Tim Pawlenty & His PRT Pod Boondoggle

[Avidor]

Run time: 00:49 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w61YpXBAX5I   Posted on YouTube: January 10, 2010 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: January 10, 2010 By DU Member: Avidor Views on DU: 9467

 
More info about Pawlenty's Pod Boondoggle:

http://tinyurl.com/TpawPodBoodoggle

[TheEuclideanOne]

1. Just STFU

Sorry, but maybe I am just in a bad mood today, but I have read a little bit about this new transportation system and it actually seems like a pretty nice idea on a lot of levels and this complaint seems pretty petty. If your biggest complaint about it is that people may get snow on them in the winter, then you are just whining. I am pretty sure that if this were to become a reality, that there would be a solution to what seems like a relatively simple problem. So, I repeat, just S T F U. Come back with a more legitimate complaint. Besides, I live in Florida and we don't even have snow, so should I still hate this new idea?

EDIT: If you are wondering who is unrecommending this post early on, it is me.

[Avidor]

2. Don't believe all the hype you read on the internets...

Read the linked info...

http://www.mn2020.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC=%7BB0256E30-B0AA-4FBB-955B-8FFC7EE3D1FE%7D

"Both Hornstein and Sen. Scott Dibble, who head the transit subcommittees in each chamber, said the Winona proposal has no chance of state funding. "They're not going to get nickel one of public money while I'm around," Dibble said. "

Sierra Club North Star resolution against public funding of PRT:

http://www.northstar.sierraclub.org/campaigns/transportation/position200404.html

Winona Daily News editorial:

http://tinyurl.com/WinonNewsPodEdit

"Our view: Space pods seem a little too far out"

... an did Michele Bachmann promote PRT when she was in the MN State legislature? You bet:

http://dumpbachmann.blogspot.com/2009/05/bachmann-lies-again-about-northstar-and.html

[TheEuclideanOne]

3. Okay I will check those links out.

My whole point about your video was that this aspect of it seems like a pretty minor aspect of what seems to me to be a potentially good idea. Besides, does this mean that people stop using their cars because their cars get snow on them? Or do they find ways to solve the problem?

On a related note, I have heard stories of more energy efficient versions of bulbs being used for traffic lights, the light gets covered up with snow because it doesn't produce the same type of heat that traditional lightbulbs do. The conclusion that they expect the listener to walk away from is "look at how bad these low energy light bulbs are". I heard this on the Hannity show, if I remember correctly, and his agenda is not to objectively evaluate anything that is good for the environment. That may or may not be the same case with this video.

I will comment later. I think that I am still in a crappy mood about something unrleated to this and my comments are a bit harsher than they probably should be.

[Avidor]

6. Pod Promoter Rep Mark Olson...

That guy in the video was so awful his own party (the MN GOP) disowned him:

[TheEuclideanOne]

9. I was commenting more on the technology than the politics behind it.

Who really wants to be on the same side as Michele Bachman? Not me. In fact, I almost don't like the idea anymore knowing that Michele Bachman is supporting it. :)

Although I rarely exclude politicians from their ideas, in this case I was simply commenting on the technology itself. If I like an idea, I will support it even if there are some political crackpots behind it. I grew up in the days of watching the Jetsons and am still disappointed that I am not taking my only flying pod to work each day. The only thing similar to the Jetsons for me today is the part where Jane takes George Jetson's money before he leaves for work. :) If Dick Cheney supported the idea of a flying podcar, exactly like the one in the Jetsons, I would still support the idea as much as I hate the guy.

[bluestateboomer]

4. It seems a better idea than jammed freeways

Making a snow proof door for Minnesota would seem like an easy fix. I don't know if Pawlenty makes a very good governor, but I don't think trying new ideas is a reason to condemn him. Unrec.

[Avidor]

7. It's not a new idea... it's an old scam used to fleece taxpayers and investors...

PRT has 30+ years of controversy and failure:

http://www.lightrailnow.org/facts/fa_prt001.htm



The pod people are always saying PRT is better that reality-based transit because "you don't have to ride with strangers".

[Plucketeer]

5. I once worked for a dealership that took on the ill-fated Bricklin SV1

This was a saftey-oriented sports car built on borrowed chassis and powered by a couple of different V8 engines during it's brief run. It was "real cool" with it's hydraulically-operated gullwing doors - that is until you were in a pouring rain! Standing there, while the hydraulics slowly and ponderously pushed the door up so you could get in - you could SEE the bucket seat filling with water while you waited. :crazy:

[TheEuclideanOne]

10. If they came out with a flying car, but it hurt your eyes if you were flying in the

direction of the sun, would you still want one? I know I would. My reaction would be, boy that sucks, but can't I just add the equivalent of a sun visor to it? I have one in my car.

There may be legitimate reasons why PRT will fail, unrelated to politics, but this video seemed like it focus on something pretty minor.

Actually your argument about Gullwing doors I think is a perfect example. There are some cars today with Gulllwing doors that are pretty sweet! So if somebody offered you a new mercedes 2011 or some exotic sports car that has Gullwing doors, would you say "No thanks, I might get wet in the rain". In fact, IF ANYBODY HAS A MERCEDES 2011 THAT THEY WANT TO GIVE AWAY, please send me a private message and I will send you my mailing address. If the seats get wet when it rains hard, I don't mind suffering. :)

The whole idea of Gullwing door may have been flawed earlier on for the reasons you mentioned, but chances are they came up with a way to stop you from getting wet in the pouring rain. If you look at the car below, it looks like you will not get much wetter than any car with normal doors.
http://www.lincah.com/2011-mercedes-benz-sls-amg-gullwing

[Plucketeer]

14. If you owned one of those

likely as not you'd have covered parking at both ends of your journeys. I wasn't knocking public transportation - only pointing out that "cool" isn't always practical. If the PRT pod can have a sliding cover, why can't it have sliding doors instead???

[MNBrewer]

8. I know Sen. Dibble

and I'll back his side of the argument against T-Paw ANY day.

[Avidor]

11. Dibble is good and so is Hornstein...

Mark Olson's Pods have no support in the MN House where they had to endure Olson's lengthy rants on PRT as well as same sex marriage and evolution.

I have some of Mark Olson's PRT rants up on You Tube.

Here's one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTArS_U3CE8

Here's Mark Olson's wacky "suicide and death" rant:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IhYKkTN70s

In 2004 Michel Bachmann said this about PRT:

"People on the right, people on the left, we have the common goal of moving people with transit, but doing it in the most cost-effective manner, in fact, in a manner that may end up costing no government subsidy, it may end up paying for itself,"

Here's the 2004 MPR article:

http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2004/04/26_mccalluml_prt/

[TheEuclideanOne]

12. I guess this is more about who presented the idea

As much as you might hate a politician, it is possible to evaluate something based on the merits of the technology. Otherwise, you might want to skip over all facts about a technology and just show a series of clips about the politician. If Michele Bachman, for example, proposed a cure for cancer you could just show all of the wackiness and lies that she spews, then at the very end mention something small about the canceer cure. You could end the video with a screen that says "Would you support Bachman's cure for cancer?"

[Avidor]

13. There is no "technology".... it's fake....

... and that's why Bachmann supported it. Bachmann has always opposed funding for reality-based transit.

PRT has no support among traditional transit advocacy groups and experts:

"Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) is claimed by its promoters )J. Edward Anderson, President of Taxi 2000 Corporation, and Jerry Schneider of the University of Washington, among others) to combine the advantages of rapid Transit private cars. Actually, this is an imaginary system based on an operationally and economically infeasible concept (elaborate infrastructure, yet low capacity) and has no realistic potential for application in urban transportation."

- Professor Vukan Vuchic, "Transportation for Livable Cities" (Rutgers 1999):


Of, course there will always be people who would want to waste $$$ on these futuristic transport concepts... see the Simpson episode "Marge vs the Monorail"

http://www.thesimpsons.com/episode_guide/0412.htm

Mr. Burns is forced to pay a $3 million fine for illegally dumping toxic waste under trees in the park. At a town meeting where Springfield's citizens discuss how to best use the new funds, Lyle Lanley, a charismatic traveling salesman convinces them to build a completely useless monorail. Marge is the only one in town who disapproves of the project and when the monorail is complete disaster, her reservations are proved correct.

[TheEuclideanOne]

15. Apparently you are an anti-PRT blogger

so this is not a casual topic for you. For me, I was just offended intellectually by the logic in the video and the reasons to shit-can the whole concept because some politician that you don't like. If anything, I like Bachman even less by having her name associated with it.

So, if a technology is not in use, that does not make it "fake". If it did, cars and planes were "fake" at some time before they were invented. Imagine if somebody built a prototype of an airplane. Even demonstrated it flying for a medium length distance and people reacted with "I can't support that. It is by politician XYZ" or "Planes are unrealistic, we should stick with trains" or "the wind and rain gets in your face when you fly"

[Avidor]

16. We're talking millions of dollars of taxpayers' money...

Money that could go to health care, education or reality-based transportation.

If you read the articles I posted, you'd learn that the millions of dollars they are requesting will go for a demonstration project and "research".

In other words - pork.

Millions of dollars have already gone for PRT... right down the drain:

http://www.lightrailnow.org/facts/fa_prt001.htm

[TheEuclideanOne]

17. And money toward research and a demonstration of the technology is a bad thing.

You seem to be fighting pretty hard against even research taking place. You have not even made a concrete argument as to what is so bad about it. Things can remain "fake" if there is no money to support them from becoming reality. There was a recent story about a scientist that has a cure for cancer, but can't get support for it because the Pharmacies can't profit from it and make money. Does that mean it is fake?


Right now, health insurance companies are fighting pretty hard to prevent things from happening. Public option is one example. They have a million reasons why it is horrible. From what I have seen in the past, the only reason that people and companies fight so extremely hard is that if the area that is being researched turns out to succeed, they will lose alot of money.

With all of your activism against this cause, why don't you give me a reason as to why it is so bad. One that is not politically or financially related.

[Avidor]

18. PRT research should be funded with private money... not public.

We have an enormous budget deficit here in Minnesota.

Minnesota taxpayers can't afford to waste public money on pie-in-the-sky ideas like PRT.

If you want to fund PRT research on your dime, go ahead.

[TheEuclideanOne]

19. okay.... so no facts or reasons why it is bad besides money

You do have a point about a lack of private funding. If it was such a great idea, you would think that the private companies would be jumping at the bit.

At the same time, you are pretty heavily into telling everybody that it is bad, but why can't you list out the reasons that it is bad? It couldn't be strictly financial, otherwise you would be supporting it if the economy was good. I always feel suspect about people that are so much against something, but have no reasons to explain why they feel that way. It makes me think that you are really just against the politician supporting it and no matter what that politician would suggest, you would be emphatically against it. Trying to argue logically about the pros/cons is just a waste of time. Thinking about it, that sounds like the entire Republican party and we can see how that is bad for the country.

So, in short, you are against it because you are against it. I guess there is nothing more to see here.

[Avidor]

20. I linked to articles by experts.

... please read them.

[Mr_Grant]

22. Minnesota is not the whole world

Private money IS involved in PRT.

*POSCO, a massive S. Korean steel company owns Vectus PRT which is trying to get started in Sweden,

*BAA, the owner of Heathrow and other airports, is an investor in ULTra PRT, which has completed construction at Heathrow,

*Masdar City, which will include PRT, light rail and metro, is wholly funded by a state-owned company and investors.

Avidor has spent years claiming PRT is a right wing scam. For example, Bachmann did author a PRT bill in the 2003-2004 legislature. But Avidor never mentions that there were a number of PRT bills that session, and the number of Democratic:Republican authors was something like 13:5

[TheEuclideanOne]

23. I suspected that there was private money

and in one of the articles, it mentioned a combination of public and private. I have jut not heard about it firsthand, so could not say for sure if there were private investors. Thn again, I also had a friend of mine tell me about it and it did sound like it would benefit society. When I first heard of he idea, I went through a number of doubts that I had and he had some good answers for them. He was mentioning private investors, so I am not surprised that there is private money out there.

[Avidor]

25. Mr Grant? One-post huh?

Tell us Mr. Grant if you are paid to promote PRT?

[Mr_Grant]

26. You know

what you have to do if you want an answer to that question!

[TheEuclideanOne]

28. I read that this morning..... hilarious!

Avidar, sorry to seem like I am picking on you, but I am bored and trying to avoid real work. One thing that I have to point out is that you did not rebute him on his bet. Why not? The best you could do was post a political video? Really?

Let's say, for argument's sake, that you did not think you could win the bet and didn't want such an insulting tattoo. The easiest solution is not to do anything! Nobody is forcing a gun to your head to keep posting that Mr. Grant is paid, you could simply stop implying it and nobody would even notice. Instead, you brought it here.

Okay, my brain won't let me stop, so here goes.....One last thing... So, you already knew about the bet that Mr. Grant threw out there. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that if you bring up the topic, he is going to verbally bitch slap you again about the bet. It couldn't be that hard to figure out that if you talk about him being paid, that he will talk about the bet. Even Michele Bachman could figure that one out. Whenever somebody calls you out on a claim you make and you can't back up your claim, it makes you look bad. That's just the way it is. If you don't want to look bad, don't bring up this topic.

[TheEuclideanOne]

27. A Henna Tatoo would be pretty cool

Hardly noticeable, I say. :) Okay, so I have to say it.... You may try to dismiss Mr. Grant because he only made one post, but why don't you take him up on his bet if you are so sure he is being paid. You lose alot of credibiity here on this note. If you can continue to insinuate that he is being paid, then take him up on his bet or, if I can quote my original post, then S T F U!!!

So, Avidor, why is it that the other side can at least list facts and make their case. I only know a little bit about the topic, but why is it that peope like Mr. Grant can list facts to support their side, but the best you can do is say "go read this link by an expert". Aren't you an expert? If you were just the average Joe who had an opinion about the topic, I would say fine. But since you are so involved in it, I would expect you to write alot more than I would even care to read. It reminds me of the many republicans that feel a certain way about (insert topic here) and can ony support their case by saying that Hannity said it or Rush said it. Even a friend of mine who is into this was telling me about PRT and a project he was involved in. He, also, did not have any problem giving me intelligent answers to my questions.

To be honest, I am on the fence to a degree and don't think that it is very obvious how PRT can improve some of the current methods of transportation, but I can definitely see more reasons to support it than to kill it. When one side can answer questions and the other side can't, it makes me think that the side that can answer questions is onto a solution.

[Mr_Grant]

32. Avidor has described his PRT expertise

...thusly:

"perhaps the leading skeptic of Personal Rapid Transit"

"I have the facts, I know my stuff"

"I have proof of everything I say about PRT"

[Mr_Grant]

52. Hey, look at

who has 11 posts already. Keep commenting, Ken.

[MNBrewer]

21. She's not going to find a cure for cancer

She doesn't have the capability. I don't think she has any reasoning skills, or ability to evaluate evidence. And, I think that applies pretty much across the board.

[Name removed]

24. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[TheEuclideanOne]

29. Okay, so let's make this interesting.... MrGrant vs Avidor

Okay, so you both have strong opinions about this topic on different sides of the table. Me? I am in favor of PRT, but don't have a really strong opinion either way. I just think it sounds like a good idea. I would like to see you guys duke it out on why you think it is good or bad with reasons to support why you feel that way.

[mwillong]

30. Another first time poster here

In the interest of full disclaimer, I too am a "first timer" here, and I registered only to reply on this thread. I am a PRT proponent with a long history debunking Avidor's relentless smear campaign. I have no ties to any PRT company or effort.

I wanted to point out that I have been challenging Avidor to debate for years. See: http://weinerwatch.blogspot.com/2007/07/open-challenge-to-ken-avidor-debate-me.html">my open challenge to him. Ken used to brag that he was always challenging PRT people to debate, and they always turned him down; but when I challenged him, he backpedaled. Note that I have revealed my true identity since that challenge was written, so my anonymity is no longer an issue. He still refuses.

Ken doesn't debate, he campaigns. And his campaigns are dirty.

Euclidean, I very much respect your "on the fence" approach to PRT. You, like most things Euclidean, are both sharp and logical. ;-) And actually, your position is not far off from my own, which is that the evidence for PRT is compelling enough to try it out, because only then can these questions be answered, one way or another. Sure, there is a risk in trying something new, but the potential upside is so strong that the risk is worthwhile. IMO, of course.

Anyway, that's all I have to say here.

[Avidor]

33. "mwillong" is Michael Carrato

"mwillong" (Michael Carrato) will also refuse to say whether he has been paid for his activities on the internet.

His fellow DU one-poster "Mr_Grant" (David Gow)... refuse to answer the question.

...and what are Mr. Carrato's politics?

This is how he describes his politics on Wikipedia:

"As for my political views, I detest labels and I refuse to be limited by them. :-)"

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:ATren&diff=337184510&oldid=336924982

These two guys, Carrato and Gow are desperate to keep people from finding out that Tim Pawlenty, a GOP presidential candidate is supporting former Rep. Mark Olson's PRT boondoggle.

But pictures and videos don't lie.

Olson and Bachmann:



Mark Olson and longtime PRT promoter J.E. Anderson trying to sell PRT to MInneapolis in 2004:

[mwillong]

34. I do not get paid. You know that Ken

I've said it before, but I'll say it here again for clarity:

I've never been paid to promote PRT. I have no financial ties whatsoever to any PRT efforts.

[Mr_Grant]

35. Are you sure he knows?

Avidor also 'knew' that you're really a kid named Chris who lives with his dad in Tonawanda, NY.

He also 'knew' that I shouldn't be allowed to edit at Wikipedia because I have a conflict of interest.

[TheEuclideanOne]

36. Okay, maybe I get caught up minor things

but Mr. Grant said that he does not get paid in a the post on the Daily Kos. He also said it here. You are the one making the accusation, so prove it. Who pays him? Do you ever watch the Rachel Maddow show? Okay, I am sure that you do. In the healthcare debate, there are alot of organizations claiming to be grass roots campaigns, that obviously are not. It takes her maybe a day to find out who their sources are. What is your basis for saying that these people are being paid? Give me one. If you can't support your claim, then making it is just smearing. I can't tell you to stop doing it, but from my experience I can say that people resort only to smearing when they can't support their case factually. I don't know of Michael Carrato, but if you are applying the same reasoning for claiming that he is paid, I can only draw the same conclusion.

Now regarding his political stance of "As for my political views, I detest labels and I refuse to be limited by them. " That is hardly a damning statement. I could name a few close friends that have said the same thing. Besides, does he really have to tell you his political position anyway? If you have been at odds with this person for the last 3 years, you should know. If Michele Bachman refused to classify herself, I would still have no trouble knowing what party and positions she supported based on her actions. To me that seems like a non-argument.

[Mr_Grant]

37. I have tried

... to teach Ken about the dangers of smearing, but to no avail. Oh, have you noticed that Ken has never apologized or retracted any of his disproven claims (such as)?

[TheEuclideanOne]

41. Well, I think I am out of material.

I never thought that this discussion would become so active. It was interesting to hear all sides, but I am going to bow out, assuming I can resist posting further. Apparently this topic has been going on for quite some time and there are alot of heated points of view. I must say that it was fun to participate. I really did like the concept of a debate and it is too bad that it never happened. I am involved in a number of discussions here and although hearing people who agree with you is good, I am always interested in hearing a discussion from both sides involving people who are educated on the topic. Hearing all input from one side is not as interesting, IMHO.

[Mr_Grant]

42. Yes, it was interesting

In addition to my commitments to public transit, transportation alternatives and accuracy, one of the reasons I keep debunking Avidor is that it can be a great deal of fun. It really exercises the satire muscle, and sharpens my BS detector and research skills. I also wouldn't be writing as much political satire as I do if it weren't for Ken Avidor, indirectly. Thanks, Ken!

[TheEuclideanOne]

45. Yeah, I must admit that it is alot of fun.

Sure hard to quit this thread. But Avidor sure does make it easy to continue the conversation. Just too much low hanging fruit in his responses. Kinda funny to see somebody try to get the moderators to delete all of the messages because of all of those mean posts where you use his own quotes. I don't think I have ever seen that here on DU. If this were an elementary school, I am sure you would here... "I am telling the teacher!" Quite frankly, with the exception of my initial posts, I thought that the conversation was pretty civil, IMHO.

Avidor.... no hard feelings. We definitely don't agree on thit topic, but I am sure we agree on many other things.

[mwillong]

47. The Boston Globe has a pretty balanced piece if you're interested.

Euclidean One: The Boston Globe recently did a nice extended piece on PRT. It is mostly supportive of the PRT concept, but not a blanket endorsement by any means, and it lists many of the detractors' arguments. It's a nice place to start if you're interested in the argument from all sides.

BTW, one of the most frequently quoted critics is Vukan Vuchic, a transit expert who has published multiple textbooks on transit systems. Ken quoted him earlier. While I respect Vuchic for what he's done in other areas of transit, I have serious issues with his PRT criticisms. For example, Vuchic's main criticism deals with what he perceives as low PRT capacity, but I've read his PRT capacity arguments (they're in his textbook) and I believe them to be seriously flawed. It basically comes down to Vuchic making an apples to oranges comparison between PRT and other forms of transit, and as a result, he underestimates PRT's relative capacity by anywhere from 4x to 10x. I can elaborate if you like; just email me or respond here.

[TheEuclideanOne]

48. Thanks for the article

I am reading the article right now and am a big fan of balanced approaches to issues. You learn alot more than having one side crammed down your throat. As I have hinted at here a few times, hearing both sides of the issue is important to me. I would definitely like to hear your thoughts on the capacity issue (among others), which is what I think the most obvious concerns is. For me, at least.

[mwillong]

53. Guideway Capacity

The guideway capacity of PRT is dependent on "headways", which (for PRT) is generally measured as the distance between the fronts of vehicles. A headway H measured in seconds translates to a maximum vehicle capacity of 3600/H vehicles per hour.

PRT vehicles can usually hold up to 4 passengers (system dependent) but in practice, the average will be no more than 1/3rd that, because PRT is personal and therefore has an occupancy more like a car. Also, some percentage of PRT guideway will be devoted to empty vehicle movement. When these factors are taken together, a rough estimate of passengers per vehicle is about 1. So passengers per hour is roughly equal to vehicles per hour.

Headways are dependent on the safety design of the system in question. The Morgantown PRT (actually considered "group rapid transit" due to 20-person vehicles) has a headway of 15 seconds; that's considered very high for PRT designs, but Morgantown makes up for it by grouping passengers by destination. This is possible because the number of destinations is very small (5, I believe).

Most designs feature headways under 5 seconds, all the way down to 0.5 seconds for Taxi 2000. Here are the maximum capacities at different headways, with comparable line haul capacities interspersed.

Passenger capacity, pph
432 - 72 passenger bus at 10 minute frequency
720 - PRT, 5 second headway
865 - 72 passenger bus at 5 minute frequency
900 - PRT, 4 second headway
1200 - PRT, 3 second headway (current generation systems)
1400 - 175 passenger rail car, 7.5 minute frequency
1440 - PRT, 2.5 second headway (Cabintaxi trials, 1978)
1800 - PRT, 2 second headway
3500 - 175 passenger rail car, 2-car trains, 6 minute frequency
3600 - PRT, 1 second headway (next generation systems)
6300 - 175 passenger rail car, 3-car trains, 5 minute frequency
7200 - PRT, 0.5 second headway (cutting edge)

So, for maximum line capacity, current generation PRT is competitive with a 175-passenger rail car (i.e. streetcar) running 8 times per hour. Next generation PRT systems will compete with 2-car trains running 10 per hour.

Some PRT opponents have overstated the minumum PRT headway. For example, one anti-PRT document asserts that PRT cannot operate at less than 15 seconds headway, despite the fact that the German Cabintaxi system was fully tested and safety approved at 2.5 seconds, over 30 years ago. By overstating PRT headway, opponents thus understate capacity.

Vuchic actually assumed a reasonable headway of 3 seconds (though still higher than most designs plan for). However, Vuchic compared PRT line capacity to absolute maximum theoretical line capacity for rail and buses, without accounting for stops and stations. Without stops and stations, buses and rail lines could simply run nonstop at high speed, at a separation of only 30 seconds or so. When calculated using these assumptions, rail capacity for 10-car metros maxed out at 320,000 passengers per hour running ~60mph and <30s separation between trains. Theoretically, this is possible; practically, no metro in the world can carry even one quarter that number.

He used this theoretical nonstop rail/bus capacity when comparing to PRT capacity, and dismissed PRT outright without considering stations and stops. Problem is, PRT line capacity is not impeded by stations or stops, so while rail/bus capacity is impacted by a factor of anywhere between 4 and 10 times when stations are analyzed, PRT is unaffected. This is what I referred to earlier when I said Vuchic's analysis was apples-to-oranges.

Now, the question arises, what is the minimum safe headway for PRT? Obviously the skeptics who say 15 seconds are completely wrong. Current generation systems are generally around 3 seconds, but PRT vendors are targeting 1 second for the next generation. There IS some controversy with 1-second headways, because current safety regulations explicitly prohibit headways that low. But those regulations were based on human-operated trains. PRT is fully automated and features fail-safe design features that make vehicles as reliable against catastrophic fault as a commercial airliner. For these reasons, PRT proponents believe regulators will eventually relax the rail-based restriction and allow headways down to 1 second for specific designs, after sufficient operational experience at 3 seconds.

So 3 seconds is possible today, and one second is a very reasonable near term target.

One last point: I listed 0.5 seconds above as the shortest headway. Such headways ("subsecond headways") are proposed by linear-induction-based systems without rubber tires, where stopping is extremely reliable even in bad weather. Such a system must also be designed from the ground up for short headways, and would be subject to extensive failure analysis before being approved. It would likely require seatbelts or some other restraint. Some feel such headways will never be accepted. I myself am skeptical, but I think it's theoretically possible from an engineering standpoint. Notably, the Taxi 2000 system targeted 0.5 seconds headway in the long term, and Ed Anderson has detailed his safety engineering in published papers.

So while I think 1 second headways are likely, 0.5 seconds is possible, but I have my doubts.

So that's my spiel on line capacity. There is also station capacity, which is also important; I can discuss that too if you like.

[TheEuclideanOne]

54. Okay, let me ask a stupid question..... What is a headway?

Is the headway the distance between one vehicle and one behind it? Don't worry, your explanation was not completely lost on me. I think that it interesting a smart to compare transportation method in a scientific, measured way and I also like the way that you gave a realistic assessment of 1 person per car and for empty cars rather than using numbers that assumed that each car would be filled to max capacity and no cars would be empty. However, not being directly involved in the Transit field, even terms like Headway are foreign to me. So if you could explain Headways to me like you would to a 5 year old, I could understand the rest of your explanation a bit better.

[mwillong]

55. Headway

Headway is the time it takes for two vehicles to pass a given point, either front-to-front or rear to front. Ed Anderson (who has written much of the modern academic literature on PRT) assumes front-to-front; others may assume rear-to-front. The difference is not insignificant.

As an example of headway, imagine that you are standing right next to a PRT guideway and vehicles are going by. For front-to-front, start a timer as soon as the front of one vehicle passes you. Then stop the timer as soon as the front of the next vehicle passes. That's front-to-front headway. For rear-to-front, start the timer when the rear of the first vehicle passes.

If one vehicle front passes you every second, then 60 will pass every minute, and 3600 every hour. If vehicle passes every TWO seconds, then 30 pass every minute, and 1800 every hour. You can therefore see the inverse proportion between capacity and front-to-front headway, so if front-to-front headway Hff=2secs, then capacity is 3600/2 = 1800 vehicles per hour.

If your headway is measured rear-to-front, then capacity is a bit more complicated because you have to add in the time it takes for the body of each vehicle to pass. If Hrf=2secs, the length of the vehicle L=4 meters, and the guideway speed V=10m/s (~25mph), then it takes L/V time for the vehicle body to pass, and capacity is 3600/(Hrf + L/V) = 3600/(2+4/10) = 1500 vehicles per hour for the assumptions given.

Does that make sense?

(Note: there is sometimes confusion when the term "headway" is used without specifying whether it is explicitly front-to-front. For all PRT analyses I've read, headway is specified front-to-front, but I included reference to rear-to-front because I believe there MAY be some cases where the term headway might be used to refer to rear-to-front. Practically, the difference between rear-to-front and front-to-front, at typical vehicle lengths and line speeds, is usually less than 0.5 seconds.)

[TheEuclideanOne]

56. So let me clarify my question.

For starters, headway does make more sense now because of your explanation, but it doesn't seem to take into account the time it would take for people to get in and out of the vehicles. Maybe that is in a seperate location at each station and is a different part of the equation. Maybe I am reading it wrong or misunderstanding the way that it is used. Wouldn't you have to to account for load and unload time for each car to truly measure the capacity? Thinking about it, I guess a bus does have the same load/unload issue at each stop. Maybe a subway or a train would be a better comparison becauase it loads and unloads alot of people at one time. I live in Aventura, Florida, which is like the city of the living dead. I believe that the average age is deceased here. If you had to factor in how long it would take for each person to get in and out of each car, I would imagine that it would slow down capacity. A college town would be different.

[mwillong]

57. Line capacity vs station capacity

Your question relates to one of the fundamental differences between PRT and other modes. For PRT, maximum guideway capacity is not affected at all by station loading latency, because all stations are offline. Consider this example: when you are driving on a freeway, there may be a stop sign at the end of an exit, but that stop sign has no effect on the freeway capacity, because the stop is fully offline with merge/diverge lanes for accel/decel.

Rail, on the other hand, has to stop for every station, and therefore rail stations limit the capacity of the rail line. It's like a chain being only as strong as its weakest link: capacity of a rail line is no more than the capacity of its lowest-capacity station. PRT stations do not limit capacity in this way.

Now, this is not to say that PRT station capacity is not important - it certainly is. PRT stations have to load vehicles efficiently enough to keep the guideways running at capacity. Consider the freeway again. A 3-lane freeway can move maybe 6000 vehicles per hour, but no single on-ramp could ever supply that many cars. If a freeway had only one onramp, and that onramp was fed by a city street that had a capacity of only 1200 vehicles per hour, then that freeway would always be underutilized (specifically, it would never run more than 20% of maximum capacity - 1200/6000)

If, however, 5 such onramps fed the freeway, each 1200 vph, then the freeway could be fully utilized.

It's the same for PRT. Consider ULTra: if an ULTra PRT "line" (actually, they're usually conceived as loops, but a line is simpler to visualize) has a max capacity of 1200 veh/hr, and each station has a loading capacity of 300-500 vehicles per hour (reasonable for a 3 berth ULTra station), then 3 or 4 stations would be sufficient to keep the guideway at capacity. At the future target capacity of 3600 veh/hr, 9-12 stations would be required.

Note, however, that PRT stations are small, and intended to be installed at much closer spacing than rail. At half mile spacing along a line, 6 miles would have 12 stations.

This analysis is simplified. In a full network, the dynamics of interconnected loops would complicate the station requirement. Simulations and modelling can help predict the station requirement in a real world setting. But this example illustrates the underlying concept that PRT stations add up their capacity to supply the full guideway capacity, as opposed to rail, in which stations limit the maximum guideway capacity.

[TheEuclideanOne]

58. It is refreshing to see formulas and a logical approach and a science behind it.

You have a good way of explaining things that the layman can understand. What you explained really shows that you can compute and compare the capacity of not only PRT, but other approaches to transportation. It also shows that this really is a viable option for public transportation. I can see now why people oppose it and why some are even afraid to debate the topic. I was actually surprise at how vehemently some do oppose it, but when I see such extreme pushback it makes me think that it is because this threatens people in some way.

So, one thing that I still am wondering about is how this technology consistenly loses enough support to be adopted. Perhaps there is more success in recent years, but in the meetings when somebody presents a case for PRT as you have, how do people oppose it so successfully? I was trying to pry the information from Avador, but you know how that went. What seems to be the dealbreaker that is stopping people from adopting this?

[mwillong]

60. It's easy to capitalize on fear of the unknown

For the public at large, I think it comes down to fear of the unknown. People have no experience with PRT or anything like it. The closest thing is perhaps skyscraper elevators, but even that is not a close analogy. The idea of driverless vehicles and elevated guideways is completely foreign, and it appears too complex and futuristic to be achievable today.

I've commented on dozens, perhaps hundreds, of PRT threads over the last 4 years, and in almost every thread, someone will bring up the Jetsons; someone else will reference the Simpsons "Monorail, monorail" episode; several others will call it silly or ridiculous (the buglike appearance doesn't help that ;-)). Even those who are mildly supportive sometimes have difficulty imagining the scope of it, and are skeptical that a dense enough PRT infrastructure could be built.

So there's the natural fear, but then there are the actively anti-PRT people like Avidor, who are more than willing to amplify those fears. Look at Avidor's campaign, both here and at his anti-PRT website: it's all one big scare tactic. He tells people the guideways will be big and ugly (actually, they'd be smaller than a footbridge); he tells them it's a scam, he tells them it's anti-transit, he tells them that only conservatives support it (all completely false); he says it will be a terrorist threat; he says it will be unsafe; he says it's a waste of tax dollars... and there's no truth to any of it.

But the uninformed get suspicious, because they have no knowledge of PRT.

Now, human history is filled with examples of great conceptual leaps. Consider the airplane or the automobile. Nobody in the 19th century could have envisioned how those technologies would transform our lives, yet they we able to overcome inherent human fear of change and are now part of our every day lives. How did this happen, and why doesn't it happen for PRT?

I think it comes down to having a "bootstrap", if you understand the term. Planes and automobiles could start small. Air travel started with innovators taking chances with small homemade flying machines. No infrastructure was needed to jumpstart air travel. Once the early risk-takers had worked out the kinks, others could join in, and air travel grew from zero planes in 1900 to thousands of planes in the air at any given time today.

Same with the automobile. Early versions worked on dirt roads; no need for infrastructure. Early adopters created a market, which slowly expanded, and as the market expanded, roads were built, gas stations went up, the Interstates were built, etc., until today, when it's become so successful that it's a blight.

There is no such gradual path for PRT. PRT startup is difficult and relatively expensive. The risk takers are not hobbyists or early adopters, they are politicians and transit professionals, neither of whom are known for risk taking. There's a saying among PRT enthusiasts: "Nobody ever got fired for proposing a train". Trains are safe: tried, tested, true. Low risk. PRT is the complete opposite: untried, untested, high risk, and, as we've seen, political poison once the detractors find out about it.

Fortunately, we finally have a few early adopters. Heathrow and Masdar are both non-public efforts, so they can bootstrap without political complications. But it took some very forward thinking people with very deep private pockets for it to happen.

So that's my take on it. Others may have different views. Sorry if this is long winded, but I'm enjoying this discussion. :-)

[TheEuclideanOne]

61. Yes, I am enjoying the conversation as well.

This thread should be referenced somewhere in the Pro-PRT websites. Maybe it should be referenced in the anti-PRT sites as well as an example of how "NOT TO" make your case. It was a really interesting conversation involving parties from both sides and a real demonstration of how each side approached the discussion. The anti-PRT side really did focus on fear, smearing, easily disprovable claims and could not answer even the simplest question of "What supports your point of view? Make your case". The Pro-PRT side had multiple people just chomping at the bit to explain in clear detail their viewpoints, debate the issue and even explain what the downsides are.

You are clearly passionate about this cause and are almost to point of being embarrassed about writing in such detail about it. That is passion.... you can talk intelligently ad infinitem and can support your case with sound reasoning. The same applies to Mr_Grant. In fact, I think that some of it rubbed off on me now and I was not really emotionally attached to this topic at the start. In fact, my initial post was really a result of being insulted intellectually and I did not really care that much either way. Avidor, on the other hand, has put in 3 years in taking the anti-PRT position and behaves as if the Silver Bullet is to scare, smear and make sure the truth is kept hidden. He should realize that that is a red flag to anybody who has not already decided on their position. He was put on the spot in a number of places and could have easily defended himself if he had the facts on his side. The absense of that makes the anti-PRT side look sketchy in my book. You even listed several facts that could easily be disputed if they were false.

[mwillong]

64. You are not alone...

Believe it or not, I became a proponent because of Avidor, and I know of others who did too. Sure, Avidor's base techniques work on the masses who either don't care or can't understand the concept, but intelligent people see right through it. Four years ago I was mildly interested in PRT, but after encountering Avidor's over-the-top campaign, I felt so repulsed by the intellectual vacuousness of it that I felt compelled to answer him publicly (using my old pseudonym, A Transportation Enthusiast). In order to properly answer him, I had to educate myself, and the more I learned, the more I realized the promise of such a system. So in essence, he pushed me into PRT advocacy.

Avidor may have created a lot of detractors, but in a few cases he's spawned some hardcore proponents. And we've been very vocal. :-)

Thank you for your kind words. I really do like talking about PRT, because so few people truly understand it and I feel like I can bridge that knowledge gap. I come from a family of teachers so maybe it's in my blood.

And in return, I must say I was very happily surprised to see genuine open-minded questions here... you have no idea how rare that is in PRT discussions. Most forums are filled with mudslinging from those who don't understand the concept, or who fear it.

One last thought on PRT: I am a proponent, but I offer no guarantees. PRT is new, and real world deployment may reveal unforeseen issues. But the evidence is more than compelling enough to TRY. Too many opponents see PRT's lack of real-world proof as a reason to reject it; I see it as a reason to test it and obtain that proof, one way or another.

If you ever have questions about PRT, feel free to ping me via email.

[TheEuclideanOne]

65. Yes, Avidor is doing wonders in

creating new pro-PRT advocates, simply by being himself. :rofl:

I could not ping you here, maybe because you are a new member, but you should be able to send me a direct message with your email and I will reply back.

[mwillong]

66. Yep, I can't either...

I can't email you either. Sigh. :-)

My email address is:

m wil long at gmail.com.

Remove the spaces, change "at" to @. Let me know when you have it and I'll remove it here.

[mwillong]

59. A little more on station capacity

You brought up the issue of slow loading passengers. In a system like ULTra, each station is independent, and each berth within each station is independent. So an elderly passenger will slow down one berth but will not affect others. The overall effect is therefore marginal. If there is one elderly passenger in 10, and that passenger doubles the typical loading time, then the total impact on station throuhghput is 10 percent. This would be addressed by adding a station berth to a few stations, maybe 3-4 extra berths added to the 12-station, 36-berth example I described in the last message.

Back to the freeway analogy, if one of the streets feeding the freeway is always backed up, lanes can be added to that street to increase capacity leading up to the onramp.

[TheEuclideanOne]

49. Finished the article

I thought that it was an excellent article. It confirmed what my general understanding was. I even saw a comment or two from Mr Grant. :) One of the reasons that I was pressing Avador so hard on facts AGAINST IT was really just to see his reasoning. I don't see it as a silver bullet for all transportation issues, and it is clearly not aimed at being that. I can see it being a big plus in a number of situations and wonder if some of the funds allocated by Obama for the environment could be used for this. I think that it would be a great use of those dollars since at the end of the day we would have an improved transit system. I drive my car almost exclusively, but my sister does not have a car and something like this would be perfect for her. I have also live in places where having a car does not really solve every problem. In Miami, there is really no great public transit system. There is one that exists, but it is not reall great for everybody and does not reach enough of the city and state to bbe truly useful. I would like to see something innovative like this.

[Mr_Grant]

62. Looks like

somebody didn't learn

[Mr_Grant]

63. HA!

Seattle Transit Blog has blocked me after one comment! And I just wanted Jeremy to see this link: http://kinetic.seattle.wa.us/~prt-q.html#prtsupp

[Mr_Grant]

31. Thanks for your neutrality

I gave up on the possibility of debating Avidor ages ago, and now just hope to mock him in the course of debunking his claims.

This is what happens in any comment thread -- you have already noticed the pattern: Avidor does not respond to facts so much as he just changes the subject and posts another claim, cartoon or video. It's as if he has a checklist of claims. And when he runs out of claims, he says "Whatever..." and starts the whole thing over somewhere else.

Some of Avidor's claims are humorous. For example, Avidor once claimed a PRT test facility in Wales had been "bulldozed", based on a Google Maps photo taken before its construction.

Other times he blames PRT for things it didn't do. For example, he once tried to blame 10-15 years of neighborhood neglect in central England on 2-3 years of PRT planning.

He distorts facts: he once claimed for weeks that he had a document proving PRT is "too risky." It turned out to be a company prospectus, and the damning passage was a fairly mundane investor safe harbor statement.

Other claims are tiny, but make you wonder "WTF?" Avidor once wrote to a blog in Alameda and signed his message "Ken Avidor, Alameda".

Others are outrageous and just plain evil: Avidor once claimed a company headed by a board member of ATS Ltd (maker of the ULTra PRT) was "one of the the worst when it comes to privatizing transit," because one of its trains was in a multi-fatality accident. Avidor failed to mention -- or failed to find out like I did in a 10 minute Google search -- that a court blamed a different company for the accident.

As I previously mentioned @22, there were a number of PRT bills in the Minnesota legislature in 2003-2004, and the majority of authors were Democrats. But Avidor only ever mentions one of the authors, a Republican: Michele Bachmann.

And so it goes. I suppose I could debate Avidor (mwillong is still saying he wants to do it), but come on now -- who wants to debate someone with such breathtaking disregard for facts? The only thing you can do is debunk. So I do.

[Avidor]

38. Mr. Carrato, Mr. Gow - DU has rules.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/forums/rules.html

This is a moderated discussion forum with rules. We have a team of volunteer moderators who delete posts and ban disruptors. Members are strongly urged to familiarize themselves with our rules, and make an effort to become a positive member of our community. Those who do not risk having their posts deleted or their posting privileges revoked.

2. Who We Are: Democratic Underground is an online community for Democrats and other progressives. Members are expected to be generally supportive of progressive ideals, and to support Democratic candidates for political office. Democratic Underground is not affiliated with the Democratic Party, and comments posted here are not representative of the Democratic Party or its candidates.

3. Civility: Treat other members with respect. Do not post personal attacks against other members of this discussion forum.

I am not "neutral". I am a Democrat, I vote and volunteer for Democratic candidates and attend my precinct caucuses and conventions.

I also live in Minnesota where Pawlenty is asking taxpayers' to waste millions of dollars on PRT.

Neither Carrato or Gow live in Minnesota.

[TheEuclideanOne]

39. So....let me guess...little voice in your head saying

MAKE THEM STOP!! MAKE THEM GO AWAY!!!

So, if your main viewpoint is that Pawlenty and Bachman support PRT therefore you are against it, you should say it. It sure would save time discussing the merits of the technology with you. I was really trying to get a discussion going here on the topic itself. After doing some research, apparently this is a pretty heated topic. I must say, Avidor, that since you are so much against even debating PRT and making your case, I must conclude that it really does have alot of merit and the folks that are fighting tooth and nail against it are probably supported by industries that would lose money if it became a reality. That is simply my conclusion from this exchange. It was a very interesting discussion based on what was said and, more importantly, what wasn't said.

BTW, I am from Miami, Florida. This is not Minnesota Underground the last I checked.

[Avidor]

44. I support the Sierra Club and DFL Leaders in Minnesota - NO Public Funding for PRT.

You said:

"I must conclude that it really does have alot of merit and the folks that are fighting tooth and nail against it are probably supported by industries that would lose money if it became a reality."

I say; PRT has no support among traditional transit advocacy groups in Minnesota (Transit for Livable Communities and the Sierra Club North Star both have resolutions opposing public funding of PRT). http://www.northstar.sierraclub.org/campaigns/transportation/position200404.html">Here is the Sierra Club's resolution.

North Star Chapter position on Personal Rapid Transit, passed April, 2004
Whereas regional transit needs to be high speed, high capacity, cost-efficient, geographically comprehensive, uniform and safe in order to build ridership;
Whereas Minnesota is about to open its first light rail line and there is strong popular support for its first commuter rail line;
Whereas clean air, clean water and sensible urban development depend in part on and result in part from moving as many people as possible using as few resources as possible with feasible technologies that will attract riders;
Whereas Minnesota has historically underfunded transit;
Whereas no Personal Rapid Transit proposal has yet received majority financial backing from any government;
Whereas elevated concrete guideway on existing public right of way is regarded as incompatible by most residential and small business neighborhoods;
Whereas elevated concrete guideway threatens the urban forest of affected areas if routed along existing, tree-lined streets and roads;
Whereas elevated concrete guideway may preclude future forestation of public right-of-way in dense urban areas;
Whereas public safety and protection of public property requires a minimum level of manned presence on transit systems;
Whereas, automated vehicles not owned by individuals do not replicate the advantages of the personal, private automobile;
For these and other reasons,
Be It Resolved, the North Star Chapter of the Sierra Club
(1) supports light rail and commuter rail as the standards for regional transit in the Twin Cities Metro Area;
(2) does not believe that automated, small-cab vehicles on fixed public guideway can provide the cost-efficiency or environmental benefits of large-capacity vehicles on fixed public guideway;
(3) does not believe that automated, small-cab vehicles on fixed public guideway replicate the proprietary attractions of the privately owned, controlled, personal automobile and consequently cannot substitute themselves, in open competition, for any meaningful share of the current private vehicle fleet;
(4) supports the concentration of available public funding on initial and expansion legs of light and commuter rail;
(5) opposes diversion of scarce public transit dollars, either capital or operating, to the development and operation of automated, small-cab vehicles on fixed public guideway for general transit purposes;
(6) does not oppose the study and possible use of automated, small-cab vehicles on fixed public guideway for limited geographic and functional sites such as airports or large educational or business campuses, as long as such systems are financed by the entities being served.

I support the Sierra Club North Star position.

I also support the http://www.mn2020.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC=%7BB0256E30-B0AA-4FBB-955B-8FFC7EE3D1FE%7D">DFL leaders Rep. Hornstein and Senator Scott Dibble's position:

Both Hornstein and Sen. Scott Dibble, who head the transit subcommittees in each chamber, said the Winona proposal has no chance of state funding. "They're not going to get nickel one of public money while I'm around," Dibble said.

[Mr_Grant]

46. Well OK...

...and the World Wildlife Fund is backing the Masdar carbon neutral city project, which is to have light rail, intercity rail, and PRT. Awareness about PRT has changed a lot in the six years since that Sierra chapter issued its statement.

If you don't want to spend public funds on PRT in Minnesota, fine. That's our representative democracy. But if the entire US does things your way, other countries will pull ahead in PRT. And arguably fewer Americans will have access to rapid transit, since the conventional systems you maintain are the only valid technologies are too expensive to be constructed to reach everyone who needs to be served.

My goal is urban rapid transit, in many forms, that provides comparable service & access to everyone who pays taxes to build and maintain it. What's your goal, Ken?

[Mr_Grant]

40. You are claiming things about PRT, Ken

All I am doing is discussing them, and reporting other things you have claimed. Your words.

Are you now claiming I am not a Democrat? Prove it. Are you claiming I claim to live in Minnesota? Prove it.

Otherwise, your seeking refuge in forum rules is just changing the subject.

[TheEuclideanOne]

43. Yeah! Don't attack people by claiming that they are Paid Shills. That is against the rules!

Racking my brain to try to remember who keeps claiming that people are being paid. My apologies for not remembering, but somebody here keeps accusing people of being paid for their viewpoints. The name escapes me. :) Those darn personal attacks I think break the Civility rule (#3).

[Avidor]

50. Interesting....

[Mr_Grant]

51. I am glad

you find it interesting that I am telling my Twitter followers about this exchange -- please tell us why, as if we can stop you. Rest assured that I still do not think my Tweets are private.

Quizzically yours,
Mr_Grant