billso.com

I followed a link on BoingBoing to this Times of India article: Delhi is getting a 45-kilometer monorail system.

The technology panel will announce their selection for Honolulu’s proposed fixed guideway mass transit system tomorrow, according to this article in the Honolulu Advertiser. The five panel members are evaluating four technologies, including:

1. trains (steel wheel on steel rail)
2. buses (rubber tire on concrete)
3. monorail
4. magnetic levitation

The decision will also be announced on the Honolulu High Capacity Transit Corridor’s web site. The video simulation of the proposed Aloha Tower station is pretty good. Most of the site’s content is trapped in PDF files, however.

As I posted on 6 February 2008, I support the bus option. This option could create a two-lane elevated road that can also be used by emergency vehicles. The buses for this system might also be deployed on surface roads as demand warrants. The other three technologies are less flexible and more expensive. City councilmembers Donovan Dela Cruz and Ann Kobayashi appeared on the byline for this article in the Honolulu Star-Builletin on 26 August 2007. The article includes a picture of one bus model. Below is a promotional video for the Eindhoven bus system.