How Personal Rapid Transport Works

notice you shaved your goatee. It's startlingly different. Yeah. Yeah, I'm not used to the air conditioning on my chain, but I'll get used to it. Well, we're not used to it around the office. We're actually lamenting the loss of it. We're sitting shiva over chris is goatee. We've got the mirrors covered. But we have to soldier on, don't we, Chris? Yeah? So I'm thinking we could soldier on by talking about whether or not there's going to be a new kind of taxi cab in the future.

What do you know about this? Well, I do know that gas prices are going up and people are looking at all kinds of alternatives, even something that might seem like it's right out of one of those uh nineties nine fifties art deco. Uh, this is the wave of the future, like the wed Way people move her. So what we're talking about is personal rapid transit or PRT. And it's actually not a new idea. It does find its roots in the fifties um an American urban designers

started toying with the idea. What it does is it takes the the um the best of both worlds of subways and taxis and put them together. Uh. It's personal rapid transit because there's so many cars on this rail line that you don't have to share with anybody. So people who are unsettled by the homeless or are xenophobic to a clinical degree can rest easy on this ride. Uh. And it also takes you pretty much exactly where you want to go. Surprisingly, it's less less to build than

light rail by a long shot. There doing one at Heathrow Airport in the infamous Terminal five UM and it's costs about sixteen million for a mile of track. Total costs. Most light rail costs about forty million, which is amazing that it's got it beat by that. Why don't we have this installed everywhere? Now, Well, I would guess that even though uh they're claiming that it is less expensive than light rail, um, that there's just so much more

infrastructure involved in building a light rail system. You know, from from what I've read and researching for the podcast, the the cars we're talking about here for these PRT systems are are small. They're they're like a you know, a personal automobile rather than a big honking train, which

I'm sure you know costs a lot to build. Um. Plus, the track would probably need to be considerably wider for a light rail train, so you know, it sort of makes sense that it would be a little bit more cost efficient even with the number of stops going up. But even with hard numbers, there's a lot of people who aren't swayed. Um. Personal rapid transit systems have found vocal opponents everywhere that they've been proposed. You watched The Simpsons, right,

oh yeah, okay, you've seen the mono rail episode. It's it's one of my favorites. It is a great so it has it all, has Leonard di moy apossums, it's a from the music man. But really, when I was researching personal rapid transit, I realized that the mono rail episode of The Simpsons is a subtle indictment of PRT systems. Um and while in the episode, Homer Simpson is the conductor of the mono rail, Uh, what better metaphor for

a failing computer system than Homer himself? Right, that's true? Yeah, and uh, that's one of the big criticisms of the PRT system is is that you know what happens if one of the cars fails, if you're on the same track as everyone else, and especially if they're moving as in a close proximity as it suggests that we will be if we use these systems, it will be essentially bumper to bumper. And they are in man they are computerized, their computer driven, which is good because they can run

twenty four hours a day. But if they're unmanned, then what happens when they stop? Uh, like you said, you've got all the cars behind you stopped behind you. Uh, it's it could be just a complete nightmare. It's like being stuck on a roller coaster. But you know, you're not at an amusement park. You're trying to get home

or get to work. Maybe they'll install horns in them, so at least we can you know, have the satisfaction of honking if you Yeah, that would be awesome actually, But I was intrigued that they're being installed in some places, uh, I think Sweden and Abu Dhabi, which is sort of ironic considering that's they would have gotten the money from

that from oil. Yeah, yeah, that is ironic. But they are starting to uh they're actually the the United Arab Emirates and and do buying some of these other areas are really starting to lead the charge on going green. And the city called Masdar City, it's the development outside of Abu Dat. They're they're aiming to become the first zero carbon footprint city ever. And part of that is the personal rapid transit system they're implementing. And this is not a test. I mean, they're putting in a whole

stop uh system. So it's it's a huge deal and there's going to be a lot of eyes on Abu Dhabi to find out, you know, if this can really work and if it will fail like people expect, or if it could be the wave of the future for taxis that's fascinating. It'll be it'll be exciting to see you know that this may be a real solution. Yeah, I hope so, because we're drowning here. If you want to learn more about personal rapid transit, read will there

be a new kind of Taxicab? On how stuff works dot com for more on this and thousands of other topics. Does it how stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think. Send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com. Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, Are you