Suggestions for Vehicles

Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it. (Dalai Lama)

n accordance with the principle of "open interfaces", the actual design of the vehicles are details that are not part of SwedeTrack's concept. On this page we will, however, put down suggestions for suitable vehicIes. The measurements in the figures are (of course) in meters.		Vehicles for Transportation of People PRT-Vehicles GRT-Vehicles Flatcars Vehicles with Grappling Hooks Service Vehicles Emergency Vehicles

1. Vehicles for Transportation of People

Seats: wedeTrack System entertains ideas about the seats being automatically swivelled opposite the direction of travel when the beamcar exceeds a certain speed. This would increase the margin of safety for the passengers; in case of collision or emergency braking of the vehicle it would be safer to travel backwards. One could of course have passenger cabins with a designated front and a back, i.e. they would always travel in the same direction. For those cars, the seats need not be swivelled. This is a matter of debate; most people don´t like to travel backwards, and this measure will probably be regarded as excessive. Since the SwedeTrack cars are meant to be able to swivell the carriage, it would not matter in which direction the propulsion car inside the beam is facing. The passenger cabin could always be swivelled so that it faces in the desired direction. Looking at the beamcars with 3 or more seats in a row, further down on this page, one might get the impression that the space is too cramped inside the car; that it would be rather difficult to reach certain seats. Like in a cinema; people would have to get up while you wriggle past to get at your seat. But this is not quite the case. We have drawn rather comfortable, reclinable seats, measuring 68 times 80 centimeters, as can be seen in the drawing to the right. Seats in trains and buses are usually about 50 times 50 centimeters, and quite close together. So, considering the middle illustration in the drawing at right, it´s clear that the needed space could easily be provided by replacing most seats with the more spartan model.

Doors: ll passenger cabins should have doors on both sides, since there is really no "front" or "back" on most cars; they could move in either direction. There could be 2 kinds of doors: narrow, to service one row of seats, or broad, to service two ore more rows of seats. The door controlling mechanism would have to be connected to mechanical sensors on the bottom of the cabin. These sensors would register when the cabin is resting on a suppport, so the doors cannot be opened while the beamcar is still up in the air. On the other hand, the cabin should also have manual door openers.

There are 2 modes of maneuverability that could be used: sliding doors and swivelling doors. Sliding doors take the least space when opening and closing, they just run in tracks like most doors on underground railways. The swivelling doors hang on two arms, attached to the top and bottom of the door. The arms are attached on the middle of the door´s inside at one end, and the other end attached to a vertical pole, which is twisted 180 degrees when moving the doors. Many buses and trains use this arrangement. These doors require more space when moving, but they have an advantage which is useful for the beamcars; they can move one outside the other and allow for openings closer to each other, as is shown in figure 4 below. The doors should both have mechanical sensors on their edges, to detect an object in the path of the closing door, and photocells of the type common in street buses. They would open and close automatically, but this would have to be complemented with manual control by the passengers for opening and closing. A timer would then at regular intervals try to close the doors. If passengers intervened and kept the doors open, this would only be tolerated for a maximum number of times. After this number of unsucessful closing-attempts, the doors would shut anyhow, and the vehicle would travel to a manned control station for inspection. One solution to the problem of providing adequate door openings without the doors blocking the way would be to use doors that move straight up, as illustrated to the left. In this way, there could be a door for every row of seats, providing for maximum mobility. These doors would have to move faster, though, since they would have a longer way to travel than doors moving horizontally. The potential for accidents is probably not greater than for horizontal doors. These doors would have a contact list at their lower edge, causing closing doors to move back up again if they detect an obstacle. One type of passenger cabin of SwedeTrack design has moreover trunkdoors at both ends. These are manually opened and they go upwards, like on an ordinary station waggon. They are to be used when loading and unloading gear. It has happened (and continue to happen) that people get caught in the closing doors of underground cars, and are dragged along as the train starts. These hazards are even more important to deal with when handling automatically driven cars. Read about The FLYWAY design for safety at stations.

Heating and Air-conditioning: ll passenger cabins should have this, considering that all countries are either too hot or too cold at least part of the year. This should be regulated by a thermostat. It is not a good idea to have the passengers being able to control the heating of the cabins; it would only result in waste of energy. The air-conditioning should, however, be implemented through individually controlled air vents above each seat (like in most buses). One would think that these considerations should be self-evident. Yet, the new underground cars being shipped to the Stockholm Public Transport from 1999 cannot run during hot summer days, even in Sweden, because of lack of proper ventilation for both drivers and passengers; they get too hot! (Presumably, that problem has been fixed now)

2 groups of passenger cabins: There would generally be 2 groups of passenger vehicles, according to their capacity for taking on people. The PRTs would take at the most 4 (or maybe 8) passengers, and be available at all times of the day. They would function like taxicabs; they would not run according to any timetable, but rather be available at certain stations in the network and for ordering by way of telephone, computer terminal or booked in advance to any adresses. The GRTs would only run during normal working hours and whenever many people needed transportation, such as at football games and other public events. They would run generally run according to timetables or at certain intervals along certain routes. They could of course also be booked, by parties, employers, for sight-seeing tours, etc.

Dimensions of Passenger Cabins

Width of cabin(W)	Number of seatrows	Number of seats	Length of cabin (L) including nose and rear (b)
1 person 0.7 meters	1	1	l + b = 1.6 m
	2	2	2 * l + b = 2.5 m
	3	3	3 * l + b = 3.4 m
2 persons 1.4 meters	1	2	1 * l + 2 * b = 2.3 m
	2	4	2 * l + 2 * b = 3.2 m
	3	6	3 * l + 2 * b = 4.1 m
	4	8	4 * l + 2 * b = 5.0 m
	5	10	5 * l + 2 * b = 5.9 m
3 persons 2.1 meters	3	9	3 * l + 3 * b = 4.8 m
	5	15	5 * l + 3 * b = 6.6 m
	7	21	7 * l + 3 * b = 8.4 m
4 persons 2.8 meters (3.6 m. with aisle)	4	16	4 * l + 4 * b = 6.4 m (7.0 m)
	6	24	6 * l + 4 * b = 8.2 m (8.8 m)
	8	32	8 * l + 4 * b = 10.0 m 10.6 m)

2. PRT-Vehicles

a) 1-seat abreast

Figure 1

b) 2 seats abreast

Figure 2

Figure 3

hese cars, 1 or 2 seats abreast, would together constitute the "narrow beam traffic". This means that they would be the only cars allowed to run on the smallest beams, meant for narrow passages, low traffic volumes, and indoors, in such places as shopping malls, etc. The 2-seats-abreast could come in 5 sizes, with 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 rows of seats. The smallest model (figure 3) has 2 seats next to each other and a narrow sliding door on each side.

For the 4-seat models (figures 2 and 3 above) the sliding doors are broad enough, working in pairs, to service 2 rows of seats. Passengers that don´t have doors along their seats would have to fold the backs of the seats in front of them forward, and then slide in/out, just as is done with 2-door motorcars. The door arrangement for the 10-seater is a bit tricky. A solution like the one in figure 3 requires that the doors are hinged on swivelling arms, since they would bump into each other if they were of the sliding type. Swivelling doors can open one outside the other, as shown in figure 4.

Figure 5	Figure 6	Figure 7

As with ordinary taxicabs, travelers must be able to bring their (sometimes) bulky gear along. This is easily fixed by simply removing a certain number of seats at the back of the beamcar. When the traveler orders a car, he just have to ensure that the cargo bay in the car is big enough for his/hers needs. These examples show just the 2-seat-wide models.

One difference compared to the smaller cars is that the 8-seat model is envisioned to have vertical-moving doors at both ends; doors that could be opened and closed manually as on ordinary motorcars of the station-wagon models. Figures 6 and 7 show examples of such doors. The models with rear-doors could not be used in conjunction with the safety berths. These berths are a specific FLYWAY feature.

c) 3 seats abreast

Figure 8

Figure 9

Figure 11

One could cramp 3 seats in a row together, as shown in figure 8 above. In would be like in a cinema, not much mobility getting in and out, but quite comfy during the ride. These cars would be great for transports lasting at least 15 minutes. Figure 9 shows a 21-seater with swivel-doors that are overlapping in the middle. A more functional variety is shown to the right in this figure. One row of seats has been removed, thus allowing space for baby-carriages and wheelchairs. By turning the row of seats in the middle backwards, one could here alter the door arrangements to allow for sliding doors. A guess is that this spacier modell would be more attractive. For shorter trips, we would suggest that passenger cabins with 3 chairs abreast be made in one size (with 5 rows of chairs), and in 2 models: One with 1 sliding door on each side and with 10 seats (figure 11). This car would provide space for baby carriages, etc. If the passengers don't object to travel backwards, they could arrange the seats as shown in figure 12; this would provide for 10 seats. The other model would have 2 sliding doors on each side and room for 14 seats (figure 13). This could be labeled the "sight-seeing model"; it would not function well during peak-hour traffic, as it would be too tedious to get in and out.

Figure 12	Figure 13	Cabins with 3 seats in a row would be the largest PRT-cars to run on the SwedeTrack-designed beam network. Cabins with 4 seats in a row (or more) need an aisle, as in today's buses. This would make the cabins excessively broad. These cabins would not have any trunk doors on the short ends. The side doors would be sufficiently big. In the examples on figures 14 - 16, the 4-door model has been used. There is nothing preventing all seats to be removed. As an alternative, one could use seats that could be folded up and pushed aside, to make room for goods. Figure 16
Figure 14	Figure 15

3. GRT-Vehicles

Figure 18

Figure 19

4. Flatcars

Figure 20	Figure 21

Figure 22

SwedeTrack Systems´ flatcars would be open at both ends and be able to take on motorcars as well as other kinds of bulky goods. One thought behind these cars is that the motorists should be able to travel with their cars on the beams a part of their journey (what is referred to as "Dual Mode"). The drivers would save gas and get a chance to relax. Figure 20 shows the flatcar taking on load, figure 21 the flatcar during transport. Beam cars like the middle one in figure 22, which are broader than most other cars could maybe not travel on all parts of the beam network. This depends on how the beam network is planned and built.

Figure 23

Figure 23 shows how to secure a motorcar during transport. The forward stop beam (A) is folded up from the floor and the driver takes his car aboard. When the car is in position, the rear beam (B) is folded up from the floor and moved forward by the mechanism (C) until it hits the rear wheels of the motor vehicle, in which position it locks in place. The car doors cannot be opened during transport because of the sidings of the flatcar. The flatcars belong to that category of cars that, in the SwedeTrack concept, could twist sideways to facilitate loading and unloading.

5. Vehicles with Grappling Hooks

Figure 24

6. Service Vehicles

here will be a need for cars equipped to enable service and maintenance of the beams. One suggestion is a car with elevating platforms on both sides (indicated by A in figure 25). Figure 25

The inside of the beam could be inspected by means of trapdoors on the side of the beam (C). The service car must be equipped to run on batteries, so it can function without depending on power from the beams. The propulsion vehicle of the service car (the vehicle that moves inside the beam) should be equipped with lamps, video cameras and vacuum cleaners (for inspection and cleaning of the beam's interior). As can be seen from A in figure 26, one can only have these elevating platforms on both sides of the car if the car is sufficiently narrow to alow the needed space to the pole.

Figure 26 Otherwise, one will have to make do with only one elevating platform, on the side facing away from the pole. This need not be the only solution, however. One could also have platforms that could be folded up or down whenever the car passes a pole.

7. Emergency Vehicles

nce the network has become fairly extensive, and covers most of the metropolitan area, it would become motivated to introduce firetrucks and similar vehicles on the beams. This type of vehicles are often hampered by traffic jams when they are needed the most, i.e. in connection with serious traffic accidents. Using an extensive beam network in these situations would further enhance the usability of the beams. Figure 7:1 shows what an ambulance could look like.