ARCHIVAL VISUALS

Trans.21 -- the clearinghouse of information on automated people movers established in 1983 -- is cleaning house. Several dozen video cassettes on various kinds of advanced, automated transit as well as scores of slides and other material are available. They can be useful to researchers, historians and podcar fans and useful to publicists.

Ford Motor Co.'s 1970s APM

The cassettes should work, but cannot be guaranteed. These are pre-digital relics from last century, They include system descriptions of Aerorail, Apogee, Austrans, Otis, nd Taxi 2000. An interview with Franzen who launched the Chicago RTA's PRT program with Raytheon. A plan for Denver's Auraria district. These are rare finds. A tribute to the artwork in the stations of the Detroit DPM. And more.

You can obtain all of these slides and cassettes by making a $1000 tax-deductible donation to the Advanced Transit Association, known as ATRA, which since 1976 has been pushing the agenda of modern mobility forward, ATRA wants to become more active and aggressive in 2015. Your purchase will not only get you a set of rich and valuable visual material, it will boost ATRA's coffers.

Questions, email lfabian21@gmail.com.

PARLEZ-VOUS ‘PODCAR’?

The world of advanced mobility spoke a Swedish-accented English early this month at PCC8 at Arlanda Airport.  Where are the metro-loving, transit-exporting French in these exchanges?

  

The 8th Podcar City conference in Stockholm (Sept 3-5) emitted strong signs that PRT (aka ATN, podcars, GRT and perhaps dual-mode systems) is now a serious contender for urban transit implementations. As ride-sharing start-ups garner big buck investments from even larger global Silicon Valley dynamos, it seems that PRT is on the verge of getting long overdue public support and private funds.  

Magnus Hunhammar is in the center of the sun-kissed Icebreaker

As evident in plans for a huge Green activist march in New York City Sept 21--  timed  just before aUN Summit on Climate Change -- heightened interest in PRT is coming from an urgent world search for ways to reduce carbon emissions. Themed as To the next level!, PCC8 in Stockholm took podcar discussions to higher operational, financial and political levels. Bravo to chairman Magnus Hunhammar, director of the Institute for Sustainable Transportation and to Hans Lindqvist, chair of the association of Swedish municipalities moving to embrace PRT solutions, known as Kompass!

Modest Implementations Within Reach

Discussions at PCC8 excited many. One session previewed the newly released assessment of the Automated Transit Network industry by San Jose State University’s Mineta Transportation Institute. The USDOT report was internally and externally reviewed, and includes a significant recommendation that ten-station PRT projects are within technological reach. A live hook-up to San Jose with three of the research team who were at PCC8 made this clear. The report is available at  http://transweb.sjsu.edu/project/1227.html.

PRT developers Ultra and Vectus were also actively present in Stockholm in early September, along with several new Chinese entrepreneurs. The team from Tubenet impressed all with their future-embracing outlook and Asia-scoped action plans. Swedish consultant Ingmar Andreasson wowed the largely Swedish-US gathering with quantitative analysis indicating that PRT capacities can be boosted to levels more comfortable for transit officials.

A Venue near Arlanda Airport

Tubenet’s podcar design uses quite small vehicles that can operate at three “tiers” -- 40, 60 and 80 km/hr -- coming from a country where transit is in boom mode. Vehicles running within a tube have overhead power rail and solar collectors atop the tube. This Chinese R&D program is working on a 4km, 12-station test network running in 3 years based on existing vehicle and guideway prototypes. A metro-wide 446km network has been simulated for the ancient city of Xian (population. 4m).

No one from France participated in PCC8.  Podcar visionary Christer Lindstrom, whose French mother taught him la belle langue, was perhaps the closest thing. France prides itself on innovative transport and earns lots of foreign currency planning, building and operation metros and bus systems. How triste that no one from France or Germany seems to be paying attention to PRT potentialities

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Political Questions and Challenges

The Swedish Transportation Administration’s Chief Strategist Bo Olsson is not and cannot be a podcar “fan”. He must take an objective standpoint. At PCC8 he advised that taxi-sized vehicles as typically envisioned for PRT are not necessarily optimal for all urban mobility needs. Larger vehicles make good sense in thinking out future modal priorities. Olsson also cautioned that PRT guideways are a negative due to their costs and aesthetics.

The mainstream transit world - engineers, planners, contractors and operators - is still largely dismissive of PRT. None of them were at PCC8. They are busy with the worldwide metro boom which is increasingly driverless. By and large, Swedish civic leaders think of PRT as “science fiction”. Their European and American counterparts do too. The big difference is that in Sweden, officials have a qualitative and quantitative grasp of PRT. In the US, they hardly know what it is.

Crystallizing Interest

Sweden’s sophistication with PRT is based on analysis and simulations that offer dimensions to public discussions. Goran Tegner is a major leader in these debates and pointed out that Stockholm transit ridership is stagnant. Andreasson’s new research indicates that PRT capacities can be boosted by use of coupled, larger vehicles, each trip scheduled to 2 or 3 stations during peak hours. For a California city, a 48 km, 50-station network can distribute 13,400 in an hour from a regional rail station (link capacity 6000pphpd).

Ron Swenson in a Pod

Dozens of Swedish municipalities and institutions are working to advance PRT visions. Two new ones popped in at PCC8 -- from Stockholm suburbs Sundbyberg and Botkyrka. Plans for Uppsala were “frozen” last year, but are not dead. EU officials have asked why an application for funds has not been submitted. Meanwhile this university town of 200,000 residents is studying streetcar options.

Four development nodes envisioned outside Stockholm’s growing Arlanda Airport are showing broader and, in the long run, more financeable podcar ambitions. Major office expansion of the airport’s Airport City, a successful segment of retail, hotel and meeting facilities wedged between the main passenger terminals, is underway. A PRT network connecting all this and the town of Marsta is widely understood by airport and local officials to be a sustainable option that will reduce carbon emissions and make the area more efficient and prosperous. This has been drafted into a report, and a panel of four political candidates from different parties at PCC8 agreed that it is worth pursuing.

Based on these discussions, the maturation of the many aspects of PRT technologies made over the last decade and the new USDOT report, PCC8 ended with a clear statement: public officials can plan and implement better mobility options with confidence. And next year -- in San Jose?

MARKET BASICS

A significant report by the Mineta Transportation Institute on the status and prospects of the podcar “industry” is to be released this fall as a peer-reviewed USDOT document that will be freely and widely disseminated. It advises that a 5-10 station Automated Transit Network (ATN) project is within confident technological reach and with supportive public policies can be brought to passenger service in two or three years.

Does ATN have the potential to restructure
life in cities such as Cleveland?

ATN State-of-the-Industry in 2013  is intended to be an informative tool for planners, urban designers, and others involved in public policy, especially for urban transit and redevelopment. Despite the international nature of ATN supply companies, the MTI study focuses on prospects in the USA. Implications for the rest of the world are not explored.

A Silicon Valley Outlook

 Dr. Burford Furman, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at San Jose State University, led the team that included, Sam Ellis (SJSU), Lawrence Fabian (Trans.21), Peter Muller (PRT Consulting), and Ron Swenson (INIST).

Automated Transit Network (ATN) is defined as a passenger system consisting of automated vehicles on exclusive, grade-separated guideways that provides on-demand, non-stop, origin-to-destination service over a service area as opposed to a corridor, as with LRT and metros. ATN is not today ‘on the radar’ nor taken seriously by urban planners, transit professionals, or policy makers. The City of San Jose recently looked seriously at ATN as an airport connector, but found reasons to pause.

Over the years there have been ATN or PRT proposals in Sunnvvale,  Stanford/Palo Alto, Milpitas, Mountainview and Santa Cruz. The MTI report discusses how ATN could expand the coverage of existing transit systems and presents parameters for planning an installation. It touches on options for project financing and identifies the opportunities and challenges in planning and funding ATN systems.

California-Swedish Dialog: September 5

Furman and new MTI director Karen Philbrick will discuss these findings from California via satellite connections during in a session with Fabian, Muller and Swenson at the 8^th Podcar City conference near Stockholm’s Arlanda Airport on Friday, September 5.

The edge of future urban mobility is being cut with Swedish design excellence and Silicon Valley genius.

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!

COMMON GOOD at PCC-2014

If government is supposed to be about the pursuit of common good, then public officials should be thinking of ways for us the people to live in harmony and promote a sustainable general welfare.

Many of them are already doing that, some quite eloquently so. We need government to satisfy public needs (such as rubbish removal, road maintenance, etc.) and to promote commerce opportunities (e.g. education, public works, transit).  Government should provide the framework in which individuals, communities and societies do most of the work. US “conservatives” want minimal government, whereas “liberals” don’t fret so much about public “bloating”.

Auto De-Addiction

Our transportation infrastructure, so heavily weighted to auto addiction, is sadly unsustainable.  Do we need an unending stream of new cars, vans and trucks?  Whether powered by gasoline or propane, vehicles across the USA generate millions of tons of carbon dioxide every day. Road costs keep getting higher. We hardly have funds to maintain the existing 50,000 miles of Interstates and 2.6 million miles of paved roads -- a total of 8.6 million lane-miles. And don’t forget the thousands of acres of parking lots and garages. Few doubt that car costs will continue to rise.

What a climate-challenged mess!

US Government statistics show the continuing marginalization of transit in US life.

A Pod-Way Out of Our Dilemma

We, the People of the USA and the World, need preemptive policies to get us out of our auto addiction. There are very strong arguments that investing in pedestrian and bikeway networks provides more benefits per dollar than highway improvements.  Wisely planned, new ped-bike infrastructure will make mass transit more viable by feeding into it.

Automated Transit Networks (ATN for short) has emerged as an interesting new option for community-scaled mobility services that can also feed existing transit stations from places more than most people’s walking range.  A study by San Jose’s Mineta Transportation Institute recommends modest ATN projects of ten-station networks, maybe more. Rapid advanced in automation on road vehicles means that robo-cabs and robo-vans may provide ATN services without costly guideways.  

Sadly, ATN is not being designed into huge road projects. Witness New York’s $4-billion replacement of the cross-Hudson Tappan Zee Bridge north of NYC. ATN is light and would not impact the bridge’s structural requirements the way rail would (it was dropped for that very reason.).

We have a huge task ahead of us. It is not easy to re-orient personal attitudes and habits. But we do know that things sometimes do change -- sometimes quickly and visibly, but sometimes slowly -- like the decline of cigarette smoking. According to Harvard’s Professor Emeritus Charles Harris, in 1850 eighty percent of the land in southern New England was directly used by humans: only 20% was forest.  Radical change came over the course of a century as the USA expanded westward. By 1950, agriculture and industry had dwindled in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island so that 80% of the land is today in forest!

Hmm…… cigarette smoke is like instinctual driving. Maybe we can tell people the cost of the parking spaces that they think are free. That cost includes a few minutes of the end of their lives for not getting the great aerobic exercise that walking and biking are.

Reaching for the Numbers to Sustainability

Today over 90 percent of urban travel is by motorized vehicles, almost all burning fossil fuels and emitting greenhouse gases. Securing fossil fuels in the future has enormous political and environmental costs. US transit’s share is modestly 2-3 percent. Walking and biking are harder to measure, but at most, these three green modes make up 10%.

Is it not in the common good for us to push that green share to 25%, and then to 50%? What might the Sierra Club, the National Institute of Health and the League of Women’s Voters have to say such matters? 

Does it matter how Detroit reacts? More is happening in California’s booming Silicon Valley - hotbed of Google, Uber, and ATN. 

California is collaborating with Swedish officials, and the 8^th annual Podcar City conference will take place September 3-5 on Stockholm’s airfront. Come up to speed there!