Monorail Expansion?

[Tom]

That`ll be good

I e-mailed my prof. If he still has them, and sends them to me, I'll be sure to get you copies! I could have stayed there, out in the middle of the desert, all day watching them make those beams.

 

[Tom]

Awesome . . . Thanks edward! (Off topic btw: got my airline tickets and car lined up for the 500, I can smell the methanol from here! Woo-hoo!)

Cool info....:wave:

Mmmmm...methanol! I haven't gotten my Duty Card yet from the Safety Department, so I don't know if I'll be watching from Gasoline Alley again or not. Last year, the seriously best part of the whole month was on Race Day when I walked up INTO the pits and stood by the rope where cars come in and out of the garages to the pits. They brought one back out, after having been repaired, and started it RIGHT next to me - WOW! Smoke poured out, the tired laid a nice patch of rubber 3 feet from my feet, and he took off. I will NEVER forget that. Have fun at the race!

Back on topic, I'll keep looking for Vegas monnorail pics.

 

[cloudboy]

Out of curiosity, does anyone know the costs of running the current system? I just wonder if somewhere down the road (rail?) the decision will be made to discontinue the monorail, considering it's costs and inefficiency.

Hard think to quantify. Monorail does have some inherent efficiencies - it uses electric traction (more efficient), it requires fewer operators (you don't need as many drivers), it has fewer starts and stops, adn goes in a much straighter line. But monorails are held to much higher safety regulations than busses are, so there is a cost to that. And the cost of electricity and fuel depends upon the price of fues as well as what kind of fuel they are using to generate power. There's also the maintenance and equipment costs to consider. Monorails last much longer than busses, so you are looking at more than one bus per monorail vehicle. Still, the Disney monorails were custom designed by Disney themselves, so they may not be anywhere near as cheap to maintain as would a normal monorail vehicle.

 

[MickeyMan101]

just a thouoght...

SO knowing disney and they usually set aside money for FUTURE projects... I can bet they have some sort of account that is set up for extending the monorail system(sometime hiphilly) and they can probably tap into and take money out if they need some on other rides that are happening (ie. EE). So what disney would do every month or other month would put SMALL amounts of money in that account(like my dad does for me, wow i just shot myself in the foot there) But that's just a thought on what they COULD be doing. REmber people DIsney is smarter than we think, and they think about the future a lot just like walt did...

MickeyMan101

Walt Disney-"One Man's Dream is another Man's Adventure!!!!"

 

[wdwishes2005]

CSI :sohappy:

I wanna see Gil Grissom in WDW...every problem would be solved..lolol = )

It's a bug's life would get VERY interesting.....

 

[no2apprentice]

REmber people DIsney is smarter than we think

One would like to think so, but need I mention SGE? One of the most advanced animatronics put in the middle of one of the weakest storylines.

But back to monorails. One of the problems with Disney using a special account for such things as a monorail expansion, is that Disney does not operate their finances that way. It's my understanding from information provided by others (anyone correct me if I get this wrong) is that transportation budget is funded by the revenue that resorts generate, not the parks. That is why (among other reasons) that the monorail resorts cost more than AKL or WL.

Based on this information (if it's correct), I always get a little apprehensive when people talk about extending the monorail to AKL. AKL would have to raise their rates to cover the expense of their new transportation. As a guest am I willing to pay, say $50 more a night (if not more), just to ride the monorail from AKL to the TTC? No, I'm not, not when a bus can get me there faster with no transfers.

I guess it's always possible for Disney to use profits from all the parks for a special account for something like an expansion. It's their money, they can do whatever they want (as long as it's legal). But then the justification would be that it would increase attendence to the parks. I strongly believe that better attractions would do that more than a monorail expansion.