Joel Siegfried
December 27, 2009 - San Diego Airport Examiner

According to David Holdcroft, BAA's PRT Manager, "This innovative system forms part of BAA's plan to transform Heathrow, improve the passenger experience and reduce the environmental impact of our operation through the development of cutting edge, green transport solutions. It offers a completely new form of public transport - one that will deliver a fast, efficient service to passengers and bring considerable environmental benefits, saving more than half of the fuel used by existing forms of public or private transport." BAA was formerly known as British Airport Authority.

Another agency looking at this system is the City of San Jose, California, which has allocated $4 millionProjected San Jose ULTra PRT stations (Photo Credit - ATS ULTra) to conduct an economic and technical evaluation of PRT for San Jose Airport and surrounding destinations. In September of 2008, the City of San Jose issued a Request for Interest for an Automated Guideway (PRT) system for San Jose Airport.

“I was impressed with the great amount of thought and attention to detail Advanced Transport Systems (ATS) has invested to translate this innovative technological concept into an attractive transit service — the kind of service patrons will want to continue to use once the 'wow' factor has faded.” - Laura Stuchinsky, Sustainability Officer,
San José Department of Transportation

The City of San José has allotted $4 million to conduct an economic and technical evaluation of PRT for San Jose Airport and surrounding destinations, and then will work with a PRT vendor to implement PRT in San José.

Fully automated, pods are more convenient than shuttle buses driven by humans. Currently, 18 pods are being tested at London Heathrow's Terminal 5.  They let you board when you want to, rather than wait for a bus on a fixed schedule.  Punch in your destination, such as a parking lot, on a touch screen.  Then leave the driving to the machine, which glides on rails at speeds of 25 mph. 

But in the past few years, the idea has started to come back into vogue. At London’s Heathrow airport, a PRT system - with 18 vehicles, 2.4 miles of track, and three stations - is slated to begin running next spring. Masdar, a carbon-neutral city being planned in Abu Dhabi, will include pod cars (albeit, atypically, underground). There is a demonstration track in Uppsala, Sweden, and the Swedish government just announced its intent to build a system in a major city, although the plans are vague at this point. Last month, a Korean steel company indicated that it will assemble a project in Suncheon, South Korea.

Interest in the United States is also on the rise. A 2007 report for the New Jersey Department of Transit concluded that “PRT has the potential to help the State address certain transportation needs in a cost-effective, environmentally-responsible, traveler-responsive manner.” San Jose recently issued a “request for proposals” with the aim of building a PRT system in the vicinity of the airport. The city council of Mountain View, Calif., where Google’s headquarters are located, is also considering the idea, as are officials in Santa Cruz, Calif., and Ithaca, N.Y. And in the Boston area, a small group of transit advocates is promoting the construction of a PRT system linking local universities.

Driverless, battery-powered pod-cars will soon zip passengers around part of London's Heathrow Airport. The manufacturers of the Ultra personal rapid transit (PRT) system say it is the world's first public transport to balance the convenience of a taxi with the efficiency of a bus or light rail – albeit only for business passengers arriving at the world's third busiest airport.

Personalised rapid transit has been an elusive dream of engineers and city planners. Since the mid 1970s, many schemes have been proposed at sites around the world, and a PRT-like system has been built at Morgantown in West Virginia. But Ultra is the first PRT system to give passengers control over their destination.

Heathrow unveils first Personal Rapid Transit system July 10, 2009

Heathrow's proposed Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) system has reached a significant milestone after moving into operational testing on July 7.

The system, when launched, will see passengers board PRT vehicles at one of three stations and select their destination via touch screen. They will then be transported directly to their destination without any stops in between.

The Heathrow PRT is the world's first, designed to make passenger journeys quicker and reduce congestion on airport roads. It consists of 21 low-energy, battery-powered, driverless vehicles capable of carrying four passengers.

John Holland-Kaye, commercial director of system designers Advanced Transport Systems, said: "I am excited about the trialling of Personal Rapid Transit at Heathrow and am proud of the dedicated work of staff to deliver this pioneering project. Today marks a big step forward and the team will now focus on operational testing, with vehicles becoming a familiar sight along the guideway during this process.

"When launched, the PRT trial will offer an exciting, quick and environmentally friendly option for passengers travelling from the business park to Terminal 5."

Graham Bradburn, chief executive of Advanced Transport Systems, said: "Today marks the beginning of bringing the working system to life, as operational testing starts. It is hard to overplay the significance of reaching this stage in the project. It is the physical manifestation of many years work for ATS and BAA, and represents the vision of the original individuals involved.

"I would like to thank all of those companies and individuals, clients and suppliers alike, as well as our own staff, for the fantastic efforts they have made to make this a reality."

Getting Around Future Town
Joann Muller, 11.27.08, 06:00 PM EST
Forbes Magazine dated December 22, 2008

Bustling cities will have to rely on shared-vehicle ideas and clean mass transit to avoid severe congestion and pollution.

Image includes PRT, Solar Power sourcing, shared bicycles, light rail, stackable shared city cars, foldable shared scooters and self-guided cars that avoid crashes.

Attached to Car Sharing by Joann Muller.

Or imagine commuting in a lightweight, computer-driven podcar that rides on elevated guideways that extend into every neighborhood in the city. Bill N. Reinert, national manager for Toyota (nyse: TM - news - people )'s advanced technology group, suggests that an on-demand, personal rapid transit system might be just as effective and no more costly than self-guided cars. Riders would reserve a vehicle on a phone and the car would be waiting at a nearby station (rather than the other way around).

CNN: ITHACA, New York (AP) -- The thought of a driverless, computer-guided car transporting people where they want to go on demand is a futuristic notion to some. To Jacob Roberts, podcars -- or PRTs, for personal rapid transit -- represent an important component in the here-and-now of transportation. "It's time we design cities for the human, not for the automobile," said Roberts, president of Connect Ithaca, a group of planning and building professionals, activists and students committed to making this upstate New York college town the first podcar community in the United States.

Jobs in PRT Land will make a great addition to our site.  For now, I'll toss in this recent entry:

ATS Ltd., creator of the ULTra PRT System now being deployed at one of the world's busiest airports, Heathrow, has an opening for a Vehicle Project Engineer amongst five open positions you can find here.  ULTra is also in the planning stages of deployment in Abu Dhabi and the new city under development Masdar City.

The next pod revolution

By Chris Morrison, Business 2.0 Magazine
June 19 2007: 4:42 PM EDT

Tomorrow's public transit could look very different from today's if Martin Lowson's $20 million project at Heathrow Airport in London is a hit. Starting in 2008, Lowson's company, Advanced Transport Systems, will be whisking passengers between Heathrow's new Terminal 5 and a parking lot a mile away in tiny driverless vehicles that run on an elevated concrete track.

Unlike buses or trains, Lowson's "pods" are private -- about the size of a taxi, fitting as many as four adults -- and arrive on demand, within five minutes after passengers press a call button.

The concept behind Lowson's system, called "personal rapid transit," is not new. PRT dates back to the Nixon administration, and it's probably the best transit system you've never seen.

For 32 years, the PRT has provided a unique solution to growing pains in Morgantown

Tuesday, May 29, 2007
By Joe Grata, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- Like the "Energizer Bunny," West Virginia University's PRT is an icon that keeps on going. And going.

PRT stands for Personal Rapid Transit, a one-of-a-kind, computer-run, electric people mover system whose 73 gold-and-blue transit cars have been whisking riders around hilly Morgantown and the school complex since 1975.

ON TRACK: One of 
the ­automated vehicles 
that will shuttle people around London’s 
Heathrow Airport.

A snaking array of steel pillars outside the newly renovated Terminal 5 at London's Heathrow Airport will, by the end of next year, hold up a guideway upon which little automated electric vehicles will shuttle passengers and airport workers back and forth between the terminal and a distant parking lot. In doing so, the pillars will also be supporting a transportation movement decades in the making.

The project—dubbed ULTra (Ultra Light Transport) and designed and built by Advanced Transport Systems, of Bristol, England—is but one example of a mode of quasi-public transportation known as personal rapid transit, or PRT. According to PRT purists—including the board of the Advanced Transit Association, which advocates the use of technology to solve transportation problems—this label can be applied to transit systems that have all the following characteristics: fully automated vehicles that run on a reserved guideway; small vehicles that can, like taxis, provide exclusive use for small groups or even a single passenger; nonstop service using the most direct route available; off-line way stations; and on-demand access to vehicles instead of fixed schedules [see photo, “At Your Service”].

This is the forth issue of a series of newsletters that Vectus intend to distribute. The aim is to communicate the development of the Vectus PRT (personal rapid transit) work mainly at the test site in Sweden. The content of the newsletter is free to use and distribute, but please name the source. More information about Vectus can be found at www.vectus.se and www.vectusprt.com. If you are not part of the distribution list but want to be part, please send an e-mail to vectus.newsletter@fireflycomms.com.

The test track outer loop is complete Work with the track construction started in September and Vectus has now finalised the outer loop of the track. As seen on the website the test track will consist of an outer loop and an inner track that passes the station. The inner track will also be completed soon and later the station platform.

First chassis arrived in Sweden The first Vectus chassis, the bottom part of the vehicle, has been delivered to the Uppsala site. It has been designed and manufactured by Vectus supplier WGH. The chassis, which includes wheels, hydraulics, control and communications systems, arrived late November. The newly completed outer loop of the track is being finally adjusted and commissioned to allow putting the chassis on the track and start running tests within the next few days.

First approval from SRA Vectus has received approval from the Swedish Rail Agency for the infrastructure and for testing with one vehicle without passengers. This approval is just the first of several steps towards a full system approval.

About the Vectus PRT test project The test project consists of multiple parts. At the moment, various tests for wheel types and emergency brake system, parts of the communication and control system, and the propulsion system are being performed in Sweden, the U.K. and Korea. The first tests on the test track in Uppsala are scheduled for spring 2007, and the ambition is to receive approval from the Swedish Rail Agency by the middle of 2007. Vectus is planning to operate the test track until 2010. Please visit www.vectus.se and www.vectusprt.com for more information and images.

June 15, 2006

Tom Smith
Online Editor in Chief

The airport of the future could seamlessly integrate security screenings and future transit modes which would change the footprint of the terminal building.

The key to the new airport – and improved security – would be the successful implementation of personal rapid transit (PRT) technology, according to presentations made at a security seminar on June 5 in Baltimore sponsored by the International Air Rail Organization.

London´s Heathrow Airport will be the first to build a PRT system. Dubbed ULTra, the system will involve driverless, four-person cars which will travel along rail-less guide paths and link the airport’s premium parking lots to the terminals. The system is scheduled to be fully deployed by December 2007 and in commercial operation six months later.

Read Full Story Here

MonicPRT a Singapore based startup. Not sure yet if they are inventing a PRT vehicle/system, or will be implementing someone else's designs. Stay tuned.

First found in a news article found here.

INTELLIGENT TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS

A personal rapid transit (PRT) system is an automated transit service based on a fleet of small, computerized, driverless vehicles that ride on a track and take passengers directly to their destinations without intermediate stops.  Research has shown that an appropriately designed PRT system could improve mobility on a university campus by saving travel time, relieving traffic congestion, and making distant parking lots more accessible to the core campus area.  However, the use of PRT systems on large campuses and their surrounding communities remains an untapped method of transport at most universities...

[Editors Note: Morgantown PRT began as a PRT project, but quickly picked up characteristics of Group Rapid Transit in order to be up and running in a short amount of time to meet political pressures.  While, in our opinion, it does not represent a PRT as defined by ATRA and others, it has run as an fully automated system and accident free for over 30 years. --Mike]