Why you will never see a People Mover at the DLR to move folks to parking structures - $5 Billion

Darkbeer1

Darkbeer1

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
LAX, which gets crazy money in the airline fees and the passenger ticket fees, just got the green line to build one.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...ple-mover-contract-approved?int=undefined-rec

>>
A 30-year, $4.9 billion contract to design, build and operate an automated people mover at Los Angeles International Airport has been approved by the City Council.

The contract voted on Wednesday goes to a consortium called LAX Integrated Express Solutions, known as LINXS.

The elevated 2¼-mile system will have driverless electric trains that carry airline passengers between terminals, a transportation center and the Metro light-rail system, reducing the number of vehicles that use the airport's central loop roads.

It is expected to be operational in 2023 and have a capacity of 10,000 people per hour.

Bombardier Transportation will provide the operating system, including all vehicles.<<

And more detail here....

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-lax-people-mover-20180411-story.html

So it is clear that the combination of cost, plus the fact that Disney would need capacity of at least double that during a peak hour, would not allow the project to be approved. Yes, capacity could be fixed with three systems going to three parking structures, but now we are close to $15 Billion for the fleet.

Yes, I look forward to riding it at LAX, but know it will never be built in my back yard (aka Anaheim).
 
Phroobar

Phroobar

Well-Known Member
Why does it have to be a super cool train/monorail? What's wrong with the abandoned one's design in Tomorrowland? That surely can't cost that much to build.
 
TROR

TROR

Well-Known Member
Rich T said:
You're kidding, right? :D And we do NOT want DL's breaks-down-every-hour People mover system servicing LAX. It would be a nightmare of stranded, angry travelers.
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Isn't the point of the People Mover that it can't break down? Each wheel propels the cars forward, so even if one motor fails, the other ones will keep it going.
 
Phroobar

Phroobar

Well-Known Member
Rich T said:
You're kidding, right? :D And we do NOT want DL's breaks-down-every-hour People mover system servicing LAX. It would be a nightmare of stranded, angry travelers.
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I'm talking about connecting the Disneyland parking structures with it. Not an airport.
 
Practical Pig

Practical Pig

Well-Known Member
The LAX system will be elevated and 2-1/4 miles long, two factors that I'm sure heavily factor into that 5 billion price tag. I don't think we'll ever see Disney cough up whatever the no-doubt steep costs would be, but I very much doubt it would cost them that much to accomplish it.
 
Darkbeer1

Darkbeer1

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
The current need to move people in a peak hour (Trams, buses and walking) is over 18,000 people per hour. This is before Galaxy Edge and DCA expansion. And since it would have to go over city streets and be ADA friendly, you are looking at a LAX style system.
 
Practical Pig

Practical Pig

Well-Known Member
Darkbeer1 said:
The current need to move people in a peak hour (Trams, buses and walking) is over 18,000 people per hour. This is before Galaxy Edge and DCA expansion. And since it would have to go over city streets and be ADA friendly, you are looking at a LAX style system.
Click to expand...

For a considerably shorter distance. But with your background, you are not someone I would try to counter on a subject like this. Carry on. :)
 
Rich T

Rich T

Well-Known Member
Phrubruh said:
How often did the original People Mover break down? Does the MK version break down a lot?
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The DL People Mover broke down constantly-- Not a lot per day, but guests stranded on PM was a very common sight, and past CMs have described it being a long, tedious process to evacuate and reset. Think about all those exposed rotating tires on the outdoor sections. If one stopped working, it could bring the whole system to a screeching halt.
 
truecoat

truecoat

Well-Known Member
It'll take time to finish (about a disney project and a half) but it will make LAX much better. Being able to hop on one train to get to a rental car facility will be a great option for us out of town travelers.
 
FerretAfros

FerretAfros

Well-Known Member
As your friendly local transit-industry engineer, I must remind everybody that it's well and good that the LAX system will cost around $5billion, but that doesn't mean a Disney system would approach that price tag. A few things to consider:
  • Length: The LAX system claims to be 2.25mi, but appears to be double track for its entire length (outbound and inbound), so it's really 4.5mi. DL's current tram route is less than 0.7mi in each direction, less than 1/3 the distance at LAX. The LAX system will have 6 stations, while DL's would only need 2.
  • Scale: The LAX system is being built to operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days per year, ad infinitum, carrying loads of travelers and their luggage. It will be the gateway to a major world city, and will surely be accordingly grand, with massive stations and iconic architecture. Disney's system would realistically operate for 16 hours a day (more or less) with planned closures and downtime allowed for maintenance, carrying people, strollers, and wheelchairs. It will need to be welcoming, but Disney's previous transit projects from around the world indicate they're perfectly happy with charming decorations applied on the surface of relatively utilitarian architecture. It's an entirely different scale of system, for everything from vehicle size, to structural capacity, to power supply.
  • Public Project: The LAX system is a large-scale public project that requires the coordination of countless agencies who all want a piece of the pie. The price tag surely includes things like roadway improvements and utility relocations that will help the surrounding area, but aren't truly necessary for the system itself. Having worked on similar projects, it's amazing how things like this bring people out of the woodwork to advocate for unrelated work. Disney's hypothetical system would still need to find a way to cross the public right-of-way, but would be driven by a private company and would deal with far fewer agencies, all of whom have existing relationships with Disney.
  • Property: One of the major costs of any dedicated alignment system is right-of-way acquisition; in some cases it can be more than 50% of the cost and/or drive other design decisions in order to avoid impacting certain parcels. Disney owns the overwhelming majority of the land that they would use (again, they would need to cross one road at a single location) so this is a non-factor
  • Construction: Going along with property ownership, the LAX project will need to be constructed in such a way that minimizes the impacts on the surrounding properties and transportation network. Things will need to be phased, shifted back and forth, and worked around in order to keep the area operational. Disney's system has far fewer facilities along the way that would be impacted, making the construction process significantly easier
  • Operations: The $4.9B contract includes operations and maintenance costs for 30 years. Sure, Disney would need to operate and maintain their system as well, but the price tag in the headline is more than just start-up costs
Yes, transit projects are expensive. Yes, WDI's project costs are laughably out of line for the products they deliver. But there's no reason to think that an automated shuttle between a theme park and its parking lot would need to approach the cost of a massive transit project at one of the world's busiest airports
Darkbeer1 said:
The current need to move people in a peak hour (Trams, buses and walking) is over 18,000 people per hour. This is before Galaxy Edge and DCA expansion. And since it would have to go over city streets and be ADA friendly, you are looking at a LAX style system.
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I've mentioned this before, but 18,000 passengers per hour is ludicrous for any system that's not heavy rail with level boarding (like an urban subway). A 600'-long subway train can hold around 1,000 passengers, which would require trains spaced about 3 minutes apart. Even that would be nearly impossible with Disney's configuration, running as a 2-stop shuttle, rather than picking up and dropping off passengers at multiple points along the way; it would simply take too long to board the vehicles (not to mention the long walk to the far end of the train) to make it a worthwhile system

Again, I find this number to be highly questionable. I'd like to see how Disney proposes to move that many pedestrians to their parking areas, and then release the corresponding number of vehicles into the road network. Assuming 3 passengers per vehicle, that's the equivalent of 3 fully-loaded freeway lanes moving non-stop. It just doesn't make any sense within the realities of the site
 
Model3 McQueen

Model3 McQueen

Well-Known Member
In the Parks
No
Is the one in LAX going to be similar to the one at WDW?

Also, wasn't the monorail originally put in DL as a showcase for future transit?
 
Rich T

Rich T

Well-Known Member
Here's the one they built at SFO. All automated. Fun to ride.
peoplemoversfo.jpg
 

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