Pod car: A picture of the first vehicle of the Masdar City personal rapid transit system, unveiled at a conference in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.
Jesse Fox
Small, automatic electric vehicles will be demonstrated in two new projects.
A novel kind of transit system, in which cars are replaced by a network of automated electric vehicles, is about to get its first large-scale testing and deployment. Two of these Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) systems are being installed this year, one at Heathrow International Airport, near London, and one in the United Arab Emirates, where it will be the primary source of transportation in Masdar City, a development that will eventually accommodate 50,000 people and 1,500 businesses and is designed to emit no carbon dioxide.
PRT systems are supposed to combine the convenience and privacy of automobiles with the environmental benefits of mass transit. Automated electric vehicles, or pods, each designed to carry from four to six people, wait at stations throughout a city or development, like taxis waiting at taxi stands. A person or group gets in a pod and selects a destination and the vehicle drives there directly.
The concept isn't new--the basic idea goes back at least to the 1950s. But it hasn't caught on for a variety of reasons, including the cost of the initial systems and the difficulty of integrating them into existing cities. A number of small test systems have been installed, and one system that is similar to a PRT has been in operation in Morgantown, WV, since the 1970s. But the systems at Heathrow and in the UAE will be the first real-world demonstrations of a true PRT.
Although PRT systems vary, the basic design involves a network of stations connected by a track that loops past all of the stations in a system. Large networks can include many interconnected loops. When a vehicle leaves a station, it travels along an on-ramp until it merges with the main loop. When it reaches the destination station, it exits this central loop via an off-ramp. The ramps allow individual pods to stop at a station while others pods continue to travel at top speed along the main track. As a result, it can be faster than buses, which have to stop frequently. Simulations suggest that the systems could run with as little as half a second between each vehicle, but the initial systems, such as the one in Masdar City, will keep the vehicles three to four seconds apart--enough to stop a pod should the one in front of it suddenly break down. A central computer controls the traffic.
At both Heathrow and Masdar City, the vehicles will be battery-powered, driverless cars. The system at Heathrow--built by Advanced Transport Systems, based in Bristol, UK--uses cars powered by lead-acid batteries along a concrete track and guided by laser range finders, says Steve Raney, a consultant for the company. For Masdar City, a Dutch company called 2getthere has developed cars powered by more-advanced batteries made of lithium iron phosphate. The pods travel on pavement equipped with embedded magnets placed every five meters, which the vehicle uses, along with information about wheel angles and speed, to determine its location, says Robert Lohmann, the marketing manager at 2getthere. When a person selects a destination, a central computer designates a path for the vehicle, and an on-board computer makes sure the car sticks to the path. (The system is being used now to control vehicles that transport cargo in warehouses.)
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This concept is excellent. As indicated in the story, early versions failed to run properly due to computer malfunctions of some type.
Why did they take the human element out in the first place? Keep a conductor in the seat of larger systems so they can make sure the product behaves as intended.
I'm not sure about for the larger systems, but for the 4-6 person PRT, not having a driver and a seat for the driver (etc.) saves a lot of weight relative to the total vehicle weight, reducing energy needs.
A sound innovation that might set
out to safeguard environment on the
strength that, it is electrically
powered, as opposed to conventional
transportation system(s) flanged
with gaseous polution of human atmosphere .
The possessive psycho-socio cultural
practices of mankind stands to be seriously
affected, leaving liberal minds to ponder
possible reactions from conservative folks.
On wide scale implementation, a chunck of
our economy might be comprised, unleashing,
unimaginable impact on humans,revenue, as well
as systems like auto-industry,railway
industry, famous Metro systems etc..
And more importantly,its networth benefits
at this point might be too early to project,
except for very clean and rapid reward of
new system patronage..
Just build a tailgate system.
One that lets me stay exactly 6inches behind someone, automagically.
That would reduce road rage, start-stopping, excessive lane-switching, wrecks, increase thruput.
We aren't going to buy minority-report cars, but we will take some of their features like auto-tailgating...
Why don't you have a "zero" star rating available?
What some people would like is mechanically impossible, so there is no point in wishing for something that can't be done safely.
Think of 20 cars 6 inches apart, and the lead car brakes. What if car #4 is on a slippery patch of road? Think!!
Medieval religious values and modern technology
I find the video hilarious - as it zooms around the futuristic city, you can see that a good number of the women are dressed in burkas. I guess, Sharia law is here to stay.
This bizarre mix also brings up the question of what it really means to be a modern society.
Is it enough to build some futuristic buildings and infrastructure? Is THAT all it takes to be modern?...
If you're being zipped around in some futuristic pod, while you believe in the Islamic volunteerest view according to which there are no natural laws, but that everything functions according to Allah's arbitrary will...well, my friend, if that's the case, I don't think you are a modern person, no matter how many shiny toys that oil money bought you.
Re: Medieval religious values and modern technology
Those burkas may become passe. A maker of science fiction movies was criticized for not having Muslims in his sci-fi epics. He replied the reason there were no Islamic types in these movies was because they were about the future.
One good thing about these personal transports is terrorists will have target-poor opportunities (compared to buses).
This is not the “This is a world first and a new approach to travel." as BAA describes it.
In 1969, West Virginia University filed for a grant from Housing and Urban Development to study the feasibility of such a system.
In 1970, the DOT created the Urban Mass Transportation Administration to further study the options.
Shortly after that, West Virginia created a research demonstration project and with the help of Boeing Aerospace Company and a Frederick R. Harris, a civil and transportation engineering firm in Fairfax, VA, the PRT system was built in 1975.
It's been in use since then in Morgantown, WV where it serves as the model for other systems in London
This is great stuff! The video looks like Venus Project coming true!
it's a very neat video, I especially got a kick out of the oil capitol of the world running on windmill generators.
But the video is 2:20 seconds long and the pod segment is maybe 5 seconds... not really a vido about pods is it?
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I think that shared vehicles like this are going to have some serious problems with "maintenance".
In a typical city culture the shared and unsupervised vehicle concept just is not going to work. If you have ever gone into a public restroom and been revolted by what you found then you will understand what I am talking about.
There are places where it could work, but not across the board, there are just too many "uncultured" people out there. Consider that most people won't be willing to get into a pod saturated with cigarette smoke and consider that rules not withstanding, most smokers won't be stopped from smoking in the pod.
The only alternative would be to put spy cameras and monitors everywhere, which would be a far far worse thing. Orwell tried to warn us of the consequences of allowing our every movement to be tracked our every conversation monitored. We have become much too complacent and naive. There are too many people who are mad for power, and far too many other people who are willing to sell them the technology which shall ultimately be used to enslave us all.
The Middle East is fast running out of oil and must plan for its scarcity or absence. In a few years they will only have enought oil left for their own needs and will cease export. Until a better solution is found, windmill generators are a good idea because the oil capitol must anticipate tomorrow.
too true. a lot of these issues have not been thought through very clearly. there is also the basic maintenance issue of the operating gear. the MTBF cannot be high enough in aggregate across all these pods, or the control system anticipatory enough, to prevent the occasional failure of a pod in a traffic stream. safeties can be implemented to prevent damage/injury, but that will not help the routing/rerouting issue that will cause. a massively parallel track system would likely resolve that, but the cost would be outrageous. not sure we're there yet.
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tomgarven
43 Comments
Ugly Pod - Beautiful Stacker
Kevin:
Excellent post and oh how I wished such a system were in place. Went to Los Angeles last week and traffic was so bad it took 2.5 hours to travel 32 miles on Interstate 10. Waste of my time, my fuel and the aggravation to my brain cells didn't help either :-)
Of course everyone reading this post realizes that the $500-700 billion we send overseas each year to buy oil helped pay for Masdar City. We seem to be satisfied living in crumbling cities instead of something beautiful just as long as we have our gasoline. As Americans we may not be the sharpest cheddar in the deli case after all.
Personally I like the MIT Stacker design much better. It is appealing and in my not so humble opinion, much more stylish than the Pod.
Very good post
tomgarven@hotmail.com
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Kevin Bullis
177 Comments
Re: Ugly Pod - Beautiful Stacker
Thanks Tom. Well said, re: our crumbling cities.
Reply
tech2008view
6 Comments
Re: Ugly Pod - Beautiful Stacker
Hi, currently it is US, Liberia and Burma not using the metric system (temperature included).
It would be amazingly more easy if you guys in these three countries tried to adopt the metrics.
Now I installed Firefox Plugin https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addons/policy/0/2286/48936 which is a neat way to fast learn Celsius, Kilograms and Meters (Kilometers)
So I learnt 32 miles is 51 kilometers. Hmm 2,5 hours for that distance is a lot of waste of energy and time.
Efficiency is the word of the day.
Regards!
Reply