Frequently Asked Questions About Autoway

Is 500 mpg a realistic number for fuel efficiency?
Some people questioned this number of 500 mpg as unrealistic and incredible. We put up a technically reasonable estimate of the fuel efficiency. We did not expect the reaction of "too good to be true." From a marketing point of view, it may be better to give a lower but more "credible" number. After some thoughts, we decided to stay with the technically correct number. After all, if people do their own calculations, they will arrive at similar numbers.
First, Autoway uses electricity as the power source. How to convert to the equivalent miles per gallon (mpg) in terms of gasoline will change the number significantly. We use 1 gallon = 11.75 kwh. This takes into account the generating and distribution efficiency of electricity as well as the distribution efficiency of gasoline. Some people use direct energy comparison, and that will give an equivalent mpg about 3 times higher. Others use the prices of electricity and gasoline, and that will yield a much higher number at present.
The small vehicle has a small front surface area (0.85 m wide by 1.4 m high by 2.0 m long), less than half that of a typical car. The vehicle weighs about 300 kg. Taking a Cd value of 0.2 and a rolling resistance of 2/1000, one will get about 200 mpg for a single vehicle at the speed of 62.5 mph ( 100 km/hr).
When the vehicles form a train, the air resistance will be much lower. In my calculation of 8 vehicles in a train, the air resistance is assumed to be 2/3 for the front and rear vehicles and 1/10 for the intermediate vehicles. This will make the average fuel efficiency above 800 mpg. If the train is well streamlined, the number will be 1000 to 1700 mpg based on high-speed train data or fluid mechanics. After playing with different variations, we believe 500 mpg is a reasonable number.
Reality check. Freight railway in US and Canada can get about 400 mile-net ton per gallon (converted from diesel to gas) on average today. On comparison, Autoway has a much lower number of 50-100 mile-net ton per gallon. One Siemens study of Combino light rail gives about 300 mpg per passenger, or about 500 mpg if fully loaded. Therefore, the 500 mpg, although much higher than the 25-50 mpg of cars, is a reasonably achievable number for Autoway.

Is two year a realistic timeline for autoway development?
Technically, it is doable to have autoway pilot-implemented on the street in two years. This is different from starting an automobile factory from scratch. It is more like building a personal computer from available components. Of course, the political and business issues are more difficult to predict.

How about snow and icy weather conditions?
Unlike highway and railway, autoway is designed in such a way that it will not collect snow on most of its surface. An automatic vehicle is used to remove snow and ice easily and cost-effectively on the very small surface area. Snow and icy weather conditions will not disrupt the operation of autoway.

How about land use?
Autoway is typically built as an overhead construction. It has minimum impacts on existing structures due to its small space requirements. Normally it can be built above the median and sidewalks of existing roads and streets. Autoway can also be built on the ground or underground.

Such overhead construction can be ugly as crossing bridges on the street?
No. The difference is the small footprint (about 3 feet) and open-frame structure of autoway. This allows some beautiful urban structures for autoway, to the imagination of architects. Besides, autoway provides a natural structural support for utility wires and this is an opportunity to optimize and hide the wires. Here is a model for the overhead autoway track.

How does autoway change highway safety?
Highway safety is an important issue. Every year tens of thousands of people get killed and millions injured in highway accidents. The major cause is human errors: inattention, anger, fatigue, drunk drivers, unskilled drivers.
Autoway is a very safe transportation system. By reducing traffic congestions, autoway reduces the road rage and possibilities of traffic accidents on the highway. By providing a safe alternative, it reduces problematic drivers on the highway. If you decide to have a good time drinking beer and wine, take autoway.

How does autoway improve air travel efficiency?
The most time consuming part of air travel is get to the airport. Due to possible traffic congestion on the highway, you have to leave earlier. You need time to find a parking space, take time to go from the parking lot to the terminal, and take time to check in your luggage. Autoway will reliably take you to the terminal at a high speed a few minutes ahead of the boarding time. Autoway can take your luggage to the airline before you go to the airport. At arrival, you do not need to wait for your luggage. Autoway will automatically take your luggage to your hotel.

Is autoway a public transit system like subway?
First, autoway is a personal transportation system. This is fundamentally different from the mass transit system of subway. Second, autoway can be public or private. The most likely situation is like the roadway. As a result, most of autoway are public-owned but there are private autoway, for example, inside a company campus and a private property. Most of the vehicles are private, but some are public vehicles for tourists and infrequent users.

How about the cost of autoway?
The cost of autoway includes the physical structure, the control system, and related infrastructure for power, control and communication. The construction cost of autoway is estimated to be about 5% of corresponding subway. The construction cost of autoway is comparable to that of highway but can be significantly lower in difficult conditions like mountain areas and river areas. The cost for acquisition of right-of-way is negligible for autoway in comparison with subway and highway.

What are the differences from previous PRT like the Morgantown PRT?
Except for the basic principles of PRT, Autoway is quite different from previous PRT in design. First, the Autoway vehicles are for one adult or one adult plus two preschool children. Second, the concept of stations and control is totally different from traditional guideway systems. A station in Autoway is just a place for service notification. The Morgantown PRT is just an automated bus system. It has a large building for a station, just like subway station. You need to know which direction to go to choose the right platform. In Autoway, you just get into your vehicle and input the destination, like pushing the floor number in an elevator. The system will figure out how to take you to your destination. The revolutionary departure from traditional guideway systems in control makes Autoway cost-effective. Third, above all, previous PRT systems are public transit, but Autoway is designed as a network complementary to the road network. There are private and public vehicles on Autoway. Most of the vehicles will be privately owned in the future when Autoway is developed into a nationwide network.

How emergencies are handled on Autoway?
Autoway vehicles are very reliable. Mechanical breakdowns are very rare since it does not have an engine, and electric problems will be detected beforehand. In an unlikely case of breakdown, it will be pulled by another vehicle. This can be automatically performed by the system. In many cases, the passenger will not even notice a problem. The condition of all systems, including the collision avoidance system, will be checked every time a vehicle is in service. In the case the collision avoidance system fails, the central control system is immediately informed, and the situation is addressed to avoid collision, for example, by slowing the affected vehicle down. The system is designed in such a way that one or two component failures will not lead to a crash. In case of a crash, for example, from a falling tree, the incident will be immediately known to the central control system, and a rescue team will be sent out to the accident site. The team is equipped with a ladder, or special equipment to handle the situation.

Is the vehicle wheelchair accessible?
Yes, the vehicle can be made wheelchair accessible. This will be developed at a later stage. Since autoway is a personal transportation system, special accomodations can be provided on a case by case basis. A blind person can have a special vehicle, a deaf person can have a special vehicle, and a lame person can have a special vehicle. Autoway is people-oriented. When you ask for service at a station, it knows your requirements on an individual basis. This is different from mass transit. This is also cost-effective. When Raytheon developed its PRT for Chicago, they are asked to make every vehicle wheelchair accessible, which is cost-prohibitive and unnecessary.

How does Autoway meet the ADA requirements?
Autoway is a new personal transportation mode, not quite fitting into existing transportation modes. From my understanding, ADA does not specify reqirements for personal transportation modes like automobile, motorcycle, and bicycle. Autoway is designed for one adult passenger only. Since accessibility has been considered from the start, Autoway provides much better accessibility than automobile, motorcycle and bicycle.

Thanks to suggestion by Sergey Prokhorenko, we can make a more systematic evaluation of the accessibility of Autoway following examples of mass transit. The accessibility of an ordinary vehicle is shown in the figure. For the remaining cases, special modifications will be made on a case by case basis. For wheel chair access, the original chair in the vehicle will be removed and replaced with a lift mechanism. Once the door is opened by the remote signal, the lift mechanism extends out from the side of the vehicle. The wheelchair will move parallel to the vehicle facing forward, on to the lift mechanism. Then the lift mechanism retracts into the vehicle. The vehicle width is choosen just enough to place a wheelchair. At the destination, the lift mechanism is extended sideway for the wheelchair to move away from the vehicle. The remaining special cases can be solved by voice recognition and sound activation.

How do you compare Autoway with the futurist's cars in Steven Spielberg's Minority Report?
The movie Minority Report has some artistic renderings about future transportation. Autoway is a practical transportation invention. The vehicles on Autoway can move horizontally as well as vertically. The vertical movement is accomplished with a vehicle carrier.
One noticeable difference is that Maglev is used in the movie but not used on Autoway. A common misconception about Maglev is energy efficiency as it does not have contact with the track and it eliminates the surface resistance. In fact, the major resistance at the high speed is the resistance from air. Maglev makes little difference in energy efficiency. The real advantage of Maglev over conventional rail is the lower maintenance cost and lower noise level. Autoway solves the problem of conventional rail by separating the guiding and driving functions. Therefore, we achieve a lower maintenance cost and a lower noise level in a different way without the costly guideway structure of Maglev.
Maglev may find its applications at high speed transportation in a vacuum tube (no air resistance).

What are the future work for Autoway?
The concept of Autoway is just the first step. It will take the efforts of many people to bring it into a transportation network. On the engineering side, there will be continuous improvements. Think about the car, although the basic principles have been the same for about 100 years, we still see many new things today. Autoway will become a big transportation industry just like automobile industry and air transportation industry.
Autoway solves the traffic problems of congestion, air pollution, energy shortage and traffic accidents. We can do more with Autoway. How do we integrate Autoway into the economic, cultural, and social fabric of a city? How do we build or transform a city into a better community? People-friendly and environment-friendly.
We have some initial thoughts. The new urban district can have a population density of 10,000 people per square kilometer or 26,000 per square mile. This is slightly above the population density of New York City. This density is 5 to 10 times higher than the suburban population density in the United States. However, we can have a better living and working environments. We can have a green coverage of above 60%. There are many recreational and natural facilities in the community. There are a variety of residential options for people of many income levels and family sizes.
Autoway will be a big field of research and employment. Discussions and inputs from people around the world can make significant differences.

Why not dual mode?
Dual mode means that the vehicle can run both on a guideway and on ordinary highway and streets. A guideway on a congested corridor can potentially relieve the corridor congestion. Essentially dual mode acts like a fast lane or a toll lane. However, there are shortcomings. (1) The dual mode concept does not address the congestion and parking problem in the business district. Its effect on congestion is limited. (2)The vehicle has to meet requirements for both guideway and road travel. It cannot get the 500 mile per gallon fuel efficiency of Autoway. The guideway will also become bigger and more expensive. (3)It is often more convenient and cost-effective to have two separate vehicles rather than one dual mode vehicle. There are dual mode cars, boats, and airplanes, but only for certain small niche markets. Similarly, as an Autoway vehicle will cost less than $2000, a car (you already have one) plus an Autoway vehicle will be more effective than a dual mode vehicle.

The focus of Autoway is commuting and delivery of light freights for e-commerce. Is that too narrow?
This focus is intentional. But autoway will still cover the majority of urban transportations. It is complementary to existing modes of transportation. In fact, during the first 10 years of Autoway deployment, it does not affect car sales, and ridership on public mass transit will go up. Only when a network of Autoway is formed in about 20 years then Autoway will become the dominant mode of urban transportation in both vehicle numbers and miles of travel.

How can Autoway help with emergency evacuation?
Hurricane Katrina and Rita revealed two problems with the transportation system: emergency evacuation and oil dependence. In an emergency evacuation, the highway is prone to congestion. In contrast, Autoway is a coordinated transportation system and it will not have the problem of congestion. As a matter of fact, the capacity will be much higher since people are going in the same direction. One lane of Autoway can transfer 20000 to 30000 people per hour. Autoway can be easily changed to one-way traffic to double the capacity. In an emergency, the oil supply is also prone to disruption. Autoway does not have this problem. Of course, in the long run, Autoway will end the oil dependence.

An example for Autoway application in Northern Virginia
A 30-mile Autoway (solid circle) will provide an immediate congestion relief on Interstate 66 and a fast connection to Metro subway system. In the next phase, the Autoway can be further extended (yellow circle and solid line only) to meet the increasing demands in Northern Virginia.

Updated: February 7, 2008