Maglev Personal Transportation System Set For Trial In Tel Aviv 81
andhar (194607) writes The BBC reports a system of two-passenger maglev pods suspended from 500 meters of elevated tracks will be constructed on the campus of Israel Aerospace Industries as a pilot for a larger deployment in Tel Aviv. The article claims a top speed of 150 mph (240 kph) for these autonomous "personal rapid transit" pods.
From the article: "Joe Dignan, an independent smart city expert, said the system represented 'a hybrid between existing infrastructure and autonomous vehicles.' 'It will get the market in the mood for autonomous vehicles — it is not too scary, is cheaper than building out a train line and uses part of the urban landscape, 20 feet above ground, that isn't currently used.'"
Long Overdue Use of "free space" (Score:5, Insightful)
The concept of using the equivalent of ski lift pods above ground between light poles has always made a lot of sense to me.
I've wondered why downtown city planners haven't implemented this type of transit as it could potentially alleviate all sorts of congestion for relatively "long walks" people have to make in dense areas.
Vaporware. Totally. (Score:2, Insightful)
1. Only 200 meters of track is supposed to be built. it is projected to be finished by end of 2015.
http://www.iai.co.il/2013/32981-46034-he/IAI.aspx (Hebrew; the English version of the article strangely does not mention the track length)
2. The BBC article claims speeds of 70km/h. definitely not 240kph. read TFA.
3. Earlier incarnations of this story claimed implementations in the Tel-Aviv harbour area or alternatively in Atidim hi-tech park in Tel-Aviv:
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-03-12/nasa-pod-transports-close-to-reality-in-tel-aviv
pay attention to the estimate of 18 months to finish construction. this was in March. 2012. never happened.
4. Israel has an excellent reputation for innovation. no argument there.
5. Israel also has a reputation for infrastructure projects that take much longer to complete than planned. and for neglecting to invest in infrastructure in general.
6. Tel-Aviv has no subway and no tram. traffic and parking are pretty bad. talks of building a subway have been around for ~40 years. no government/mayor is actually doing that because it will take more than one term to complete...
7. in the entire Israel there is 1 (one) operational subway line, the Carmelit, which is a whopping 1.8km (1.1 mile) long. it was build in the 1950s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carmelit
disclaimer: I live in Tel-Aviv.