Features & Specs
Technology
Features of Austrans
The system had been designed to overcome the disadvantages of rail (poor cornering, poor wheel/rail traction, operating noise) by developing a self-steering bogie, grip wheels, a Z-shaped rail, and a high-speed switch:
Steel Wheels and Rails
Offering high efficiency, low wear, and excellent high-speed stability.
Self-Steering Bogie
Enabling tight radius turns of as little as eight meters.
Emergency Braking
Special pressure wheels provide braking capacity comparable to buses and cars.
Environmental Impact
Electrically powered to avoid air and noise pollution.
Quiet Operation
Energy Efficiency
Passenger Capacity
Each vehicle designed to efficiently and reliably transport 9 passengers.
Under-Rail Grip Wheels
Enhance stability and safety, particularly in adverse weather conditions.
High Frequency of Service
Smaller vehicles allow for more frequent service, reducing wait times for commuters.
The Austrans system is designed to solve the problems of car dependency and public transport in cities. It can also be used for smaller metropolitan areas where there are major trip generators.
Headway (the distance between vehicles) should be as low as two seconds. In regular practice, they would probably operate on a fixed schedule during peak demand and on an ‘at request’ frequency. They would operate on a twenty-four-hour basis.
There is the possibility that paired units could be used as a triage center and operating room for a natural disaster if the disaster is close to the guideway, or for treating a patient that needs to get from a stop to a hospital that is on the guideway network. Other possibilities include a mobile police operating unit for coordinating riot control, rescue efforts, and similar events. Also, people could purchase a two-car unit as a caravan equivalent when the guideway line reaches popular tourist destinations.
Specifications of Austrans
Dimensions
These vehicles are about the size of a people-mover road vehicle.
The system is built to the following dimensions:
Length
Width
Height
Capabilities
Seats
The system uses a nine-seat pod operating with steel wheels on steel rails with an under-rail grip wheel that allows the vehicle to climb a twenty percent (20%) slope with ease.
Passengers
The system is capable of carrying up to 9,000 passengers per hour per direction and more if vehicles are linked together in pairs.
Track width (mm)
The vehicles run on a seven hundred and fifty millimeter (750mm) gauge track. A dual-track guide-way would be only 4.1 meters wide with track center-lines only 2.2 meters apart.
Types of Austrans Systems
There will be three types of stations for this system:
offline, online, and high-capacity.
Offline
Most stations will be offline to enable other vehicles on the system to pass the stopped vehicle while it is disembarking passengers and embarking new passengers at the offline stop.
Online
The online station will be used at the terminus of the line if the frequency of demand at that terminus is low.
High-capacity
The high-capacity station is for areas where there is a high demand for stops at certain periods of the day. Such stations would be built at major transportation hubs such as international airport terminals, central business districts (CBDs), cruise terminals, inner-city railway stations, as well as sporting arenas. Stations would be built at suburban railway stations, Austrans is not meant to be a replacement for suburban or inter-borough metros but as a supplement.
Safety
The Austrans system could be considered the safest form of transport is existence, when it is built.
According to the aircraft manufacturing and airline operating businesses, avaiation is the safest.
However, they use deaths per passenger kilometres.
The insurance industry uses death per passenger journey.
Under this metric aviation is the second most dangerous form of travel, behind motorbikes. Rail is the safest form of transportation. The Tokyo – Osaka bullet train (Shinkashen) has been operating from 1964 with zero deaths and zero injuries.
The Austrans system is even safer than regular railways because of the under-rail grip-wheel. Austrans will only de-rail if there is an earthquake or other ground-disturbing activity.
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Friends of Austrans seeks to preserve and promote the legacy of the Austrans PRT system and the groundbreaking work of Arthur Ernest Bishop. Join us in our mission to advocate for sustainable, efficient, and innovative urban transportation solutions.
Email: gefordy@hotmail.com
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