Where is the Minnesota anti-PRT propagandist sticking his nose today? The experimental Modutram personal rapid transit test system in Guadalajara:
A unique operational feature is that the vehicles will keep moving slowly through stations without completely stopping. This operation has proved successful when tested with handicapped passengers. Passengers alight as soon as the vehicle enters the station while others board just before it leaves the station. If no one boards, or if boarding is incomplete, the vehicle will stop in the station. Stations are arranged so as to keep boarding and alighting passengers separate (even to the point of having separate staircases).
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Why do they do it that way? We don't know, their reasons will come out in due course.
The point is that Ken Avidor doesn't know either. He just ridicules it on Twitter:
And despite Modutram being a design that has been conceived, designed and built by a Mexican university and funded by the government of Mexico, Avidor blogs:
Personal Rapid Transit Pod People Invade MexicoMore locomotion lunacy from the PRT Consulting blog about a Mexican PRT project called Modutram
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"Invade"? Right, Ken -- those Mexicans couldn't possibly engineer something high-tech all by themselves.
Update 1:
Don't tell Avidor about this other transport technology that also moves slowly in stations without completely stopping!
2 comments:
Well. That is not a joke, even when it actually look like one.
I was part of the designers group that had development the first prototype of Modutram´s PRT. And i have to say we allways told them it was not a good idea to do it that way, we even show them some Stardars such as ADA and so on; at the end they decided to do it that way but the project is not finished at all, so i hope they chance their mind. I saw the testing yo talk about and it was not good at all, so, I dont know. It`s a nice project and a good idea to build a PRT system so i hope they keep on going and develop a very nice one.
Thanks for your firsthand account. As I have written elsewhere, the option of not completely stopping in stations seemed crazy.
Do you know if Modutram is still planning to implement it that way? I hope the testing experience was enough evidence for them to decide to do it the way other PRT companies do.
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