When I was a kid, I had a toy monorail. It looked like a rocketship, only pointed on both ends, or possibly two airplane fuselages back to back, and it hung from a thin, round metal rail. I saw one on a web site about historic toys once, but can’t find it now.
Now a former Boeing engineer wants to build a full-scale monorail like it in Portland. Instead of calling it a monorail, which is what it is, he calls it an “air tram,” possibly because he thinks that will sell better in a city that has already built an aerial tram.
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This sounds like a completely kooky idea, but in the city that loves spending money on mass transit, no idea is so kooky that it won’t get coverage from not one but two newspapers. After all, aren’t the notions of building an 1890s-technology streetcar, a 1930s-technology rail system, or a 1950s aerial tram just as kooky?
The engineer has proposed to build such a system across the Columbia River or between the Portland suburb of Troutdale and Mt. Hood. Or anywhere at all, in fact. He just wants someone to give him some money for the project. After all, he lost his web site and could use a few dollars to get it going again.
He actually managed to get it on the agenda for the Troutdale City Council, although at least one member of the council was pretty skeptical. I don’t think anything will come of it, but in Portland, you never know.
Parts of this idea are good. A suspended monorail is a good approach for carrying people across barriers such as rivers and canyons. It is also good for low effect on other transport modes such as pedestrians, animals, and road traffic. The real estate right of way costs are comparatively low – if done economically it would be more like a small power line utility easement than a road right of way. The aerodynamics, speed and electric propulsion are also good.
The part that makes this uneconomical is the scale; trying to save money by using old airplane fuselages results in excessive cost for the guideway because the vehicles are too big and heavy. The initial capital cost and the life cycle cost would be a lot lower and the potential profits and area served a lot more if the vehicle size were limited to less than one ton gross vehicle weight. It would also be better to automate the system and operate in the demand response mode with distributed control in the vehicles.
Of course I have just described somewhat the Higherway system I am designing.
ROT:After all, aren’t the notions of building an 1890s-technology streetcar, a 1930s-technology rail system, or a 1950s aerial tram just as kooky?
THWM: O’Toole you sleazy crooked asshole, automobiles are 1880’s techology!
THWM: O’Toole you sleazy crooked asshole, automobiles are 1880’s techology!
Building rails and trains is still much older.
prk166 said: Building rails and trains is still much older.
THWM: Not as old as roads, they’ve been around for thousands of years!
Yes they are. Nevertheless, that doesn’t help your point.