost is the beauty circuit, but nonetheless, i never thought in my wildest dreams that i could stand on the podium at the mall and not just, not just me, but real me. and i just remember thinking,

which is, you know, if i can, if i can do this, i can get this fall. then that's like her. it's like a sign. it's like, and i him, it's like you've got a train, you gotta keep going and try make this happen and raised the 24 hours long for ill . whether i got on the podium or not. another thing in this life, i want to help other people find the happiness that i found. and i also want other people to understand the role day can play in facilitating more inclusive environments where everybody can be the true authentic self. when you're brave you, you take risks. sometimes it doesn't go to where you want, but, but more often than not, you know, like i could go faster on the corner. i can, i can't say that, that corner in 4th gear,

i can't acquiring 50. you. you just continually push the boundaries, push your own limits of what's comfortable with what, what's cheaper, bowen and before long you have built courage. you build resilience, you build something very yeah. very real inciting. i think 70 charlie priest price, i think 70 her charlie was pretty happy cuz i never imagined that things would be the way they are now. so i think i feel like i've had to wait a little time had to quit patient for the system. but i think you can say right now as like a good time say, i think 7 year we would be pretty happy like this. get me a big part of it. is believing impossibility. yeah. if you believe something is possible, you, you give it a guy,

you give the 100 percent rather than talk yourself out of it. say, i do. he said this is impossible, i can't do this. this isn't for me. so suddenly you flip that around and you think, okay, but it is possible and i and i just prove and i can do that will. what else can i do them way to go, charlie, and stay tuned for more automotive hope, street and possibilities. on the next episode of reb with

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specialists of the lifestyle europe. your romance. coming up on d. w. whole cattle at this live stock market are being exchanged for young lou. half of all girls in south sudan are forcibly married. many are abused and raped. the pope's visit has raised high hopes, but can his words really help the country's female population, global 3000. in 30 minutes on d, w. ah. with our flying rivers created by waterfalls throwing water particles into the

air. b, trees, sweating out up to 1000 liters of water in a day or sea forest fires, evaporating large amounts of moisture tune in to get the answer. learn more about this phenomenon. it make a heavy, invisible river that flows through the sky starts march 23rd on d w. m. and how many portion of lunch turn out in the world? climate change to the bank off the stores? this is my plan, the way from just one week. how much wife can really get we still have time to go. i'm going all with

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