Goodbye, monorail drivers.......? Sorry if already posted.

[s8film40]

Cool - I was only speculating about the turns. The outside ones are still longer tho much like taking the inside lane vs the outside lane on a road. Same turn but one accelerates more than the other.

But why the 20mph zone between contemp and mk on the lagoon beam?

It's actually 25 coming out of MK, then goes down to 20 for the switch and once past the switch 30 the rest of the way to the CO

 

[copcarguyp71]

So this little guy would be SOL with the new plan???

 

[Timon]

 

[Monorail_Red]

The differences on the turns is negligible on the two beams. In general a Straightaway is 40MPH a banked curve is 30MPH an unbanked curve or an aligned switch is 20 MPH an unused station is 25 MPH a station in use is 15MPH. There is no difference between the two beams, in fact if you look at the maps above the speeds are the same on both with the only real exception being the resort stations since the lagoon beam is on the operational side of the station.

The speed zones are also somewhat different while going in the opposite direction.

 

[distopi68]

Walt Disney World Exterior Beam Speed Zones:

Walt Disney World Lagoon Beam Speed Zones:

Epcot Beam Speed Zone Diagrams:

Source: Walt Disney World Monorail Standard Operational Procedure Guide 'Study Guide' of August, 1995.

Great maps! Would you happen to know how long it takes to get from each station to the next?

 

[Gregoryp73]

Within a decade I would imagine their Bus and boat system will be automated as well...especially with bus only lanes.

 

[dixielandings]

Is this Walt Disney World Monorail Standard Operational Procedure Guide 'Study Guide' of August, 1995. you reference available online? Would love to read an old monorail SOP as a monorail junkie

 

[Gringrinngghost]

Great maps! Would you happen to know how long it takes to get from each station to the next?

I do not have that information.

 

[unkadug]

Great maps! Would you happen to know how long it takes to get from each station to the next?

That would depend upon the speed that the driver takes the vehicle up to and how quickly he accelerates and brakes.

 

[s8film40]

Great maps! Would you happen to know how long it takes to get from each station to the next?

I don't think thats ever really been measured and would vary greatly as stated above. Pilots do regularly track what they call their cycle times (time it takes to complete one full lap). Generally "good" cycles are as follows. Exterior 7-9 Minutes, Lagoon 8-12 minutes and Epcot 16-18 minutes.

 

[Tom]

Since this is a monorail thread, I have a quick question. What is the timer for at the end of each platform? It seems to continuously tick upwards toward 60-minutes, then reverts to 00:00 and starts over. I've always wondered, and after watching them this past week, I see no real pattern.

 

[luv]

So this little guy would be SOL with the new plan???

Poor squirrels.

 

[Monorail_Red]

Since this is a monorail thread, I have a quick question. What is the timer for at the end of each platform? It seems to continuously tick upwards toward 60-minutes, then reverts to 00:00 and starts over. I've always wondered, and after watching them this past week, I see no real pattern.

This goes back to the discussion of cycle times that s8film40 talked about. Not all of the timers work properly, but when they sense a train in the station, it starts to count up to calculate the station time. Ideally a station time should be around 90 seconds. When the train clears the station, the time resets to zero (or pauses and resets when another train pulls in - I can't remember). When I was there, they tried to turn those timers off because the management wanted to do away with cycle times. For whatever reason, they were under the impression that pilots would put lap times before safety. So going back to your original question, there is no pattern as they are now irrelevant.

 

[MaryJaneP]

I wondered this too since there does not seem to be any relation to actual GMT or EDT or EST or whatever system WDW uses. My guess was that this is like the timer in a swimming facility. Only used for reference by those in the know (ie. drivers, platform CMs, etc)

 

[Tom]

This goes back to the discussion of cycle times that s8film40 talked about. Not all of the timers work properly, but when they sense a train in the station, it starts to count up to calculate the station time. Ideally a station time should be around 90 seconds. When the train clears the station, the time resets to zero (or pauses and resets when another train pulls in - I can't remember). When I was there, they tried to turn those timers off because the management wanted to do away with cycle times. For whatever reason, they were under the impression that pilots would put lap times before safety. So going back to your original question, there is no pattern as they are now irrelevant.

I was hoping you'd be the first reply

This makes sense. Some timers were completely off. The rest were either continuously counting upwards (even with no train at the platform), or counted up when a train was present....but none of them reset until they hit 59:59. Then they just went to 00:00 and started counting minutes and seconds upwards again.

It would make sense to just turn the dang things off completely at this point, wouldn't it? They literally serve no purpose the way they function now.

 

[Monorail_Red]

It would make sense to just turn the dang things off completely at this point, wouldn't it? They literally serve no purpose the way they function now.

They had more of a use before the touchscreen consoles came into play, but now all the trains have a counter on the display itself as well as the total cycle time. I bet most of them count all the way up to 59:59 because there might be some filth covering the train sensor (similar to the safety sensors on garage doors) or the reflector on the the beam has fallen off.

 

[Tom]

They had more of a use before the touchscreen consoles came into play, but now all the trains have a counter on the display itself as well as the total cycle time. I bet most of them count all the way up to 59:59 because there might be some filth covering the train sensor (similar to the safety sensors on garage doors) or the reflector on the the beam has fallen off.

Gotcha!

 

[s8film40]

This goes back to the discussion of cycle times that s8film40 talked about. Not all of the timers work properly, but when they sense a train in the station, it starts to count up to calculate the station time. Ideally a station time should be around 90 seconds. When the train clears the station, the time resets to zero (or pauses and resets when another train pulls in - I can't remember). When I was there, they tried to turn those timers off because the management wanted to do away with cycle times. For whatever reason, they were under the impression that pilots would put lap times before safety. So going back to your original question, there is no pattern as they are now irrelevant.

Yes exactly the sensor is an inrafared beam in the trough that starts the timer when it is broken and then resets the timer when the train departs and the beam is reconnected. Because it's in the trough it needs to be cleaned regularly. Debris builds up and blocks the sensor making it think a train is in the station, the timer only goes up to an hour so will reset at that point even if the sensor is blocked.

Any station time over 60 seconds is unacceptable.

 

[Tom]

Yes exactly the sensor is an inrafared beam in the trough that starts the timer when it is broken and then resets the timer when the train departs and the beam is reconnected. Because it's in the trough it needs to be cleaned regularly. Debris builds up and blocks the sensor making it think a train is in the station, the timer only goes up to an hour so will reset at that point even if the sensor is blocked.

Any station time over 60 seconds is unacceptable.

Then all of last week was unacceptable. And I'm not exaggerating. We rode Resort many times, Epcot a handful of times, and Express once (I think). Never was the train stopped for less than a minute.

Hell, there were times when we were "holding for further traffic clearance" at the MK station, on the Resort loop, after the train had been sitting there for minutes already. Obviously that meant another one was hanging out at the Contemporary for a long time, which was often the case. It seems like they sit in the Contemporary longer than anywhere else. We never had a problem catching a monorail there.

 

[s8film40]

Then all of last week was unacceptable. And I'm not exaggerating. We rode Resort many times, Epcot a handful of times, and Express once (I think). Never was the train stopped for less than a minute.

Hell, there were times when we were "holding for further traffic clearance" at the MK station, on the Resort loop, after the train had been sitting there for minutes already. Obviously that meant another one was hanging out at the Contemporary for a long time, which was often the case. It seems like they sit in the Contemporary longer than anywhere else. We never had a problem catching a monorail there.

Yeah this is the problem with how monorails are operated today. The key to making it a fast and convenient service is to keep the station times as short as possible. Any experienced pilot will tell you faster cycle times don't come from driving fast but getting in and out of stations quickly and having all the other drivers on the beam doing the same thing. When trains wait in stations to get that last guest other trains then have to hold for clearance. At peak performance the resort line can easily run with less than 15 minute cycles. While guests might get cut off and told to wait for the next train they also have the benefit of being able to get to their destination in around 10 minutes or less.