[sustran] Re: More on Walton, Cowherd, Hook, Cervero, Dinesh, Obwon.. becak, bajajs, ojek et al

[Eric Bruun]

Bravo to Eric Britton's posting re. not letting the discussion drift
towards particular technological solutions. But, I am sorry to say
that consensus has not been reached regarding monorails, PRT, etc.
I was just at the American Public Transit Association Annual Meeting,
and I can assure you that PRT is still being pushed actively with a demo
project still going forward in Rosemont, Illinios, adjacent to O'Hare
Airport. Larry Fabian and others are pushing automation heavily.  Etc.,
etc. 

Incidentally, I wrote a short column for the forthcoming Urban Transport
International where I raise the issue of displacing labor and whether
it really is a good idea.

Finally, if you look at a place like Bay Area Rapid Transit, even though
highly automated, it still has to carry operators on every train to mind
the doors. It just doesn't maintain schedule adherence as well as a well 
run manually driven system, and requires a much bigger engineering support
infrastructure. I think the case for automation is best where extremely
frequent service is needed no matter how little the demand, such as 
airports, and weakest where trains are large, demand is high, and 
headways are already reasonably short. The case is especially weak for
developing countries. (The last things they need are more capital
intensive, low labor content solutions.)