Transportation Systems Engineering

System Engineering: Decision Making in Systems Engineering and Management

Gregory S. Parnell, Ph.D., Editor
Patrick J. Driscoll, Ph.D., Editor
Dale L. Henderson, Ph.D., Design Editor
2011

"In fact, one of the most significant failings of the current U.S. transportation system is that the automobile was never thought of as being part of a system until recently. It was developed and introduced during a period that saw the automobile as a standalone technology largely replacing the horse and carriage. So long as it outperformed the previous equine technology, it was considered a success. This success is not nearly so apparent if the automobile is examined from a systems thinking perspective. In that guise, it has managed to fail miserably across a host of dimensions. Many of these can be observed in any major US city today: oversized cars and trucks negotiating tight roads and streets, bridges and tunnels incapable of handling daily traffic density, insufficient parking, poor air quality induced in areas where regional air circulation geography restricts free flow of wind, a distribution of the working population to suburban locations necessitating automobile transportation, and so on. Had the automobile been developed as a multilateral system interconnected with urban (and rural) transportation networks and environmental systems, U.S. cities would be in a much different situation than they find themselves in today.

What is important here is not that the automobile could have been developed differently, but that in choosing to design, develop and deploy the automobile as a stand alone technology, a host of complementary transportation solutions to replace the horse and buggy were not considered.

Envisioning Solar Skyways in Silicon Valley

At the request of the City of San José's Department of Transportation, the General Transportation Fund, Rodzmas, INIST, Spartan Superway, Southern Illinois University, and Swenson Solar have collaborated to present a vision for Solar Skyways in Silicon Valley.

We envision an unobtrusive guideway above the streets with small podcars for you and your family, friends, or colleagues. We offer to liberate the landscape at street level for people, pets, flowers, and sidewalk cafes.

Riding high above the streets!

With many stations, small and large, we can get you there quickly, right where you want to go.

Station at the Shark Tank

Authorized riders will be able to take a podcar right to their office or high rise apartment building. With offline stations, folks en route to other destinations will go right past the building without stopping.

Station on the upper deck of a Landmaker highrise

Where freeways have cut through neighborhoods, separating former neighbors, podcars can restore connectivity without the expense of high overpasses.

Getting around town at night, riding under the freeway

This map shows how the podcar network navigates the streets to quickly get you to your destination.

Navigating the maze so you can slip under the freeway

Though it's not the first choice, where at-grade barriers are too daunting, it is after all possible to build the guideway over freeways.

Going higher and higher to cross over the freeway

Automated cars invading our cities, creating even more congestion, noise, and danger at every turn? Or a smart city restored for people -- the technology for our transportation system to rise above the streets is now at hand -- and the choice is ours again.

Our formal presentations to the City of San José Department of Transportation can be seen here:

• General Transportation Fund
• Spartan Superway
• Southern Illinois University 
  

 Stay tuned for more!