PRT FAKERY

There are two leading so-called PRT vendors, The U.K.'s Advanced Transport Systems Ltd. (ULTra) and the Taxi 2000 Corporation (Skyweb Express) Here's how they sell their "products".

ULTra is FROG-on-a-Stick

ULTra uses a navigation and control "platform" provided by a maker of "APM's" or Automated People Movers called FROG. FROG, does not... I repeat, does not describe any of its products as "PRT".

A FROG brochure available in PDF form on the Frog website describes what they supplied to ULTra in 2001:

"Urban Light Transport, ULTra, is being developed by UK-based Advanced Transport Systems Ltd. The platform of the ULTra-vehicle, including FROG-technology for navigation and control, is supplied by 2getthere. In 2001, two platforms were supplied for testing purposes on the test track in Cardiff."

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The FROG website also says the maximum speed of their Cybercab is 25 mph... hardly "rapid".

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Incidentally, that PDF of the FROG brochure has a good description of the Schiphol FROG project at the "Long-Term Parking Lot P3" to which you need to take a bus (with driver) from the terminal... a parking lot!!! big deal!!!

FROG provided the technology for ULTra... so ATS put an existing APM technology on a short stretch of "elevated guideway", really a beam bridge (see below) called their their borrowed system "PRT".

ULTra is not PRT... ULTra is FROG-on-a-stick.

ULTra's Guideway Fakery

ULTra claims they can use slim guideways seems to have resorted to photographic fakery to convince people that a slim structure can be feasible. In photos on their site, UlTra (downloadable files) shows a test track built mostly on the ground like a go-cart track. Only one section is on pylons... two pylons... with the ramrod-straight guideway firmly anchored into solid abutments. It's not a guideway at all , but a simple "beam bridge". Other photos show only the pods, guideway and pylons, but no abutments... it's so fake.

Also ULTra runs on batteries.

ULTra has a new set of three computer-generated visuals that depict what they're planing to build at Heathrow. The files are huge, so I put all three together with some comments:

So, this is the wonder of technology that will make trains and buses obsolete...who are they kidding???!!! The reason the station is on the ground is obvious. If it were elevated, it would be huge, ugly and expensive... so they cheated and put it on the ground. When the PRTers say that LRT is inefficient because it operates at street-level, show them this picture. Note also that the curve is not banked. Want to guess the speed of the little robotic golf-cart as it crawls through that turn?....5 mph, 10 mph?... what a joke!!!

Dorky Wheels and Undercarriage

Raytheon made an attempt to build a PRT system. It was a huge flop. It just looked awful. The undercarriage of the pod had these little tires that looked like they came off a boat trailer. The tires looked very, very dorky. A photographer boasts on his website how he was asked by Raytheon to... well, here's Matt Ferguson's own words:

"We were just outside Boston, Massachusetts at the Raytheon world headquarters. Raytheon, a big producer of hi tech military weapons and air traffic control systems, was working on the PRT (Personal Rapid Transit) project. Several energetic images were needed to promote the new system worldwide, with instructions that we were not to reveal the rubber tires under the vehicle in any of the final photos. A circular 1/8th mile test track had been assembled about 25 feet in the air, so we had a rented scissors jack platform and cherry picker delivered to the site. We had decided that a sunrise shoot would provide low light in the east to perfectly side light the pod, and colorful trees would create a rich texture. To create motion effects, slow shutter speeds were used as I panned when the pod zoomed by while my assistant Mark panned a speedotron strobe synced by a remote from up in his cherry picker just out of camera range. One concern we had was for our model (the project's lead technician), who rode in circles inside the pod for hours."

Ed Anderson and crew made sure that the new model they built would have a fully enclosed guideway concealing the clunky undercarriage and the dorky wheels. Pictures of dorky wheels are rare on the PRT brochures and websites... and it's easy to see why. Imagine one of these things going 100 mph on those crappy little wheels. Look at the narrow wheel base and the crappy go-cart-style undercarriage and imagine this pod taking a turn at 40 mph with 3 heavy passengers. For contrast, take a look at the undercarriage, wheels and suspension system of cars, buses, trains and trolleys.

Massive Pylons and Guideways

Another problem was that massive guideway. The above picture shows the actual Raytheon guideway superimposed on a Minneapolis street. No city official in his or her right mind would propose putting this huge structure all over their cities. Ed Anderson and crew disowned the Raytheon project, claiming Taxi 2000 could make the pylons and guideway slimmer. The engineers of the 2001 OKI Central Loop Study proved that there was no way that slim guideways and pylons could safely holdup a bunch of fully loaded PRT pods.