Monarail Extension to all WDW Parks????

[wdwmagic]

What? I can't speak my mind??????

Freedom of speach rember.

You can speak your mind, and have freedom of speach, BUT not when it becomes argumentative and generally disruptive. Remember this is a moderated and privately run forum, and you as a guest here have to abide by the rules.

 

[Tom]

Good grief! I just had the "pleasure" of reading a page and a half of crap! This is a monorail thread, not a who's who thread, or a "you're stupid and I'm not" thread! SHEESH!

EXPERT: having, involving, or displaying special skill or knowledge derived from training or experience. Thus, I think i would consider Invero an expert on monorails. He obviously has a grand interest in monorails and other transportation, and has far surpassed any of us on research and investigation on the facts surrounding Disney Transportation. He may not be an expert on Construction and Costs of Construction (which I would consider myself to be, by definition), but he has the scoop on monorails.

As for the 26-year-old sourpuss, perhaps he should try finishing his grammar homework next time :animwink: and perhaps some classes on manners.

 

[wdwswan&dolphin]

I think that, first of all, they should replace the ugly, slow monorails with peoplemovers, which are much faster and more aesthetically pleasing forms of transportation. The bus service should be kept as is, as should the boat launches and ferryboats. The monorail can be preserved for transporting guests from the Magic Kingdom parking lot to Magic Kingdom Park. Otherwise, they should go.

 

[Disneyland1970]

First off, I find the posts by INVERO very informative, and he has always shown the utmost respect in his replies to others! You can't take away hands on experience from someone.

Second I have the answer to this Monorail expansion argument..........Busses that look like Monorails!


PEACE

 

[The_CEO]

Tyler is a very smart guy and can tell you about a monorail inside and out! He is a great CM and always has been.

 

[monothingie]

Courtesy, politeness and patience are key to presenting information and making an effective and pursuasive argument. Thank you Tyler for doing this so eloquently.

Getting back to the things, I believe that a recent mass transit appropriations/permit for bringing some type of direct link to Orlando International was recently defeated? I would think that this Mass Transit link would be an excellent area to expand the monorail system into. Federal/State funding would definatly reduce some economic concerns. Its a shame that a project like this, in which everyone seemingly wins, would be so dificult to implement. Considering alternative such as light rail, train, and busses. The monorail option seems sensible.

-ADN

 

[sillyspook13]

im just droping it and walking away... its not worth my time to bicker with you...

I've taught you well! :animwink:

 

[cloudboy]

It still boggles my mind how much false information people throw out there regarding monorails. Not only is it relevant to this discussion, these same falsities are then propagated until it is nearly impossible to tell what is the truth.

FACT: Expanding the monorail system would cost $600m to ONE BILLION DOLLARS. Not cheap, folks. $75-$110 million per mile for track, not including switches or stations. $25m per train. You do the math. It adds up quickly.

Even Las Vegas’ overpriced and terribly mismanaged 4 mile system only cost $650 million. And of this an estimated $300 million was finance costs, extra insurance, and reserves. Seattle’s proposed 14 mile, 19 station monorail is budgeted at 1.6 billion. The Okinawa (middle of the city!) monorail is estimated at $44 million a mile. $75 million plus for the track alone is absolutely absurd.

FACT: Fixed guideway systems are NOT flexible. Disney Transport *REQUIRES* flexibility in transporting our guests. Fixed guideway systems may work GREAT in urban environments. Disney is not one of these places. We need a system that can expand and contract to current guest flow, and can be re-routed at the drop of a hat.

There are plenty of examples of monorail switches operating. Just because the current Disney network does not have switches to go from one track to another does not mean that they could not be used. Dropping down to a single beam is less efficient, but you can still travel on it.

Disney is NOT a flexible environment! I seriously doubt that any of the Disney parks is about to close up shop, nor are they likely to relocate one of them. Train size and frequency can be controlled. And the Disney monorail system currently operates with large block sizes. They could easily improve the number of trains through the stations by using better block planning.

FACT: Guests want a DIRECT (and preferably NON-STOP) mode of transportation. Quite frankly, they could care less if it was monorails or a bus, as long as it was DIRECT. Transferring is NOT an option. (It should be noted that the opinions expressed on this board do not reflect the actual average of opinions of Disney guests.) If you had expanded the monorail, guests would potentially have to transfer once, if not twice. That's the problem with a fixed guideway system. It works in an urban environment, because people live there, and have time to get used to and learn the system. Not at Disney. I can't begin to tell you how BAFFLING the transfer from the Resort monorail to the Epcot monorail is for many guests. They don't like it, and many would rather have the direct bus which would require no transfer, and would be much faster.

This, of course, is just going to be one of those arguments that goes round and round. Busses are in no way non-stop – they often times make several stops on the way between the park and the resort. And if you want to go anywhere other than between your resort and one park, you have to transfer. Yes, the switch from the Epcot beam to the Resort beam is bad – in fact it is terrible! But that is purely a layout problem of the station itself and an attempt to sacrifice that convenience for the convenience of having the stations side by side.

FACT: If one were to expand the monorail, one would want to service the highest of the congestion areas, ie: Value Resorts. That would mean increasing the low priced rooms to a point where they would no longer serve as the great value they are currently. Park to Park travel is not great enough to warrant any expansion.

If you were truly interested in making the easiest travel between the biggest resorts, then you would simply place them adjacent to the parks. The reason you can justify the prices of the better resorts is because of easier connections! Park to Park travel is not common – in great part because it’s so difficult. Is there a way to measure how many people take one bus to a resort, then switch to another bus? How many more people would move between parks if in fact it was easy? If guests had a high frequency connection between their resort and their home park, where they could easily and quickly pick up a connection to other parks, how would that change where people would go?

FACT: If a Monorail breaks down, the whole system is shut down. No one can pass the problem train. Hundreds of guests are inconvenienced. If a bus breaks down, it is quickly replaced by another bus. No other bus is inconvenienced.

Switches are now commonplace on monorails. Trains simply switch to the opposite beam and then switch back. Do you think transit systems have never dealt with this problem before? Yes, it is inconvenient. It is not going to bring down the entire system.

FACT: Walt Disney World properties are NOT designed with monorail expansion in mind. You can't just plunk down a monorail station just anywhere. And, you can't have stops as close together as you can with a bus, thus requiring guests to walk further than they already have to. Guests don't like that.

If you had bus stops that close, it would hardly be that efficient, would it? The parks are hardly too close to have stops at each one. The stations could be located as close to the gates as the bus stops.

Perhaps people are confused that you monorails would totally replace busses or other transportation systems. Monorails would serve as a transportation backbone, with other service connecting the resorts. A simple line for the monorail, starting from the Magic Kingdom south to Epcot (the station would have to be rotated so the track no longer passes into Epcot), then south to MGM and from there to the Studios.

 

[Lynx04]

Even Las Vegas’ overpriced and terribly mismanaged 4 mile system only cost $650 million. And of this an estimated $300 million was finance costs, extra insurance, and reserves. Seattle’s proposed 14 mile, 19 station monorail is budgeted at 1.6 billion. The Okinawa (middle of the city!) monorail is estimated at $44 million a mile. $75 million plus for the track alone is absolutely absurd.

Don't forget that people pay to use the monorail in Vegas, I doubt guest would do the same at disney, the only other solution is to raise rates at the resort to cover some of the costs. None of those would probably float with guests. I wouldn't want to pay 2 or 3 dollars extra a day to ride a monorail when I can get free transportation (Direct transportation) to the parks.

This, of course, is just going to be one of those arguments that goes round and round. Busses are in no way non-stop – they often times make several stops on the way between the park and the resort. And if you want to go anywhere other than between your resort and one park, you have to transfer. Yes, the switch from the Epcot beam to the Resort beam is bad – in fact it is terrible! But that is purely a layout problem of the station itself and an attempt to sacrifice that convenience for the convenience of having the stations side by side.

Don't forget if you have a monorail it is stopping at a few resorts and then you have to worry about trains being full when they get to some resorts. Another thing you can do is have a bunch of trains and have each train stop at one or two resorts, obviously that would require some logistics and if a train breaks down, their will be trouble.

Switches are now commonplace on monorails. Trains simply switch to the opposite beam and then switch back. Do you think transit systems have never dealt with this problem before? Yes, it is inconvenient. It is not going to bring down the entire system.

Maybe the MK portion may still run but no one will be able to get to the MK portion if the train between MK and EPCOT is stuck. And even if they had switch tracks that were not blocked and would allow a train to pass, it would still slow down the guest flow substantialy.



Also, I posted this in another thread about the monorail:

If you were to expand the monorail to all the parks and resorts next to the parks, that means you would have to cut back on the buses since you would be spending more money on the monorail obviously you have to cut the budget some where else. If the monorail breaks down, which it will, you now have people stuck, not going anywhere wasting there vacation time, which leads to a lot of angry guests. Since there would not be enough bus drivers because Disney would not hire a bunch of drivers to sit on the a$$ all day and wait for the monorail to break down, there would be no reliable back up to get guests where they need to go.

If a bus breaks down, then all you need to do is call in another bus and it only effects the people on the bus instead of the most of the resort. This is the biggest reason that they will not expand the monorail. I don't know what the monorail percent equals in amount of total transportation traffic for the resort, but I don't think it should be any higher then what it is now.<!-- / message --><!-- edit note -->

 

[monorail_man]

**EDIT**

I had a big long responce typed up but I think I will sum it all up in one word...



WHATEVER! :brick:

 

[PhotoDave219]

Hint to new guy - Dont disrespect the moderator. Its his sandbox.

 

[monorail_man]

Hint to new guy - Dont disrespect the moderator. Its his sandbox.

How did I Disrespect him??? I didn't even comment to anyones comments.


In other words. Ok, whatever. Time to move on and drop it.

 

[monorail_man]

Hey Tyler. I gots a question. What is the cable,wire, thing the runs along all the monorail beams?

Seen here:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v77/4thgenaccord/Disney/Monorail/Track/switch_track.jpg

 

[Invero]

Even Las Vegas’ overpriced and terribly mismanaged 4 mile system only cost $650 million.

Thiers worked out to be around $68m per mile, plus stations, switches, trains, finance costs, etc. A very high cost, even if it might not be as high as I had initially had read about. But also, keep in mind, Las Vegas is a revenue generating system. Advertising dollars bring in a lot of money... and the fare system helps too. They have a return on a large investment. Even still, money isn't the only reason monorails wouldn't work at Disney.

There are plenty of examples of monorail switches operating. Just because the current Disney network does not have switches to go from one track to another does not mean that they could not be used.

Switches are great, but they're not a total fix-all solution. Disney uses a cold switch proceedure, which really slows things down. I would hope that if they did expand, they would go over to hot switching... but the way Disney works, I doubt that would be the case.

Disney is NOT a flexible environment! I seriously doubt that any of the Disney parks is about to close up shop, nor are they likely to relocate one of them. Train size and frequency can be controlled.

That's not the point. By flexible, I mean that guest traffic flow changes, not the stops themselves. For example, if a large sports team checks into the All-Stars, and they all of a sudden decide to go to the MK, we can reassign buses instantly, and take care of the demand. With monorails, you're stuck with what you've got. Changing what trains you have running can take time. Too much time.

Now of course, in a perfect world, both the buses and the monorails run without problem. Unfortunetly, this is not the case. Now, most times, a bus or a monorail can both make it to its next destination to drop off its passengers before going out of service to switch out with another vehicle. With a bus, another bus can be put in its place instantly at its hub. No big deal. With a monorail, the switch on and off can be cumbersome.

If a bus breaks down... another one can be dispatched instantly to pick up the stranded guests, and fill the gap. Only the guests on that one bus are inconvenienced.

If a monorail breaks down it can potentially halt the entire line. You can have potentially hundreds of guests inconvenienced. It's not as if you can have little sidebar lines used to pass the broken down train -- that wouldn't make any financial sense.

This, of course, is just going to be one of those arguments that goes round and round. Busses are in no way non-stop – they often times make several stops on the way between the park and the resort.

All mass transit will have to make multiple stops... the whole non-stop deal is a dream that usually won't come true. Buses or monorails, it's what you have to deal with to make things efficient. The key though is to minimize the stops, and make it direct.

Park to Park travel is not common – in great part because it’s so difficult.

How is a direct bus difficult? The only catch is the MK/TTC transfer. But aside from that, you have a direct bus to/from all other parks. Buses continue to run as needed even after the park is closed, so that guests are never stranded.

If you had bus stops that close, it would hardly be that efficient, would it?

Well, it depends. Take for example one of our moderate resorts. Each one has multiple stops, because they are large and spread out. In a bus, we are strictly load and go. No one to drop off or pick up? No problem, keep going. Bus in front of you is talking to a guest? No problem, pull out in front of them.

Perhaps people are confused that you monorails would totally replace busses or other transportation systems. Monorails would serve as a transportation backbone, with other service connecting the resorts. A simple line for the monorail, starting from the Magic Kingdom south to Epcot (the station would have to be rotated so the track no longer passes into Epcot), then south to MGM and from there to the Studios.

I'm not quite clear on what you are proposing, but if I understand correctly, they would take a bus to a central station, and then transfer to a monorail that would take them to whatever park they want to go to. Reverse to get back. If that's the way you're thinking, I have a few concerns. First, the transfer won't fly with guests. Takes longer than a direct bus, and can be confusing. Also, during park open and exits, things could get congested. I mean, if you have an MK firework exit at the same time as an Epcot park exit (which happens all the time), you'll have full trains coming into Epcot, and no one getting out.

 

[Invero]

Hey Tyler. I gots a question. What is the cable,wire, thing the runs along all the monorail beams?

Seen here:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v77/4thgenaccord/Disney/Monorail/Track/switch_track.jpg

If I'm thinking of what you're thinking of, that's the bus bar... it's how the monorail gets its power. There are collector shoes that hang down beyond the train that run along those bars. The Alweg style trains found at Disneyland will have the two bars on one side, but the Mark IV/VI & M-VI trains will have one on each side. One is positive, one is negative. You can tell which side the positive side is, because it has the shielding over a lot of it. The bus bars carry 600 volts DC power, and the trains can draw up to 1700+/- amps from that.

If you look further down in the picture, you'll see a transformer box. Those boxes also help with the MAPO transmitters along the beams.

Let me check my collection to see if I have any pictures of the collector shoes. EDIT: Nope, can't seem to find any. All the pictures are too dark to see anything.

 

[monorail_man]

If I'm thinking of what you're thinking of, that's the bus bar... it's how the monorail gets its power. There are collector shoes that hang down beyond the train that run along those bars.

I was wondering how the monorail got it's power. I knew it wasn't "fuel" motored.

The Alweg style trains found at Disneyland will have the two bars on one side, but the Mark IV/VI & M-VI trains will have one on each side. One is positive, one is negative. You can tell which side the positive side is, because it has the shielding over a lot of it. The bus bars carry 600 volts DC power, and the trains can draw up to 1700+/- amps from that.

Like in this picture?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v77/4thgenaccord/Disney/Monorail/monorail_liteblue4.jpg



Also. is it true that there are "sensors" along the track that tells where the trains are at any given time? If so. do you have pics of theas sensors?

Thanks

 

[Invero]

I was wondering how the monorail got it's power. I knew it wasn't "fuel" motored. Like in this picture?

Exactly.

Also. is it true that there are "sensors" along the track that tells where the trains are at any given time? If so. do you have pics of theas sensors? Thanks

Ehhh... yes, and no. The trains never know where they are. However, there are transponders throughout the beam that give a train a new speed limit. There are also transponders along the beam that will tell Yellow (and other trains, once they get upgraded) to play a certain audio file. And there are transponders at each station that will tell Yellow (and other trains, once they get upgraded) if it is parked properly. If two of the three transponders don't line up, the doors will not open.

Additionally, there is a moving blocklight system, otherwise known as the MAPO system. This is the anti-collision system. It's a rather ingeniously simple system. This is how it was explained (in easy terms) to me.

You have three radio frequencies emitted along the beam. Each zone emits a 1, 2, or 3. When a train picks up on all 3 frequencies, it gets a green light, and is good to go. When a train is ahead, it will block one of the frequencies. Now your train only sees 2, so it will give you an Amber, which means stop at the next hold point. If you do not stop, the train will only see 1 frequency, and will initiate a full emergency stop, and give you a red mapo. (very bad)

When going through switches, or parking nose-to-nose you have to use mapo override to override the system. A neat thing... when parking nose to nose, you get so close to the train in front of you, that it no longer blocks the frequencies... so, you can get a green light, even if the train is 5ft in front of you.

 

[Invero]

Second I have the answer to this Monorail expansion argument..........Busses that look like Monorails!

This actually is becoming a popular thing... BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) vehicles are being designed to look similar to light rail. 60 foot articulated buses, with sleek styling, multiple doors, low floors, and environmentally friendly engines. Sure, it's still a bus... but at least it looks better than a box on wheels.

 

[monorail_man]

Exactly.
Ehhh... yes, and no. The trains never know where they are. However, there are transponders throughout the beam that give a train a new speed limit. There are also transponders along the beam that will tell Yellow (and other trains, once they get upgraded) to play a certain audio file. And there are transponders at each station that will tell Yellow (and other trains, once they get upgraded) if it is parked properly. If two of the three transponders don't line up, the doors will not open.

Additionally, there is a moving blocklight system, otherwise known as the MAPO system. This is the anti-collision system. It's a rather ingeniously simple system. This is how it was explained (in easy terms) to me.

You have three radio frequencies emitted along the beam. Each zone emits a 1, 2, or 3. When a train picks up on all 3 frequencies, it gets a green light, and is good to go. When a train is ahead, it will block one of the frequencies. Now your train only sees 2, so it will give you an Amber, which means stop at the next hold point. If you do not stop, the train will only see 1 frequency, and will initiate a full emergency stop, and give you a red mapo. (very bad)

When going through switches, or parking nose-to-nose you have to use mapo override to override the system. A neat thing... when parking nose to nose, you get so close to the train in front of you, that it no longer blocks the frequencies... so, you can get a green light, even if the train is 5ft in front of you.

Very interesting. Now the thing about being withing 2 out of 3 points to get the doors to open. how far apart are thease points? in other words, doe sthe driver have to be exactly on a mark or is ther elike a foot or so area he has to hit?

BTW the reason I asked about the knowing where each train is. I thought I rembered seeing or reading about a "HQ" type room that keeps track of all the trains and there being like a light up switch board showing where each train is.


Ok and another question. ( I know I have alot now. been brain storming)

on the rare cases when train needs to be towed. How do they get the tow vehicle to the train? do they have to clear allthe other trains from the track, ect.? For example. lets ay RED and BLack are on the Express beam. and black is at TTC and red is coming in behind it. THen Red breaks down (which seems to be common). Do they tow Red backwards to the shop. or what?

 

[ogryn]

Do the Monorails have the equivalent of a "Dead Man's Handle"?