ROBOCARS NEED SOLAR GUIDEWAYS

The USA’s Transportation Research Board held the 3^rd Automated Road Vehicle Symposium (ARV-3) in San Francisco mid-July. More precisely it was a hotel near SFO, the international airport south of the city on the way to Silicon Valley.  ATRA was a full participant, as well as the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI). Podcar thinking was well received. Sometimes ARVs are better off on an exclusive guideway - a way that also overcomes battery limitations.

 ARV-1 was held in Irvine in 2012. Interest was so intense that organizers immediately set sight on a second, which took place last year at Stanford University in Palo Alto. It took on more solid footing with growing attendance and interest growing. This year mid-summer, it was at the Hyatt at SFO.

Driverless Road Vehicles or Guideway?

At ARV-3, much of the discussions focused on vehicle automation for personally owned cars. ATRA’s main contribution was a breakout session on the impact of vehicle automation on public transit and shared mobility.  The Symposium Committee included several ATRA members.

 TRB up to the challenge?  - Source: ecowatch.org 

Eleven speakers shared perspectives and thoughts on the influence of the mobility revolution taking place with web- and app-enabled ride- and vehicle-sharing. How do automated vehicles intersect with public transport?  Sam Lott noted that it has been about fifty years since full automation was introduced to mass transit -- yielding many lessons for the ARV world. Indeed transit operations are excellent testing grounds for automation concepts. 

Christer Lindstrom described Stockholm’s interest in ATN to prevent more ‘rubber on the roadways’ in their complicated, island-speckled metropolitan area.  ATNs were mentioned in the USDOT’s research agenda by Vincent Valdez of the FTA. He organized a breakout session on ‘Mobility on Demand’ -- transit that puts a premium on passengers. 

The week ended with ATRA’s workshop entitled   Vehicles within the Built Environment: 2020, 2035, 2050. It was targeted to metropolitan planners and had a strong planning contingency with a charrette exploring ATN-enabled built environments.  Over eighty-five professionals broke into smaller groups. In the words of one participant, it was a back-caste vision for the future that included ATN.

On to Podcar Futures

ARV-3 and ATRA’s workshop opened many minds to the promising new forms of urban development and re-purposing made possible by podcars. Many problem and design scenarios discussed came to inevitable conclusions that point to ATN. This necessitates some level of public ownership and the need for some kind of central 'control'. A fleet of autonomous vehicles alone won’t cut it.

Without central management and controls, ARVs predictably bring more congestion, more sprawl, and perhaps greater social inequities, On-street ARVs will have to interface with walkers and bikers as well as manual vehicles. One observer noted an overall lack of attention to energy issues that figure big into policy-making for future transportation. He regretted that many ATN 'enthusiasts' pay little attention to the bigger energy picture, GHG and climate violence.

How real is the promised energy plenty of fracking? - source: Association for the Study of Peak Oil

ATRA Chair Alain Kornhauser announced a new Princeton-affiliated R&D facility at Fort Monmouth along the New Jersey coast.  It is dedicated to supporting transit and public mobility agencies in dealing with ARV technology. You will learn more at PCC8 in Stockholm September 3-5. 

SHINING LIGHT ON ADVANCED TRANSIT

New York thinks it’s the Queen of Sophistication. Washington exerts a Kingly role as holder of the Big Hammer. But is it not Silicon Valley that is leading the charge into the future? With Google and its rivals and friends -- HP, eBay, Apple, Facebook, Yahoo, LinkedIn, Cisco, etc. transforming just about every aspect of human life, many conclude that the Bay Area is creating the 21^st Century. Only a -- God forbid! -- much dreaded earthquake can derail  SV’s technology-based surge.

San Jose City Hall looks to the future.

San Jose claims to be the Heart of Silicon Valley, with a neat, clean and efficient downtown and major airport nearby. Snuggled next to the CBD is the generous campus of San Jose State University. Oh, by the way, the locals, reflecting their deep Spanish heritage, insist that it’s San José, if you please.  Others wonder what might please the original peoples.

Most but not all SJSU’s students are from the hills and plains of the southern end of the San Francisco Bay. About twenty proto-engineers are designing their vision of PRT. They label it ATN -- Automated Transit Networks -- ever since Laura Stuchinsky, the City’s Director of Sustainability, coined the phrase when Arup and Aerospace Corporation were examining the feasibility of PRT to link the airport to regional transit a few years ago.

Guideways as Solar Collection Infrastructure

The SJSU workshop takes place under the auspices of the Department of Mechanical and Electronics Engineering. From the start, emphasis was given to designing into the large (and largely linear) areas of urban real estate that ATN guideways and stations require, an array of solar panels to cleanly and efficiently power the vehicles.  This gives a significant advantage to designs with suspended vehicle. The tops of guideways are freed up to collect juice from the sun!

Mid-July many of these students, Professor Burford Furman and advisor Ron Swenson showed off their evolving ATN concepts. They hauled up a scaled test track and vehicle and station mock-ups to the

SJSU student work shines (and collects),

Moscone Convention Center in downtown San Francisco. Over several days the 2014 Intersolar show drew about 30,000 professionals and enthusiasts.  That included twenty-three high school students taking summer courses at SJSU and eight chaperones. Many ideas, thoughts and business cards were exchanged.

ATRA Support

The Advanced Transit Association (ATRA) recently donated $3000 to the SJSU Solar Superway project to help pay for materials not supplied by the University.   $1000 of that came from the Minnesota-based Citizens for PRT. ATRA recently established an Academic Council with memberships from Princeton, Southern Illinois University, University of Maryland, and SJSU’s Mineta Transportation Institute.  To learn more about this, contact smcdonald@siu.edu.

The future of Silicon Valley mobility.

This does not mean that ATRA has taken a position that suspended vehicle designs of PRT are preferable. ATRA’s mission since 1976 has been to promote a wide variety of advanced forms of transit. For decades Silicon Valley members have promoted PRT thinking. Given the level of interest in ATN thinking at Intersolar, It seems like those long, patient years are paying off. 

MODE SHIFT

In previous centuries, change came with the new generation. Today, for the first time in history, change is coming to all generations. Adults and seniors are adapting to their new environments with life-style changes born of necessity. Part of that is their mobility, and a big shift just happened in Boston.

Twenty years ago, everyone with common sense, a few bucks in his or her pocket and self-respect owned a car. From 1960 to 2000, it was unthinkable that state and metropolitan officials would adopt a major public work plan for pedestrian and biking infrastructure with excellent prospects for funding.

Hiking and Biking in the Future Hub

A bike/ped shift has happened in Massachusetts, not just the City of Boston, but with Cambridge, Somerville and scores of suburbs that make up the larger Hub of Massachusetts Bay. It’s totally awesome!

Modes and Modalities

In the world of government budgeting, the elevation of biking and pedestrian amenities on the modal menu with highways and conventional transit is significant. It was powered by the cooperation of strong pedestrian advocacy, active cycling interests, demanding transit users. It happened in a Federal context changed by former USDOT Secretary LaHood who opened doors to funds for biking projects.

Massachusetts has flung them wide open! This shift is likely to spread to others cities and urban regions across the USA. It already has.

A growing number of people of all generations willingly choose not to own cars. With Zipcars and carsharing, there’s a new calculus in mobility thinking. Those who don’t own cars save, on average, $8000 a year and are healthier because of aerobic mobility. They burn less petroleum and add fewer molecules of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. By and large, they don’t know about, nor do they care about details of PRT or podcars.

Professional Shifts for Life-Style Shifts

A growing tide of life-style shifts is upon us. It is here. Hail to Boston Livable Streets, who beam visions of greenway paths throughout Greater Boston, and the new generation of city walkers who have turned throw-away neighborhoods into thriving communities where not having a car is cool. Where will new generations of architects, engineers and planners take this?

ATN infrastructure brings several new variables to the financial formulae that will be used for the cost/benefit analysis of ped-bike and transit projects. Fare revenues may be substantial - although taxi drivers may not be happy. ATN guideways can carry conduits for wires, cables and tube systems, adding value to the project. Whether in the public or private sector, the more return there is on an investment, the more likely that it will go forward.   Designed with karma-comforting solar power collectors, elevated ATN may be acceptable to community groups. In quiet spots, ATN guideways can run alongside bikers, joggers and walkers. In congested areas, sections can go underground.

A new ATN planning resource will soon be published by the Mineta Transportation Institute of San Jose State University. Stay tuned!