No, by all menas let's spoil hte idea. We have personal rapid transit, it's called the motorcar. If you want to electrify that aggressively, go with something like the GM Volt or Volvo ReCharge.

Grid-connected EVs do exist, of course: electric trains, light rail, trolley buses and trolley trucks (these days, only used in open cast mining). But personal maglev pods? Come on. That would do very little for transportation capacity.

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I suspect rgseidl doesn't fully understand the advantages of PRT systems.

PRT is fully automated, making it usable to non-drivers. Drunk drivers are not a hazard. With no drivers required, operating costs are lower than busses or rail transit.

Automation allows close spacing of the "Pod Cars", and the carrying capacity can easily exceed the capacity of light rail, and ever rival the carrying capacity of large commuter rail lines. The lines can form a switched network covering the entire city or even the nation, unlike rail it is not limited to single lines, no time wasting transfers needed.

The Pod Cars can draw power from the guideway, making them much lighter and cheaper than battery powered cars. More efficient, too! Cleaner and less polluting, even with power plant emissions figured in. Lighter vehicles mean lighter less expensive guideways.

The pod cars are isolated from traffic, dramatically improving safety. The PRT system doesn't interfere with traffic, like busses or street rail trolleys can.

Unlike bus or light rail that has to stop at almost every stop along the route, the Pod cars can go directly to the stop nearest your destination, bypassing all other stops. This makes fast nonstop travel possible.

The Pod cars wait for customers to get in, select a destination and go. Service is 24 hours a day, every day. Bus and Rail requires customers to wait for them, sometimes a half hour or more, and doesn't run at all after hours or on some holidays. Another great time saver for riders.

The Pod cars are personal, you don't have to ride with strangers, who may not be going your way anyway.

Of course, cars have most of these advantages, except for the automation and safety and efficiency and traffic jams. Of course, Pod cars don't require the riders to take out loans or leases, or buy insurance, or perform maintenance.

So why aren't there more PRT systems? Bureaucratic resistance to change and new ideas, along with interference from companies selling less efficient more expensive light rail and busses. People who just don't grasp the basic concept don't help, either.

There are several different PRT designs, some much better than others. This is not one of the better designs, those open top guideways can collect blowing leaves and snow, causing major maintenance problems.

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Excellent sum up, Chris.

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I particularly liked the safety parts. The vast majority of traffic deaths and injuries are caused by human errors..

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While I love the idea, a few things:

1) Why are they on wheels if they're following fixed tracks and can't offroad? Rails and steel wheels are much more efficient -- far lower rolling losses.

2) The current system, as designed, isn't good enough. It's not "directly from home to destination", which means it'll suffer from the same sort of adoption programs of public transit. All vehicles are identical, but people's needs (and desires) are different. You don't get to own a vehicle, which means you can't customize it, leave your stuff in it, and whatnot. These things may sound trivial, but they really do matter a lot in terms of widespread adoption of a transportation system.

3) The problem with a system like this is that it requires you to build new infrastructure from scratch. Parallel infrastructure. Many trillions of dollars worth if you want it to really replace cars ("What? I can't go to my favorite remote campground in this? I can't visit Bob on his farm? I can't head down to the lake?".. etc). I see as much more realistic programs that work up to this gradually -- increasing vehicle automation (as we've seen first in cruise control, then in sensors for other vehicles, then smart cruise controls, and now with the pilot programs to have vehicles drive themselves), increased use of electric drivetrains (as we're already starting to see), and then eventually road transfer of power to vehicles. You can move from there to autoconvoying, traffic management, and even different wheel systems to reduce rolling losses. Or even, potentially, Inductrac or other maglev for high-speed stretches.

Incremental isn't as efficient of a transition as an outright restart, but it's a lot easier to achieve.

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I suppose the wheels are only used when leaving the track. The post also says that "Nbowm's concept is a magnetic elevated rail". Maglevs experience no rolling friction at all.
A dualmode vehicle could also allow the use of your own private vehicle. Some might say that this does not support the idea of high utilization of the pods though.
In my opinion these systems are never going to replace cars completely, and that is not the goal anyway. They are a great alternative for congested areas and provide a level of service that no other form of public transport is able to provide. (No more running for the bus, no waiting for half an hour to see that the bus is full already and/or does not stop.) PRT doesn't have a fixed schedule and will be available 24/7.
If you consider the inability of computers to recognize handwritten pages or that they can be beaten by kids in Go, then you can imagine how far we are away from cars that drive themselves.

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@ Chris M -

"Of course, Pod cars don't require the riders to take out loans or leases, or buy insurance, or perform maintenance."

So they'll have to pay through the nose for the service instead, which means ridership will be low. Especially if the previous customer was drunk and decided to puke all over the interior. Not to mention muggers who would stow away behind the seats to prey upon legitimate customers. It doesn't matter how many people *could* use an unmanned PRT system, but rather, how many actually *would*.

Owning a car is more expensive, sure, but it also goes a lot more places and you control who gets to use it.

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"If you consider the inability of computers to recognize handwritten pages or that they can be beaten by kids in Go, then you can imagine how far we are away from cars that drive themselves."

Reading handwriting accurately is orders of magnitude harder than adjusting speed or planning turns based on where radar ranging or transponders are telling you other vehicles are. And yes, there could be mistakes. No, I doubt they'd be as common as human accidents, as the computer won't be distracted by a cell phone, get drunk, cut people off, etc.

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To clear up some misconceptions: PRT isn't designed to completely replace autos, it is designed as an advanced public transit system to supplement autos. Consider that a majority of the cars on the road have just one occupant (average occupancy is only 1.2 per car) and maybe a shopping bag or briefcase. Those travelers could use a PRT system if PRT stops are within walking distance. On the other hand, large groups of people travelling together will still use busses or minivans, Plumbers or other contractors will continue to carry their tools and materials on trucks and vans, and home deliveries of large items will still be done by trucks. Most freight will still be handled by trucks and railroads, although PRT can handle small freight shipments between businesses with PRT freight terminals at their loading docks. With many people travelling by PRT, traffic for the vehicles remaining on the road will be far less.

PRT won't go everywhere, but will have stations at or within walking distance of most major destinations. Some apartment buildings may even have their own PRT station, they could even be built right into some high rise buildings! Many suburban areas could have PRT stations spaced 1/4 mile apart, within walking distance of most residents.

Yes, it does require new infrastructure to be built, just as canals, railroads, and hiways had to be built. The advantage is that with an extremely lightweight construction, the cost per mile of guideway is less than paved roads, and much less than rail. We would get far more benefit from a million dollars worth of PRT guideways and podcars than from 2 million dollars of extra freeway lanes, or 10 million dollars worth of light rail.

As for automation, the US Transportation Dept. did research to develop automated highway systems in the 70's. Some parts were easy, like speed control and guidance, others a bit more difficult but solvable, like determining routes. What stumped them, and lead to the program being cancelled, was having to deal with other non-automated vehicles, pedestrians, and unexpected obstacles like things falling off trucks and animals dashing accross the road. By using elevated (or underground) guideways isolated from pedestrians and other vehicles and obstacles, PRT systems greatly simplify the automation and current technology can handle it. Indeed, the first PRT system was built in Morgantown, West Virginia, in 1972. In spite of some serious design flaws, the Morgantown PRT worked, using the computer technology of that era, and is still in operation today.

As for economics, current public transit is heavily subsidized by government funds, in most cases fares cover less than half the cost. But PRT costs much less than light rail to install, and thanks to efficiency and automation costs far less to operate. With much greater convenience, faster travel and almost no waiting, ridership would be much higher than any other public transit system. The result would be fares equal or less than other public transit systems, even without government subsidies. With the same subsidy now spent on public transit, PRT could be free - well, except for the taxes...

As for the concerns about drunks throwing up in podcars that worried rgseidl, how is that any different than drunks throwing up on a bus or subway or the drivers seat of a convertible? Ah, yes, if a podcar is messed up and unusable, the customer presses a reject button to send the messy podcar back to headquarters for cleaning and maintenance, then gets on the next podcar (usually, several are waiting). If the culprit gets caught, they get the cleaning bill. As for a mugger hiding in a little podcar, that is far less likely than a mugging on a subway car or while waiting at a bus stop or walking through a huge parking garage. Going out in public does have a security risk, but that risk can be reduced with police patrols and security cameras.

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