Beam traffic in Gothenburg

The city of Gothenburg (Goteborg) in Sweden commisioned during 1991 to 1993 an investigation as to the feasibility of a beam-carried public transport system.

The city of Gothenburg has at the present only buses and streetcars for public transportation, and ground conditions do not lend themselves to digging tunnels for an underground railway. One of the networks that were proposed is shown to the right; the metropolitan area of Gothenburg, with an enlargement of the city area below. This beam network was designed for cars travelling on top of the beams, and thus the need for elevated stations made the whole project prohibitively expensive. So it stayed on the drawing board. It is, however, interesting to note the positive effects such a network would have on travelling times and comfort, compared to today. The city planners have now reverted to traditional modes of transport.

Figures for the Gothenburg Project: Tracks: 716 km (single) Number of stops: 654 (single) Diverging nodes: 1396 Merging nodes: 1396 Number of Beamcars: 17018 During rush hour: Average speed: 10 meters/sec. Loading time: 20 seconds Acceleration time: 20 seconds Departing passengers per hour: 74 498 Average waiting time for cabin: 1.4 min Average trip length: 6.7 km Average number of passengers per cabin: 1.9 (economically stimulated co-travelling) Cars running with passengers: 38% Their average speed: 12.77 km/h Cars running empty: 25% Their average speed: 9.22 km/h Cars waiting at stop or depot: 37% Passenger-kilometers during rush hour: 412 700; which computes to 24 passenger-km/hour & cabin)

This kind of system provides a travelling standard much superior to today's. The travelling time for the average commuter would be more than halved. This type of system could have a capacity 80 % higher than today´s. It would enable 60 % of today's motorists to switch to travelling in beam cars, even during the rush hours. It does not, however, with this design, have sufficient capacity to swallow peak-hour traffic without some congestion. It will take time to trim such a complex network to efficient performance, considering that no such network has been built to date, anywhere in the world.

The idea of cars running certain routes according to a timetable would not be feasible. Instead, every car would be booked, and would travel directly to its destination, using the quickest possible route. There would be a need for about 17 000 passenger vehicles, each taking 4 passengers. Average travelling speed as used in the simulation were 36 and 47 km/hour. This could be higher if one were to accept longer distances between cars. The economic calculations in this report are not of much interest, since they are based on a clumsier system than could actually be built. Beamcars under the beams would mean a considerable reduction in costs of stations. The FLYWAY system would reduce station costs even further.

Projects in Gothenburg

1. Personal Rapid Transit ("Spårtaxi" in Swedish) in a suburb of Gothenburg (Västra Frölunda)

4 supplementary proposals for a demonstration route was put forward by the so-called G-consortium; The municipal office of Roads (Gatukontoret), the streetcar company ("Goteborgs sparvagar"), the bus company (Bussbolaget), Chalmer's Institute of Technology's Institution for Architecture and SwedeTrack.

2. Automatic beam traffic around Gothenburg's centrum.

The municipal office of Roads in Gothenburg wrote 5 proposals, solicited tenders from 17 companies, out of which 4 were considered as suppliers. Siemens was one of these. As the economic recession set in, further developments were put on hold, due to lack of money.

3. The world's so far largest beam-traffic simulation for the entire metropolitan area.

This simulation was made by Doctor of Technology Ingmar Andreasson from the Center of Logistics at Chalmer's Institute of Technology in Gothenburg. It consisted of 700 kilometers of beams, about 13 000 vehicles, and 654 stations. The study has continued in the shape of a number of projects at Chalmer's Institute of Technology, financed by "Kommunikationsforskningsberedningen", a government body for the study of public communications in Sweden.

4. Study to determine the feasibility of developing an automatic beam traffic network for the downtown area.

This study has been made by The municipal office of Roads in Gothenburg, with the aid of a computer simulation by Ingmar Andreasson.

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