THE PSYCHOLOGY OF GREATER METRO TRANSIT

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For many of us of a more dusty age, travel conjures up fond memories of comfort, and enjoyment. An airline flight then was enjoyable and novel, and a road trip freeing and adventurous. Not so today, as the mere thought of travel can bring on high blood pressure and anxiety.

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The explosive success of car and airplane travel has led to the degradation we all lament. I think we have accepted that living and commuting in a growing metro area means closer neighbors, and more congestion in shops, restaurants, and roadways. Perhaps some accept this inevitability better than others.

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But like water takes the path of least resistance, commuters for the most part take the path of least discomfort. Therefore, these commuters must be confronted with huge traffic congestion before they abandon the comfort and convenience of car travel for the less civilized cattle-car experience on today's mass transit. Car commuters may not be able to control the roadway congestion, but they still feel in control of their personal space and time in their own car.

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Of course, where passengers need to moved by thousands of per half hour, along designated corridors, mass transit is the best solution. In major cities such as New York, London, and Paris, where subways and surface/elevated heavy rail train routes were established 100 to 150 years ago, these systems are extensive and well accepted by commuters. In spite of being cattle-car systems, there exist no other viable alternatives for passenger volumes of this scale.

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Light rail, by definition, is designed for lighter passenger loads and shorter routes, but using the same head-down, cattle-car loading factors, as used in heavy rail, to meet capacity and cost numbers. Light rail does have clear cut applications such as between two or three nearby job hubs or venues where passenger loads are in the hundreds per half hour.

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For new mass transit, the options are presently light rail or express bus systems with state and metro governments under pressure to do something about the mounting car traffic congestion. Light rail seems to be the favored solution even though the construction costs can be staggering, especially where tunneled and elevated tracks are used.

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Most new mass transit projects are sold to commuters/voters under the guise that they will reduce car congestion. In fact, the success of these large mass transit projects depends on the continued degradation of car travel to force commuters onto the less civilized cattle-car mass transit. If automobile commuting is improved with more roadways and parking, transit immediately sees a drop in ridership and revenue. Not the result transit authorities and political supporters want to see.

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Local politics contributes to the disappointing performance and massive cost of mass transit is. Mass transit needs large expensive right-of-ways which limit installations to high volume corridors with a limited number of stations. Who gets the noisy disruptive tracks? Who gets the few desired stations? Hashing this out with each neighborhood and resolving the loss of roadway lanes and parking takes considerable time and effort. The final compromise is always more costly and less effective than originally planned and may leave neighborhood resentment.

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The significant commuter negatives of greater metro transit are:

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Inconvenient: Passengers must conform with the metro schedules and routes, which require advanced planning, additional time, and perhaps coordinating multiple transit methods and routes.

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Time consuming: Stations may not be conveniently located, the route travel time is slow, and transfers may be poorly coordinated. Even as roadways slow to a creep, car commuters can usually still make their commute in less time than it it would take them on metro transportation.

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Complicated and confusing to inexperienced passengers: Route options, schedules, transfers, and payment process can be challenging to those not familiar with the system.

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A cattle-car experience: During peak times, commuters face large crowds, long wait lines, passengers loaded cheek-to-cheek and jowl-to-jowl, scarce seating, a short supply of courtesy, and worry about the nervous guy with the big backpack.

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USING PSYCHOLOGY TO SOLVE THE MASS TRANSIT PROBLEM

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By providing a transit system that incorporates many of the desirable features of car travel, we do not have to depend on road congestion to make it successful. And by utilizing available air space over roadways, we do not need to steal capacity from roadways to install the system.

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The Allender Personal On-Demand (POD) Transportation system dramatically reduces many of the stated negatives of metro transit, though it does not restore the glory days of travel past.

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Convenience: A grid network of stations assure commuters a reasonable walking distance. The system is like a car ride from start to finish, with no schedules or transfers.

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Timely: The system travels above the streets in a unique network of tubes providing non-stop connections between any two stations on the network. Travel times are less than automobile or transit, and substantially less during rush-hours.

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Simple to use: Riders purchase a ticket to their destination station and insert it in the transport pod. The computer system does all the rest.

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No cattle-car here: A high density of smaller stations are located throughout the metro area, reducing queue lines to get a pod. Once in the privacy of the single passenger pod, the ride is like that of an automobile, with access to wifi and cell phone services. If traveling with a fellow traveler, communicate via the wifi video service between pods, and enjoy the elevated view in comfort.

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The POD system can fill all the gaps in rail and express bus systems, and provide connectivity through the entire system. Located above current street right-of-ways, the POD creates no conflict with current roadway usage, distributes the passenger traffic over the entire metro area, and services the entire region equally. Along with a faster, more efficient system, with lower cost per passenger-mile, neighborhood and commuter acceptance will be high.

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Local bus routes concentrate on serving riders needing assistance via smaller more suitable buses on less structured routes.

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PURPOSE OF THIS WEB SITE

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This site was created to present an idea for public review, comment, and further development. My hope is that knowledgeable people will comment and/or contribute to the concept. Any new concept such as this will face considerable head wind, but hopefully, discussion and research will lead to new ideas to solve old intractable problems.

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None of the content of this site is considered proprietary and may be used subject to verification that patents and other protections may have been unknowingly infringed.

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It would be nice to see more concept development under an open source banner, but those wishing to develop detailed implementation, may want to patent developments.

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Check it out, comment, contribute, spread the word. Who knows where this might go.

 

NETWORK IMPLEMENTATION
 

Based on a schematic design for a portion of the greater Seattle area, I was able to extrapolate an estimate of 600 stations and 800 miles of 7ft diameter tube, could serve the 1 million population surrounding Lake Washington. The design used a modified loop grid as most suburban area do not contain square block street design, but rather many random street patterns requiring more creative loops and connectors. The system could mathematically provide 215,000 rides per hour, with an estimated capital cost of $25 billion, and operational costs of 7 cents per passenger mile including capital cost amortization.

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Assuming about 50% of the total population are work participants, and assuming 20% of those may work no-standard hour, we can estimate 30% of the total population would participate in the daily rush-hour.

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For the 1 million population of the above area, we can assume 300,000 would participate in rush-hour, the POD could theoretically serve all of this peak demand over a three hour period. Large employment centers such as downtown Seattle are already served by LRT and/or extensive bus routes, but POD could supplement these systems and provide efficient connections to surrounding neighborhood districts not efficiently served by existing LRT or bus.